There is a woman that lives in my building, I believe on the floor below mine, that has the nastiest hacking cough I've ever heard. She started her hacking cough earlier this year. I'm not really sure when, but it became noticeable as soon as it was warm enough to open up our windows (we don't have central AC). The prompt, if you choose to accept it, would be to tell a story about his woman and her hacking cough. Does she have really bad emphysema? Is she some sort of alien/mutant/multidimensional horror from beyond all time and space that can't breathe the Earth's atmosphere properly? You decide in 500-1000 words.
Alright I accept the challenger. This is my first time doing this sort of thing- so bear with me.
I awoke to the sound of the garbage men swearing. They'd been called in to remove the bloated corpse of a groundhog that had swollen in the sun since the last pickup. I'd noticed it walking home from work in the crepuscular dawn, I work nights, and sleep days. On first glance I just thought someone had missed the dumpster, but as the week went by I gradually built up the courage to check it out.
Barely awake and greasy from a long night in front of the fryers, I crept to the window.Outside in the parking lot a green suited figure, presumably a waste management technician, sauntered up to the dead groundhog and looked at it, like he was sizing up a hurdle. He flicked away his cigarette and stepped back four or so yards. Through dirty windows I could not discern his designs on the expired woodchuck.
A cough sounded from bellow me. Not a dry, church cough, but a full throated lung-butter-conjuring hack. Room 204, that damn hag.
Quick were his legs, and then he leapt. Fuck. Out came a gout of maggots as his boots crunched the softbag of dead animal. A voice from the truck a called out.
But beneath me,
another cough, a slow dryheave punctuated with a clap. And maybe meowing?
I turned away from the window, not wanting to see how the sanitation engineer extricated himself from the puddle of mangey fur, clotted blood, and weekold intestine. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. Good afternoon. I went about my business and eventually headed off to work, the goddamn garbage men had left the woodchuck to back on the asphalt. Assholes. I was on grill that night, and after seeing the recreation of Mr. Rubbish, all those quarter pound patties looked awfully similar to beefed woodchuck. I worked straight through my break and skipped my employee meal. Hungry, tired, sick to the stomach- I walked home.
That morning it rained, 'thank god,' I had thought, 'wash this dirty place.' Before bed I heard a scuffling in the parking lot, probably just some dog after the kibbles and bits of groundhog.7 O'clock found me awakened by a series of phlegmy staccato notes emanating from the lady downstairs' coalshute-throat. Thank god, I needed to get to work. The glare from the fading sun shown on the parking lot, clean finally.
Work wasn't so bad, I even felt good enough to get a double burger. As I passed 204 I paused outside the door but could only hear the gentle buzz of a TV tuned to static.Up to bed.
During the day/my night, someone had put posters all over the apartment for a: LOST CAT: orange tabby - responds to names Boog, Boog-boog and Bogey. It was the summer, animals hate being inside as much as I hate going to fucking work.
I walked down to the second floor, maybe the old lady had picked up the cat thinking it was hers? The door ajar. I pushed it open further with a foot. I glimpsed stacks of soggy cardboard and whole bags of dogfood, before a goddamn roach the size of a small child ran over my foot. I took a step inside- more shit! There were dark things kept inside over turned orange crates with screens and a pile of green baby booties lay in a puddle of gravy. In the corner the TV glowed blue.
Then two things happened. My back became cool and wet as a bronchial hawk thundered behind me. My hand reached for the wet spot on my back, it had felt like someone tossed Chef Boyardee on my shirt. I grabbed it off my back and turned to address my assailant.
Another elephentine whoop, like liver shot out of a cannon- Instinctively I closed my eyes. When I opened them the crone stood before me, her hands cupped in front of her holding what appeared to be red casserole. Her sunken eyes bored holes into the front of my shirt, her mouth slack and jaundiced. Suddenly I became aware that i had grabbed something off my back. I slowly opened my hand to reveal a greyish, deflated meatball- with a string. Red string. The crone smiled, sharp teeth and black gums. I looked into her hands, the casserole swam and bubbled. A worm slithered to the surface and crawled over her hands to fall with a plop on the floor. My strength gave way and I collapsed in the hall.
When I awoke I was in my apartment, the leather couch stuck to me like a wet sock. I've since quit McDonald's and now use the fire escape to reach the parking lot.
(I'm not sure if it is even long enough)
