2 Inside the Cattle

Heart is another existence

Whether you have it, or not

Those who grow accustomed

Find a way to its delicacy

Another victim. Mother drags a fresh corpse from her car. She doesn't use her usual working coat. Every sane person will notice if she comes to work with her reddish coat. However, as an insane person, there are dozens of fake white coats in her closet. She uses those coats for seducing, and using it in her chamber.

I make my way bypassing her victim. I saw the trail of blood from the car to the front door. Of course, she drags the corpse without even caring about the blood. A sharp knife is still in his eye. This appalling trail left me sighed. No one will clean this except me. Sometimes, I do wonder, why is this horrible sight become so usual to me? However, I've got the answer through habit. A corpse, rotten or fresh with blood everywhere around is an ordinary sight. I'm just used to it.

Mother will bring a corpse every three months, but I noticed that her habit becomes more frequent than before. Her victims are either dead by strangulation, knife in the eye, or she just simply brings her victim alive. I will see their death with my own eyes. A painful show, if I can say.

There are old geezers, businessmen, part-timers, a college freshman, or a mere thug from the street. Although her trick is obvious and messy, she does have keen eyes for picking her victim. She knows the locations to go unnoticed by the crowds. Her hobby leaves me devastated at the first time. I cried, puked and begged her to not doing this kind of thing. But, my pleas worth nothing to her, she is stubborn with her hobby. Not that I stop my plea or accepting it. I grew tired of it. I found myself powerless, always.

I take the brush hanging on the wall. By using the water hose in the garden, I wash the blood off the stone. I use a brush on the stone footpath. I have to make sure the next guest won't notice any reddish spot. Not on the stone footpath and the white tiles. It scares me every time I imagine someone will notice it.

Wiping blood is not hard. It is my monthly activity after all. The difficult one is wiping my memory. I get fucking tired with all of these… sceneries. Every month, a new death comes with the face of mother get blank. Sick, I know. A beautiful woman at her prime age (she is married at 19 and still continues to finish her school) got all crazy. However, she is an excellent parent if she is not in her period. I mean, her insane period, not the other one.

"Andra, come and eat!" her voice echoed in the house. She just called me for dinner. Sigh, I hope that corpse is not our guest at the dining table. I can't eat with a disgusting smell playing with my nose. I finish my job and come inside my house.

My house is quite big. Mother said, the evil; disgusting jerk (or dad) bought this house when they got married. Bright white and gold colors decorate the inside, it gives a sparkly feeling in it. The Victorian ornament is also a niche pick. The marble staircase with beautifully designed handrail to the upper floor is my favorite. Two golden chandeliers are hanging in our living room and dining room, sparkling, elegant, and calming.

The living room is where I usually clean all the mess. Mother would kill the victim inside the living room. I often forced to watch the act, like a thriller movie in real life. The white cushions will be really hard to clean. So, mother will call me if she planned to bring someone alive in the house. I will then cover the cushion with plastic wrap to avoid that pesky blood in my carpet.

Many guests, from fine young man to a smelly old grandpa, had visited our dining table. They're all dead, though. We haven't had any real visitor for a while. Mother would put the corpse in the chair, where dad usually sat before. She said it is a reminder that dad is just useless dead meat, nothing more.

She bought us a big freezer and put all of the regular meats in there. Then, stores all the human remains in freezing room near the kitchen, or what I call as her chamber. She chop-chop-chop them and stores it there. Imagine the unpleasant smell in our kitchen. It annihilates any fragrances that I used to hide it.

The dining table had been polished, credit to me. It was dirty with dried blood and human fleshes everywhere. A month ago, mother had a wild sex with a corpse of newly wed-newly dead man on the dining table. It was awful, because I was forced to see everything.

I sit in my usual chair, facing my sister. Yeah, I have a sister. "Have you done your homework, Alska?"

"Done!" she cheerfully answers mother's question. "It is easy! Big Andra helped me!" she stares at me with her big blue eyes, just like mother's eye, but much more pure than hers. I've always been a fan of my little sister's eyes. It is glittering. Every time you see it, you will find clear, starry eyes, like a maiden watching a star fall. As far as I know, no one can resist her stare. Well, including me.

Mother's fake smile instantly vanished as she glares at me with sharp light in her eyes. Her glare will tear my strength to the bottom. It pressed my intestine and makes me want to puke badly.

I immediately shake my head, confirming my innocence. Her stern face loosens, and she smiles. She does that every time I did something wrong. Like, trying to teach my sister about moral? She will butcher me if she find out about it. Only her and her teaching method could pass through my sister's brain.

She is in charge of today dinner. I look at our dinner, three medium-rare steaks she bought on her way back home. She doesn't have time to cook a real meal. Today is her special routine of the month. If she cooked a heavy meal, she wouldn't be satisfied in her chamber. We eat like there is nothing wrong here. Beside her as the wrong thing, her freshly murdered corpse is still lying behind my chair. I don't get freaked out. It just destroys my appetite.

Alska is different. She doesn't mind a dead body behind her chair. She eats the steak without any trouble. She snatches my steak, knowing that I wouldn't eat it.

"Andra, why didn't you eat your food?" mother ask. I shake my head.

"I think you know the reason, mother," I point the dead body behind me, pointing the smell, the ugly sight, and the fact that I eat like no normal human.

"You should be ashamed. Look at your little sister, she eat normally," mother eats her food slowly, "You should get used, it is part of your training."

I keep my mouth shut. It is pointless to argue with crazy people. The only thing that I will get for arguing with her is a punch or a slap with her pointy-heels. I start eating my steak, trying as hard as I can to swallow it. Every bite that comes to my mouth, I keep imagining that corpse as my food. Not just a beefsteak. Each time the vision of human flesh comes to my mind, I gag myself.

She finished early. She doesn't even eat the half of her steak. Alska and I watch her strange behavior after she put her knife. She throws her coat to my face, leaving her with nothing but her skin. She moves around, naked. Without shame, she drags the corpse to the chamber near the kitchen. Faint odor numbed my nose for a mere second. The dark chamber has a choking aura. She disappears with her 'toy' and closes the chamber door.

I begin imagining the scary shit my mother will do with a corpse. Laugh, cry, a high-pitched scream has been heard from inside the chamber. Those voices are my mother's. I slowly put down all the plates in the dishwasher, while trying to ignore those weird voices she made. That scream is so agonizing, but I don't think she's harmed in there.

I ask Alska to go to her room and sleep. Mother stops crying after a while. I look at the chamber door, holding a big sigh and turn away. My leg feels heavy, the smell of dead meat makes me dizzy, but I managed to climb the stairs to my room.

Nothing fancy in my room, simple and tidy. I have a small-sized bed, a study desk, few dolls, and knick-knacks. I bought all of those online. Actually, I purchased any needs online (except groceries, obviously). As if, mother would let me have a sweet shopping paradise with a credit card and fancy phone in my hand like those Cher & Dionne in my school. I have few posters from the magazine too. Yeah, that's all.

I jump to the bed. I need to go to school tomorrow. And the only memory tonight is a dead human with eye pierced by a knife. I will surely have a beautiful, comfortable dream. I take the sleeping pills in the drawer, use one tablet and close my eyes. This medication helps my sleep. Every time mother brought a corpse, I use one at night. At least I can sleep well.

Peace. The only thing that I need and I get it in my sleep. Only if the world doesn't need to be so unfair to me, I would like to have a normal life with salt and sugar, not only salt. That's my only pray. I close my eyes, hoping the days will roll around fast, and I can see the end.