Fire Down Below

by Debra Anastasia

  “Hey, Dove.” Johnson smiled, and Dove died.

  Nibble his noble nose.

  “Hey, Johnson.” Dove was thrilled she said the words in her normal tone of voice. But she had a nagging feeling she was forgetting something. She looked down and reassured herself that she was indeed wearing pants. She did her best to shrug her shoulders and be sexy.

  Johnson watched her, perplexed and then intense. He slowly brought his hand close to her face.

  He’s going to touch me. I’m going to gnaw off his hand and keep it in my pussy.

  She smiled again, and despite the Spongebob music, she could hear her own heartbeat.

  Johnson moved so quickly she had no time to react. He slapped her dead center on her forehead.

  Hard.

  “Sweet Jesus!” Dove’s butt reeled from the force of the surprise blow. The little switch on the control panel was no match and broke clean off. The carousel was now on an endless, infinite cycle of rotation.

  Johnson held up his hand to reveal the bloody remnants of a mosquito. “He was going to take a bite out of your head!”

  Dove rubbed her skin and closed one eye.

  God, my butt hurts. What the hell happened to my ass? Oh well.

  Johnson was there, in the flesh. Dove tried to act a little cooler. He looked over her shoulder, and Dove wondered if there was a hotter, sexier, sweeter girl in the distance.

  “Those kids aren’t looking so great.” Johnson knitted his luxurious eyebrows together.

  Dove didn’t turn around. His green eyes were finally having sex with her brown ones. Their pupils were lined up.

  “Those kids are monsters.” Dove licked her lips and then bit her bottom lip. That had to be awesome.

  Wait, that comment made me sound like a Disney villain.

  “I mean they’re monstrously cute,” Dove amended.

  Johnson stopped having eye sex with her and twirled her around to face the carousel.

  All of the kids were crying. Most were green.

  She whirled back to the control panel and screamed, “Holy Jesus, they’re all going to die!”

  Dove began to hyperventilate as she scrambled around and found the broken switch. When she jammed the metal back in the hole, she got lightly electrocuted. Her throat made a sound like a mating moose she wasn’t even sure was possible to be emitted by a human.

  Dove pulled her hand back when the surge stopped. Johnson was watching her in disbelief, but she couldn’t just stand by as the kids died of dizziness—she had to do something. She took a running jump at the spinning ride.

  She bounced painfully off one of the poles and landed hard on her ass on the asphalt.

  Ouch!

  The panic hit her hard. The parents were clamoring and crawling over the protective fence. Dove stood up again and took another running start. This time she made it onto the circular platform.

  What the hell she was going to do now she didn’t know.

  Maybe throw them off the ride, really hard, so they land on the grass?

  She swung to the nearest boy. She assessed him while he cried at her. The kid had a really fat ass, and she wasn’t entirely sure she could fling him far enough.

  No matter how chunky, I have to try.

  She went to unclasp his belt. The woozies were hitting her hard.

  Damn.

  The boy had more sense than she did. He didn’t trust her half as far as she thought she could throw him, and he began hitting her. Dove took slugs to the face as she tried to concentrate on the buckle.

  Chunker made a horrible face that reminded Dove so much of Steve coughing up a hairball, but before she could put it all together, the boy hurled chunks of Sal’s hot dogs right at her.

  As soon as the centrifugal force had cleared the mess from her eyes, Dove was ready to hit the kid back. She had readied her bitch slap when all of a sudden the carousel lost its momentum. Spongebob’s theme song dweedled off pathetically.

  Dove dropped her beating hand and glared at Pukey. She could hear the fire trucks in the distance. Her college finally paid off when she recalled a poem by John Donne:

  “And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;

  it tolls for thee.”

  Of course the parents had dialed 911. That made sense. It also, surely, made her fired. Like a horrible game of dominoes, one kid after another followed in Pukey’s pukesteps and puked.

  It was revolting. Parents climbed aboard and cursed Dove up and down as they removed their over-whirled children from the Horses of Hell.

  Dove nodded to each as if they were telling her what a nice day it was outside.

  Please let Johnson have run away. Please tell me he didn’t see this.

  But as the parents rushed from the ride, threatening to sue, the magnificent-looking pharmacist climbed aboard her shame wagon.

  Dove looked at her feet as the fire trucks roared into the parking lot.

  “Are you okay?” He set his expensive shoes in a pile of regurgitated hot dogs as though she needed saving and the vomit didn’t matter.

  Dove could only nod.

  This thing is going to take forever to clean.

  The parents had packed up and driven away with their stirred, not shaken, offspring. The firemen moved slowly, realizing there was no longer any danger.

  “I wonder what made the ride stop.” She talked to his shoes because she could never look at his face again.

  “I turned it off at the fuse box. Sorry I didn’t find it sooner.” Johnson reached out and took her horrible, stupid hand.

  “Wow. I didn’t even think about that. I panicked. I should be kept away from kids—like matches or flame throwers.” Dove hated how her heart wagged its tail at the sight of their hands wrapped around one another.

  “Hey, gorgeous, I thought you were brave. Like, really brave.” His other hand came up to tilt her chin. “Look at me.”

  Dove’s eyes followed her heart’s religion and looked at his face. He was smiling. At her.

  “Not everyone’s great in a tough situation. You got shocked and then jumped on a moving ride. I think that’s commendable.” Johnson kept his eyes on hers but waved a firefighter over. He dropped her hand and asked in his ridiculously loud voice, “Do you think you guys could hose down this ride? The children got sick.”

  Dove’s mouth dropped open.

  That would be awesome.

  The mere thought of the time it would take to clean the hot dog chunks off the horses’ manes made her shiver.

  When the firefighters agreed, Dove actually hopped and clapped. Johnson held his hand out to her and led her from the defiled horses. Together, they watched the carousel get hosed off. By the time they were done, the fire fighters had the ride looking brand-new. It looked marvelous. It was almost romantic to stand next to Johnson and watch her mistakes be washed away.

  Dove thanked the men quietly. They were already telling jokes about her mishap. Her cell phone rang loudly, and she cringed when she saw it was her boss. She nodded and squinted her eyes as he thoroughly fired her, using every curse ever invented.

  She shrugged when she hung up. Johnson rubbed her back and went in for a comforting hug. Dove stopped him with her hand.

  “No, I’m the Vominator here.” She wanted that hug more than a shower, and that was saying something.

  “Hey, pharmacist here. Bodily fluids don’t scare me. Neither do yeast infections or wild hair-remover rashes.” He moved her hand and leaned down to give her a long hug.

  He’s hugging me.

  Me.

  Duke didn’t trust the new tenant in the apartment building. Like, at all. Prick-ston was about as French as Duke’s left fucking nut. He often found himself wandering in front of Preston’s door and glaring at its blatant generic-ness. And it pissed him off. During his glaring sessions, he ran into Shannon plenty of times.

  This was one of those times.

  “Hey, Stalky, how many times did he flush the crapper today?” Duke used his
loudest voice until Shannon started throwing the gravel from the fake hallway plant at him.

  The dusty old plant was her perch—as though she were a fucking vulture stalking a chipmunk that was choking on a piece of gum.

  Shannon was frantic as she retorted, “Shut up! God, you’re such a walking nose hair. Why are you up here? Huh? I don’t think one stalker is allowed to call another stalker a stalker.” Shannon bit one of the fake leaves to try to prove how fierce she was.

  Duke reached under his T-shirt to scratch his chest slowly. He wished he had a set of nut nipples. Nipples made of nuts. He forgot to answer the shrieking little chick while he ruminated on how awesome nut nipples would be.

  Maybe he could get a nipple transplant. He could ask the dorky pharmacist that Dove was so worked up over about it. Duke decided to add “Ball Donator” to his driver’s license. If he was going to dream big, he was going to have to give big. Big balls.

  Shannon was hissing at him. He realized he had slipped his hands down his pants again. He gave his genitals a little smirk. He came when they called him.

  “I don’t know why you’re twisted up over this wacko. I want to throw all his rocks at him.” Duke threw imaginary, huge rocks at Preston’s door.

  Shannon couldn’t take the threat of violence against her new crush and left her hiding spot to jump on Duke’s back. He laughed loudly as she beat him with her little, angry fists. When she bit his neck, he started yelling. Duke flattened himself against Preston’s door and slapped it repeatedly with a flat hand. Shannon bit him harder.

  When Preston opened the door, he was ready for a fight, holding a hefty-looking frying pan over his head. Preston’s eyes were all bugged out, and he was wearing a tank top and what looked like a pair of pantaloons.

  “Hey, Slut Nugget.” Duke wanted to set this faker straight.

  Shannon sighed and went all boneless. She slid off his back and thankfully stopped fucking biting him like a baby vampire.

  “Vat are zue two doing out le here?” Preston didn’t drop his whack-some-poor-bastard-in-the-head-with-a-frying-pan stance.

  Shannon tried to recover. “Why hello, Preston. I love your little French pants. I was stopping Duke here from doing a ring and run.”

  Duke turned and gave her a dirty look. She was small and quick and punched him right in the junk.

  “That’s how we treat ring and runners around here, asshole. Now get downstairs and I won’t call the cops.”

  He couldn’t talk because his nuts were trying to complete the nipple transplant all on their own. Before he could unleash a tirade on her paparazzi techniques, he noticed Shannon had stepped out of Preston’s line of sight to do some elaborate begging with hand gestures.

  He rolled his eyes at her and waddle-humped down to his apartment. Shannon was due a bitch slap, but God help him, he would never hit a woman—even if she was a lovesick freak job. He sat on his couch until his testicles crawled down from the back of his eyeballs and rested gingerly between his legs. They were like wild animals at this point. They hardly trusted him at all anymore.

  A noise in the hallway that sounded like sex and hairlessness brought him to his feet. He was still a little wobbly but managed to catch Debra and Mr. Anastasia making out right next to his door. Duke settled in to watch, but it wasn’t quite as much fun because they were wearing a lot of clothes.

  Debra Anastasia smiled when she saw him and stopped Mr. Anastasia with one long-nailed finger.

  “Hey, Duke, what’s going on?” She turned and wiggled her ass in Mr. Anastasia’s lap.

  “I was worried about you two. I haven’t heard any heavy panting next to my door in a while.” Duke raised his eyebrows to show his concern.

  The couple was head to toe in Healthy Water gear. Pants, hats, bandanas, visors, tote bags—the whole shebang.

  “Well, I was trying to rescue a cat. But when we plugged the address into the GPS, we were directed to a rapper’s house. He’s such a great host.” She looked over her shoulder at her husband. “Wasn’t he wonderful?”

  Mr. Anastasia nodded and explained. “When we got there, he had a huge party going on, so we had a few drinks. One thing led to another, and we wound up spending the week at his house.”

  Debra Anastasia reached into the tote and handed Duke a bottle of Healthy Water. “We are part of his street team now! We couldn’t be happier or sexier.”

  She leaned back for a lingering, totally-inappropriate-for-company kiss from her mister.

  God, I love these two.

  “So what happened to the cat you were looking for?” Duke cracked opened the bottle and took a swig. It was horrible, but he gagged it down.

  Mr. Anastasia spoke up. “There was no actual cat. False alarm. And the rapper and I are such good friends now I’m going to start suggesting new flavors for the water. That one is the prototype for beer. Then here”—the man held up another one—“is the vagina flavored. Debra Anastasia is my muse for that one. And the last is sushi water.”

  He opened both bottles and looked perplexed. “Crap, I can’t figure out which one is which.”

  Debra Anastasia put a demure hand in front of her lips, blushing. “I didn’t get to shower at the rapper’s, so I wasn’t smelling my freshest when he took the flavor sample.” She powered through the awkward small talk by talking about a different pussy. “I think there was a cat. I tried to contact the author about it, but she deleted her Twitter account so she could avoid my messages. She’s from a different country or something. I don’t think they know how important animals are and that they shouldn’t be used against their will for sex acts.”

  Duke took the vagina- or sushi-flavored water Mr. Anastasia handed him and wished the couple a happy evening. He spent some quality time trying to decide what sushi roll Debra Anastasia’s genitals might closely resemble. Dove knocked on his doorjamb soon after he had taken his last sip and decided on California rolls for dinner.

  “What’s up, Crotch Fest?” Duke burped and the repeating flavor changed his dinner order to a rainbow roll.

  “I’m here to pierce your dick, Slimestein. Flop your meat out.” Dove looked sick to her stomach. “I ran into the stupid-assed Anastasias, so I take it the search party to sex toy shops is no longer necessary.”

  “Yeah, about that. Shannon punched me in my dick about an hour ago, so I’m gonna pass for today.” Duke rubbed his nuts again.

  “Well, we’ll consider that your anesthesia.” Dove slammed his door behind her and found his piercing gun. “I’m sick of waiting to do this. It’s now or never.”

  She opened up one of his dinner trays while wearing a roll of duct tape as a very unattractive bracelet. She patted the table and then disappeared into his fridge.

  As she rattled around in his icebox, she hissed over her shoulder, “Put your penis on the tray, Asstronut.”

  One of Duke’s very strict rules was to take his dick out any time a woman demanded it of him. He reached deep and put his favorite friend carefully on the fake wood.

  She turned and cringed. “Jesus, dicks are so fucking ugly. Why you think putting your grandmother’s jewelry on it will make it more fetching is beyond me.”

  Duke covered his dick’s ears and snarled back at Dove, “You’ll hurt his feelings.”

  After rolling her eyes, she popped the top on the beer she had rescued from the fridge. It was icy cold. He licked his lips and held out his hand for the liquid courage she wielded, but Dove slapped his big hand away.

  “This isn’t for drinking.” Very methodically she pulled strips of tape off the roll and tore them free with her teeth. He wasn’t sure what she was up to until she grabbed a urologist’s handful of his genitals and roped it off.

  “Wait, crazy girl. Why are taping my dick to this tray?” Duke was seriously glad he had no nut hair as the silver tape pinned him down.

  “I’ve been having nightmares about you flinching and shit. So, in order to do this, I need to make sure you can’t get away.” She ripped off
another strip with an exceedingly loud noise.

  “You’ve been dreaming about my man meat? Excellent.” Duke had to admire the extreme dedication she was taking to hold him in place. Just the tip of his penis was protruding from the bindings. It was purple and looked like it was begging for air.

  “I think my dick’s dying.” Duke pointed to the absurdly colored flesh.

  Dove was too focused to care about his complaints. “Where do you want me to stick you?”

  Duke farted four times in a row.

  “You fucker. That smells awful. Good God.” Dove backed up and coughed.

  “It’s nerve gas. I pass wind when I’m nervous.” Duke farted five more times in quick succession.

  Dove gritted her teeth and waded back into his evil air. “You’re making this harder than it needs to be.”

  Duke clenched his ass to try to stop the next barrage, but that just changed the octave from deep baritone to teakettle scream.

  “Sorry. Again.”

  She gave him a dirty look and got on her knees to see her target better.

  “Okay, I’m just going to pop this fucker in your pee hole.” She poured the beer all over his duct tape and bits of visible genital skin.

  “Hairy Mother of God! That’s a cold bitch.” Duke jerked back and took the entire tray with him as he tried to retract from the unpleasant sensations she was offering.

  “Shut up. Put the tray down.” Dove meant business and was wielding the free piercing gun like it was loaded with bullets instead of a metal stud.

  “Don’t pop me in my pee-er. I need that fucking hole for shit.” He pointed to the top of his shaft. “Right here, so when I slide into a pussy, it will hit her moneymaker.”

  “Just don’t even talk about what you want to do with it. I’m already going to slam my head in a wall until I forget I did this for you.” Dove lined up her shot.

  “The adhesive on this tape is starting to burn.” Duke tried to peel it off. “Plus my dick’s shrinking because he’s scared. You need to talk to him.”

  Dove glared at him. She was having difficulty grabbing enough flesh around her makeshift penis jail. Plus, the gun was designed for earlobes, which were more dangly.