Captain Blackbird: I know, it's strange that the story seems to revolve around dog crap! Ah well, when I get stuck I get less fussy on suject matter I guess ;) Thanks for commenting !
Strange dream sequence inspired by a scene from the movie Party Monster.
After cleaning up the mess (and tossing out his socks) Mort finally returned to the couch. He collapsed onto it. Chico was still hiding out somewhere, probably curled up in his favorite chair upstairs.
"Probably nice and comfortable after using the living room as a lavatory. Does this look like grass?" Mort grumbled as he rolled over and tried to get comfortable.
Something was missing. He'd forgotten something but damned if he wasn't too tired to remember what.
'Didn't clean up the food but Chico'll take care of that. Didn't bring in the Pepto from the car but looks like we won't be needing THAT any time soon.' Rolling over again Mort felt what was missing. 'Ah, the robe. Just doesn't feel right to sleep without out it. Not that there's anything wrong with that. People have all kinds of things like that... Yeah, like WIVES!'
Mort smooshed a pillow into a better position. 'No, not that. I meant like blankets and pillows and stuff like that... Sure, what five year old won't sleep without his teddy bear? It's perfectly normal, LINUS!'
Thoroughly exhausted and sick of arguing with himself, Mort finally squirmed his way into a reasonably comfortable position before dropping off to sleep. His last thoughts were the nagging feeling he'd forgotten something other than his robe...
Most of the time sleeping was a perfect escape for Mort Rainey. Lately though, his dreams were becoming increasingly strange. They weren't what he'd call nightmares (or morningmares or mid-afternoonmares or...) exactly, but they weren't really enjoyable either. The dreams were not bad enough to keep him from sleeping. He honestly couldn't imagine anything bad enough in a dream to keep him awake for an extended period of time (or an entire day, which had been his goal for the past two weeks. Just one day without a nap ... hadn't happened.) And really, no matter how bad the dreams got, they never quite rivaled his snow covered, painfully distorted memories of a hotel room of betrayal last winter.
That being said, Mort was not overly thrilled to find himself sitting in his cabin beside a human sized rat. It looked like a fake fur costume over a person but there were no zippers or openings that he could see. Its eyes were huge and black, unblinking.
"So, Mort," the giant rat began in a conversational tone, "How're things going?"
"Uh..." Mort began. He looked around. It LOOKED like his cabin but something was off.
'Yeah, that'd be the huge frickin' rodent you're sharing the sofa with pal!'
It wasn't that though, or not that alone. There was an odd blue tint to everything, like the normally golden sunlight the filtered in through the windows had been replaced by cool blue electrical light.
"Thing's are going fine," he said turning back to the enormous rat. He noticed its tail, long and without fur covering it, a skin coloured appendage trailing across the cushions, its end resting on the floor.
"Have you maybe been forgetting things a bit lately?" it asked. There was nothing accusatory in the rodent's surprisingly deep ('I thought it'd be squeaky') voice. If anything, it had the tone Mort had come to recognize in many people's words directed at him over the past few months – sympathy, though not understanding. He suddenly wanted to kick the furry bastard.
As if the rat had read his thoughts, a long, furry arm came to rest on Mort's shoulder, pulling him closer as a supportive, close friend might in a time of need. "Mort, I'm not trying to make you feel bad or anything. I'm here for you man, really. Maybe you just need to talk about things a bit more, huh? It might help you to discuss this stuff with other people."
"Other people being giant, talking rodents?" Mort asked, pushing aside a long, thin whisker that had been poking him in the side of the face. He was now fairly convinced this was either a dream or he'd...
"Hey, man, we all have our faults, right?" the rat said as he ran one massive paw along the length of his tail. "Mort, I mean it. Seriously, I think if you started talking more you'd feel better, you wouldn't get so lost in your head. You might not forget so many things too. What do you say? How 'bout calling someone up, having a chat?"
The rat leaned forward, pulling Mort's old rotary phone off the coffee table and dropping it in the confused man's lap. Mort picked up the receiver thinking he would rather talk to a human person than this oversized pest/therapist anyway. Maybe if he called someone the hallucination would go away.
He drew a blank, he couldn't think of a single person to call, couldn't think remember a phone number to save his life. For a change rather than just feeling lost and giving up, Mort got pissed.
"I don't need you to tell me to do anything," he snapped, pulling out from underneath the furry arm of rodent reassurance.
The rat shifted to sit sideways on the sofa, facing Mort. Mort glared at him. He was locked into a staring contest with the huge creature. Or, that's what he thought it felt like anyway. Staring at the black, featureless eyes, Mort quickly realized he wasn't going to stare down someone who apparently lacked eyelids. He sat back against the couch, looking across the room, crossing his arms and pointedly ignoring the rat.
The rat let out a small sigh of defeat (despite winning Mort's imaginary staring contest) and got up. He was nearly 6 feet tall at the tips of his ears.
"Okay, Mort. I can see that you don't want to talk right now. That's alright." He walked across the room, his long tail trailing on the floor after him. "I want you to think about what I said, think about who you can call, who you can talk to. It'll help you feel better, less alone. It might just help you to keep from forgetting things too." The rat opened the front door and said, "I'll be waiting in the Jeep," before closing the door behind himself.
Confused, Mort remained seated on the sofa, the phone forgotten in his lap.
Tbc...