Luse Stuhls cracked open an eye and glanced around the semi-lit room. The eye slowly closed momentarily before again snapping wide open and darting around its socket like a fly in a bottle.
"What da fuck?" Luse either thought or said; he was unsure. He lifted his head a few inches from the hessian pillow it rested on. A criss cross lattice imprint covered his left cheek (because that was the side he had been lying on) but he of course was unaware of it. His brain was reeling, his head felt as though it had been kicked more times than a grand final football which had seen the whole season out. He had no idea where he was, how old he was, what his job was or whose massive arse was snuggled into the small of his back. He was completely disoriented, nauseated and one part of him felt as though he should just go back to sleep. His head collapsed back into the pillow, but then the other part of him quickly began gathering strength and momentum and grew from a sense of urgency to state of panic. Gingerly he again lifted his aching melon, prised open the other eye, propped himself on his elbow and took in his surroundings.
The sunlight in the room filtered through grimy windows and tattered lace curtains, illuminating a single room of rough hewn timber floors and walls. A pot belly stove was on the far side beside a cement trough, above which a single brass tap protruded from the wall. The room was grimy and sparsely furnished with a simple table and two wooden chairs of the most rudimentary design. Beneath the table lay the ugliest dog Luse had ever seen, a large baggy skinned affair with half a right ear and a mouth which looked like a vandalized Luna Park entrance from which emanated a vast, lolling, pink and blue tongue and an immense puddle of drool. The dog, Cassius, twitched in his sleep and dreamt of peeling back the skin from Luse's face and devouring his squiggy, mushy grey brain. Of course Luse had no knowledge of this
"Whose sack of shit is that?" Luse thought he said.
"He's yours", said a voice, or was it a thought?
"Who said that?' Luse definitely said. There was no answer.
An unexpected groan from the other side of the hard, lumpy mattress drew Luse's attention. This was quickly followed by a most unwelcome and alarming blurting from the massive arse and an acrid stench which would have curdled mothers milk while still in the breast. Luse retched and made to gallop from the shared bed but was abruptly halted when the huge mound beside him turned over and threw a large, meaty tuck shop lady arm around his chest pinning him beneath its weight. Where the massive arse had been previously were now two warm, large breast like protrusions. Luse lay trying to mind map the anatomy which would produce this scenario and after a few seconds thought better of it. Curiosity however got the better of him and he turned to see the face which was blowing regular spurts of warm air onto the back of his neck in between raspy, snoring intakes of breath. Luse looked at the face and then looked at the dog; then he looked at the dog and looked at the face. He decided the voice or thought that said the dog was his was wrong. The dog could only have belonged to one person based on the proposition that dogs resemble their owners. For a start their was the half missing ear and the lolling pink and blue tongue. For a moment Luse lay fixated and watch the long hairs from the mole on the woman's upper lip be sucked into her mouth with each inhalation. He retched again and slowly extricated himself from her embrace, deftly slipping to the floor.
Cassius opened his eyes and emitted a low growl, baring his broken, crooked dental array. Luse froze unsure, but Cassius closed his eyes and returned to a pleasant reverie of telling his peers how he had buried the bones of his dead master for later consumption in the woods. Luse's time would come Cassius thought; somewhere away from witnesses. Cassius was a very unpleasant conveyance, masquerading as man's best friend. Luse gathered some clothes from around the bed and slipped out the structure's door.
It was stinking hot outside and the wind was playfully blowing an assortment of plastic shopping bags and tumble weeds across the parched brown expanse before him. Luse turned 360 and found the only thing which broke the featureless, flat landscape apart from the small abode he had just escaped was a windmill which creaked and ground in the stiff, hot breeze. Beneath the windmill was a cattle trough brim full of water, Lost, alone and still totally uncomprehending Luse made his way to it and splashed handfuls over his stubbly face and neck.
"Where am I? Whose that hideous woman?" he wondered aloud as he donned the shabby attire he had managed to scrounge from the floor.
"This is your home. She's your wife." the thought voice replied.
Every hair on Luse's body stood up. There were many of them and he resembled a skinny echidna developing a new coat.
"Who said that!" he demanded.
"I did", the voice (it was definitely a voice) said.
Verging on panic Luse turned quickly in each direction.
"Where are you?"
"Here I am; right here"
Luse still saw nobody. He ran behind the rotting pile he had woken up in but nobody was there either. He couldn't pick where the voice was coming from. It seemed to be everywhere.
"Come out and face me you coward. Where the fuck are you?"
"Perhaps a better question Luse would be who are you?
Luse's hackles were really up now.
"OK. Who are you?"
"I am the writer," the voice replied.
"Writer, what writer?"
"The writer that's writing you."
Luse gazed out from the page and thought he perceived something beyond.
"I think I see you".
"No you don't, but you know I'm here because if I wasn't you would not exist"
"Do I exist?" Luse asked desparingly
"You are beginning too".
"Well where's my frikkin' memory!?"
"I haven't written it yet. That's something we're going to do together."
"Where am I?"
"I don't know - haven't decided yet."
"Well I don't like any of this," Luse yelled, shaking his fist! "Write me something better!"
"Too late now. No revisions."
"You could write me a better wife at least"
"Sorry she is an essential element of the plot."
"What plot?" Luse screamed
"The one I haven't written yet".
"This is bullshit! You can write whatever you like. I'm off!"
Luse took two steps before his arse hit the dirt.
"Where are my legs!?" he screamed.
"I erased them".
"Give them back!"
The writer sat back in his chair and thought for a few moments before his fingers again danced lightly across the keyboard, "I will allow you one revision. Do you want a new wife or your legs back?"
"You prick!"
"Come on, what's it to be?"
Luse pounded the hard ground with his fist, "The legs, I'll take the fucking legs!"
"Very good. So now we each understand our roles?"
Luse dejectedly nodded agreement and his trouser legs and work boots immediately filled.
"OK Mr Stuhls. Or story commences 25 years ago".
Luse smiled as images began to flood his memory banks.
To be continued ...
