By my Word

Language is a beautiful thing. Thoughts can leave my mind and enter yours. A piece of my soul, a sizeable splintered fragment, can touch you in a way physicality could never hope to.

The problem began when everything I said was taken literally.

"Last one there's a rotten egg!" I shouted to my friends. We were walking across the beach at night, the vault of stars twinkling overhead. Danielle was so drunk she had thrown up in the water, so we all decided it was time to head back to the beach house we were renting.

"Come on, Mark," a shade said. It sounded like Brett or Michael; it was impossible to tell in the dark. "You know that's not fair. Danielle can barely walk and you're the track-star of the school for Godssake."

"You scared?" I teased. "It's not like the loser will actually turn into a rotten egg. The winner just gets bragging rights." If only I had known back then how wrong I was.

"Fine," he said, as I felt a tug on the back of my bathing suit. I was thrown backwards into the sand and Brett (I could tell now—nobody else's hair was that long) sprinted ahead. "Remember you're the one who wanted this!"

Even when drunk, I was hell of a runner. Off of the sand now, and onto the pavement, it was easier to catch up. In the distance our house came into view. There wasn't enough time to pass him, but at the very least I could tie. We were running so fast, there was almost no time to stop before we smashed into the front door. Both our hands touched it at the same time.

"Hey, look at that," Brett said. "I tied with the best runner in the school. Maybe I should join the track team."

"Yeah," I said, rolling my eyes, "all you needed was a five second head start. You're lucky it was dark and nobody could see you reaching for my ass. The rumors that would spread..."

"No need to be upset," he shrugged. "We were just racing for bragging rights, remember? Besides, it looks like it was just us two. Ah, there they are, coming over the hill now."

Underneath the soft orange glow of a flickering streetlamp, our three friends marched towards us. Michael and Jane were each under one of Danielle's arms, dragging her along. By the look of Danielle's swimsuit, it seemed she had puked once more on the way.

"Gently now," Michael said, as he and Jane laid Danielle down on the porch. "We can't bring her in yet," he addressed the rest of us. "She'll throw up all over the place and we'll lose our deposit. Let's hang out here for a bit. By the way, who won?"

Brett grabbed my hand and held it up like a referee at a boxing match. "This guy smoked me," he said. "Even with my head start I couldn't beat him."

I looked over at him and he looked back with a sideways grin.

"Anyways, if we're gonna chill out here," Brett said, facing back towards everyone, "we need drinks. I'll go get the cooler."

I followed him inside and together we lifted the heaviest icebox known to mankind.

"That was cute, what you did back there," I said, trying not to trip down the stairs.

"You're welcome, hotshot."

Outside, with a beer in all of our hands (except Danielle's—she was still passed out lying on her back), the party continued. We played "Truth or Dare", "Never Have I Ever", and every other drinking game high-school kids knew. In a state of emotional drunkenness Brett confessed he actually had tried out for the track team, and got rejected. I told him not to worry about it. The coach was a dick anyways.

I stupidly dared Jane to kiss Michael and, after a show cabarets would kill to get their hands on, the two disappeared inside.

"I guess it's just you and me, amigo," Brett said, taking a swig of beer.

"Hey, at least we still have her," I said, pointing to Danielle.

Except, in her place, was an egg cracked in two, with a runny brown yolk spilling out of it.

"Looks like you were right," Brett giggled, not grasping the severity of the situation in his inebriation. "The last one in the house was a rotten egg. You and me had already gone in, and now those two love-bugs just entered, so Danielle lost."

"This isn't funny," I said, looking into the surrounding blackness. "Where the fuck did she go? Is this some sort of prank?"

"I dunno..." Brett said, taking another drink.

I put my hands on his shoulders and shook him back and forth. "I'm not joking. What did you do to her?"

"Huuuh? I didn't do nothin'... I'm so damned drunk I'm seeing three of you right now. I think it's you who's playing the prank."

I could feel my face turning red. "Stop being such a dickhead. Where is she?"

Suddenly, my words manifested reality. Between my hands, Brett's head disappeared and then was replaced with an equally sized penis.

In a shock I pushed him away. His head wriggled around, like a sea anemone looking for particles of food in the currents. Some white liquid dribbled out.

"Okay, that's fucking gross," I said, as I went into the house. "I must be dreaming or something."

Echoes of ecstasy came down from upstairs. Outside of their door, I could tell they were in the thick of it. The problem was, so was I.

"Sorry to interrupt," I said, as they both looked at me with wide eyes. "But there's a problem downstairs—"

"Dude, what the hell?!" Michael screamed. "I don't care what's going on down there, couldn't you at least have knocked first? Can't you see we're in the middle of something?"

I sighed. "Mike, just this once, can you please listen to me instead of acting like the big tough man you think you are?" In my head, I continued, "we all know you're just a scared baby, and we all like you just the same. You don't always have to mask your vulnerability."

Something cried in the bed. Jane screamed as she pulled the covers over herself and backed away. Somehow, the baby version of Mike was just as annoying as the grown one.

Okay, I definitely was dreaming.

With just a thought, I erased Mike from the scene. Now it was just me and Jane. She had her back pressed against the headboard, shaking, with a crimson sheet covering her.

"What's wrong, Jane?" I asked her, trying my best at a Joker impression. Dreams were fun to mess around in.

"Y-you," she stammered, "you're a monster!"

"Now, Jane," I continued in the exaggerated voice of an actor, "what do you mean? I'm not a monster, no. In fact, I'm the opposite. I'm a beautiful man, appealing to all of your preferences, and you're deathly in love with me."

The look on her face instantly changed. In a sultry tone she said, "well, hello there, handsome." Seductively she stood up while the sheet remained on the bed. I could feel myself becoming more and more like the transformed Brett.

She walked towards me, accentuating her hips with every step. Her tits were glistening with sweat from her romp with Michael. I wanted nothing more than to bury myself within her love.

Her finger pressed against my chest as she hypnotized me with her gaze. "Don't you think it's a little unfair," she moaned, "that you're still dressed while I'm naked?"

I couldn't hold myself back any longer. I reached out my hands to grasp them, my first touch of the bags of sand I'd read so much about. Like Zeno's paradox, it felt like traveling an infinite distance. In slow motion I watched as my squirming fingers approached the point of no return. It was just a dream right? So it was ok? Every guy had dreams like this?

Contact was confirmed and instantly I felt sick to my stomach. I pushed her down onto the bed as I remained standing, still as a stone.

"Sorry," I said. "I guess I'm... just not ready for this type of thing yet."

The apparition frowned at me from the bed. She pleaded at me to join her, but I couldn't—not even in my dreams.

I thought about what I had done that night. I turned a friend into an egg, and basically sentenced another to death. I made one disappear and forced the last to fall in love with me.

As I left the bedroom, in search for another, more pleasant part of the dream, I said aloud the thing anyone would think if they saw what I had done.

"I'm a piece of shit."

Little did I know, it wasn't a dream at all. For just a moment, before I fully transformed, I retained enough of my humanity to make one last wish.

"I wish," I said, with brown lips smacking together, "that all my friends were turned back to normal."

My vision went, and then my hearing. I felt like Alice shrinking after having drunk the potion. Eventually, all my senses were gone, and all that was left was my mind.

"Yes, this is what I deserve," I thought, as my consciousness disappeared into the world.

*****

THE END.