Fed Starving
Active Member
Thomas Earankle was a professional writer and a hermit that never left his house. He loved his house and he was proud to sell enough books to be well off enough to purchase it. Eighteen foot high ceilings, a large den area, three bedrooms, a full service kitchen with a walk-in pantry and two bathrooms. No showers, porcelain tubs. You could say that his house was vintage but not historical. Mid-twentieth century. He wasn't concerned with fussing with the latest technologies or features. He didn't like this idea of smart technology anyways and could do well without a smart-fridge or a smart-lock on his door. What was smart about being hackable? Not a damn thing.
He owned three cars. All of them made before the year 2000, he thought much the same about them as he thought of his house. Unhackable. Thomas imagined that as he stayed vintage and secure without all these questionable bells and whistles everybody was clamouring to get their hands upon, he would watch society decay and crumble into over-connectivity, in an eternal fight against privacy invasion and software manipulation, living in a constant state of second guessing and forced to live with a villain that accompanied you everywhere you went and didn't give you a moment of mental peace. He kept himself outside of that corrupt limbo.
His daughter and wife were his life. His wife, Isabelle, was a nurse and his daughter, Chasie, was student in elementary school. Isabelle completed all of the errands that demanded leaving the house because Thomas couldn't bring himself to get the courage to leave. He would even make Chasie take the trash to the can outside.
He wasn't always like this. He was a real active person before he became a writer, employed at a manufacturing plant. He worked hard and never feared leaving the house. He would take his wife and daughter out to dinner and visit family on holidays. He wasn't overcautious or shy and kept on top of things socially. But now, now he was a hermit. The last time he remembered leaving the house was over a full year ago.
Today his wife was grocery shopping with their daughter and he was watching a movie on the television, hungry, craving his wife's delicious steaks, the meal she promised she would make with dinner. He was always hungry. As time wore on he found himself more and more unsatiable. He could eat and eat and eat and while he was absolutely positive that his stomach was full the hunger would mysteriously continue.
He wasn't scared of leaving the house. There wasn't any social anxiety there. No fear of meeting someone new. He wasn't a psychopath, no hormonal shortages, no traumatic damages that made him auto-respond without forethought. Today, while Isabelle went shopping he seriously examined himself, considering what led him to become a hermit. He wanted to solve his dilemma and return to the previous active state that was always a calling card of his personality.
Thomas turned the television off. He couldn't pay attention. He got off his couch and looked around the den. The windows were covered with thick blankets. Only a dim glow could be seen around the edges of the windows where the blankets hadn't fully denied the light. He thought backwards to the time when he covered them up. Behind those blankets were venetian blinds. Isabelle and he moved into this house months before Chasie was born and through those first several years venetian blinds were good enough for both of them and often they would be raised to let bright sunlight through. Since adding thick blankets, they weren't once brought down. Thomas tried to remember precisely when he covered the windows with blankets.
He walked towards one of the windows and thought to gather the courage to pull the blanket aside and allow the sunlight to shine through but as the closer he got to the window the more sickening was the sensation within his gut. He started to feel like he was going to vomit. Resisting this urge he advanced anyways another step but then the abdominal sickness spread into his chest, feeling like a grodie wet heat, like his muscles were oozing a slick slobber, he felt nasty and miserable and increasingly sick the closer to the window he went. He soon had enough and turned around, heading towards the couch once again. And like that, in a second, the sickness ceased and he felt fine.
Thomas sat on his couch with his head in his hands, massaging his face and running his fingers through his medium length hair. He retained full mental capacity, he wasn't imagining this. There was no mental or ideological roadblock stopping him from being a hermit. He'd proved that right here, this was a real physical phenomenon. He would get sick the closer he got to the window. He searched his mind for answers but found nothing.
That's right. April 30th, last year. That was the exact day that he nailed the blankets over the windows. He did so in the den, his bedroom and the bathroom that both he and his wife shared. He didn't go anywhere else. Not usually. How did he remember? April 30th was the day he received the surprise check in the mail for his novel, "One Clown In Billings Town". He was out of work for a month at that time, using his and his wife's savings to pay the utilities and lease. He'd been patiently waiting for a response and had shut himself inside the house, trying to build his next classic novel. He knew the clown book was a classic but he was manically nervous that nobody would accept it. In the meantime he wanted to write another book that could be seen as equal. He wrote books before that weren't accepted and at that time he had three novels published and none of them were selling enough to make a financial difference. This was a critical period for him.
He was a mass of raw nerves and emotionally all over the place in those weeks leading up to the acceptance of his clown book. He couldn't calm himself. There was like this unseen entity punching him in the soul and he would go mentally empty and walk around the house like he was remote controlled, saying to himself, "Why did I go into my bedroom? Why did I suddenly leave the den as my wife walked through the door?" His uncontrollable mental and emotional state continued to increase with intensity even when he received the acceptance letter and the check that came with it. He knew that he accomplished his dream of writing a classic novel that a publisher would take but even that didn't stop the worsening haze of insanity enveloping him.
That was until he decided to nail up the blankets over the windows. He did it on a whim while in the midst of the most everpresent wave of heinous nervewracket that he felt in his life. One second he was a hairs breadth away from totally annihilating something and the next second the blankets were nailed over the windows. The third second was the start of the most calm and relaxing peace he felt in his life. And ever since that precise moment that he nailed those blankets over the windows that ominous ruminating disruption within him had never returned.
That was why he was a hermit. That was why he never opened the windows, chosing to live without the sun staring through the windows. His mind subconsciously incorporated that feeling of relief with the action that coincided with it and modified his decision-making through internal means. He couldn't help being a hermit, being a hermit was a part of him much like breathing was a part of him. He didn't think about breathing, his mind would control that part of him without him consciously being aware that he was breathing. And so it was the same with being a hermit.
Thomas got off the couch once again. He had to be sure he wasn't going nuts. He went to the window again but this time much more quickly and without hesitation. He made a sprint to the window with the intent to snatch up the blanket and yank it aside so he could look outside. That same disgusting force of slimy sickness again welled up inside him through his gut into his throat and with greater speed than before and as he clenched the blanket he dry heaved painfully as though he were coughing up a lung, sounding like he was gurgling mud. He was already in motion so now there was no turning back as he yanked the blanket aside. As he did so his skin flared up in excruciating burning pain all the way up his arm and a split second later across his face where the midnoon sunlight touched his skin. He shrieked in agony and fell onto the floor, writhing uncontrollably.
Isabelle and Chasie were then entering the house. Both of them let go of their grocery bags and rushed to Thomas’ side when they saw him trembling in a foetal position.
"Daddy! What's wrong with you?! Daddy! Daddy!" his daughter cried.
Isabelle, being a nurse, was trained to handle health emergencies, but that didn't stop her from being upset like Chasie was. "Thomas?!" she choked on her words, "Thomas? Can you hear me, Thomas? Can you breathe? Tell me Thomas, what's wrong with you?"
Thomas rolled onto his back, tongue out and dry. He nodded but wasn't breathing all too well.
"Daddy, you're skin looks weird! What happened to you daddy? Did you smash your face on something?" said Chasie.
Thomas nodded his head no and took his daughters hand into his. "I'm going to be okay." he said, "Don't you worry." Isabelle was already on her smartphone with emergency services. She brushed Thomas's hair back with her palm to feel his temperature. His skin was hot. She stated her name and nurses identification, requesting a special emergency service in the hopes she could get him to the hospital quicker than normal.
Seven minutes later the ambulance had arrived and Isabelle let them in. The paramedics brought a gurney with them. They asked a battery of questions and Isabelle relayed the symptoms to them, stating that she believed that he had a heart attack and a stroke or seizure or a possible combination of all three simultaneously.
The paramedics lowered the gurney to a floor position and then Thomas said, "You know, I'm not feeling all that bad now. I think that I might be alright." And truly he did feel alright. The intense sickness had dissipated and his skin no longer felt like it was burning. He was exhausted and weakened but overall, not that bad.
The paramedics said, "I know you may think that you are alright but considering the nature of what you suffered it is in your best interest and it is our responsibility that you be brought into the hospital so that our top health professionals can properly examine you and make sure that you are fit to rest at home."
Thomas didn't want to leave the house. He was a hermit and didn't know why. He felt fine.
Isabelle said to the paramedics, "Thomas has a disorder that makes him live like a hermit. He isn't going to agree to go to the hospital no matter what. He wasn't always like this, it’s a recent development." She turned to Thomas and said, "Honey, you have to go to the hospital. Don't worry, Chasie and I are going with you. Please don't make this difficult."
Thomas took her hand in his and said, "I'm going to be alright. You see? I'm fine now. There's no need for me to go to the hospital. I'm worn out, that is all. Some rest and I will be okay."
She smirked at him and said, "You're going to the hospital, end of story. Don't make this difficult."
The paramedics started lifting Thomas onto the gurney and he tried to kick them off of him. He said, "I'm serious about this, I don't need to go to the hospital! You should respect my wishes!"
One of the paramedics said, "Don't you worry, you're going to be alright. Quit flopping around."
The other paramedic said, "Sir, we are going to put the restraints on because we don't want you to fall off the gurney. We are only here to help you."
The paramedics put the gurney restraints on Thomas and had him securely glued in. He tried a few more kicks and he tried lifting his shoulders but there was no use. He was completely at the mercy of the paramedics and it was impossible for him to escape the gurney.
Soon they were rolling Thomas towards the entrance and Isabelle quickly went to the door to hold it open for them. Sunlight shined through the entrance and when they rolled Thomas through the door he immediately started screaming with blood curdling shrieks and yanked his limbs around so hard that he almost knocked the gurney over. The surprise of outrage from Thomas only made them hasten their speed towards the ambulance. Thomas's hideous scream became animalistic and so deep he sounded like he was being torn apart from the inside out. His skin was smoldering and became so bright with redness, blood droplets were seeping through.
When the paramedics reached the ambulance and swung the doors open it was too late, Thomas was spatting up blood and his body fat had turned liquid and started to boil, curdling his skin as it would sag. His scream became a throaty sigh, a long whisper of despair. His eyes shrunk and wrinkled as they dehydrated. The paramedics could feel heat welling up from Thomas's body. They took a step away, raising their arms, a second before he burst into flames. The stench was horrible.
Isabelle was absolutely distraught and half insane with anxiety, crying hard and walking in circles, unable to touch her husband or help him in the least. What happened that day was a mystery that has yet to be solved and most people believed the answer will never be found.
He owned three cars. All of them made before the year 2000, he thought much the same about them as he thought of his house. Unhackable. Thomas imagined that as he stayed vintage and secure without all these questionable bells and whistles everybody was clamouring to get their hands upon, he would watch society decay and crumble into over-connectivity, in an eternal fight against privacy invasion and software manipulation, living in a constant state of second guessing and forced to live with a villain that accompanied you everywhere you went and didn't give you a moment of mental peace. He kept himself outside of that corrupt limbo.
His daughter and wife were his life. His wife, Isabelle, was a nurse and his daughter, Chasie, was student in elementary school. Isabelle completed all of the errands that demanded leaving the house because Thomas couldn't bring himself to get the courage to leave. He would even make Chasie take the trash to the can outside.
He wasn't always like this. He was a real active person before he became a writer, employed at a manufacturing plant. He worked hard and never feared leaving the house. He would take his wife and daughter out to dinner and visit family on holidays. He wasn't overcautious or shy and kept on top of things socially. But now, now he was a hermit. The last time he remembered leaving the house was over a full year ago.
Today his wife was grocery shopping with their daughter and he was watching a movie on the television, hungry, craving his wife's delicious steaks, the meal she promised she would make with dinner. He was always hungry. As time wore on he found himself more and more unsatiable. He could eat and eat and eat and while he was absolutely positive that his stomach was full the hunger would mysteriously continue.
He wasn't scared of leaving the house. There wasn't any social anxiety there. No fear of meeting someone new. He wasn't a psychopath, no hormonal shortages, no traumatic damages that made him auto-respond without forethought. Today, while Isabelle went shopping he seriously examined himself, considering what led him to become a hermit. He wanted to solve his dilemma and return to the previous active state that was always a calling card of his personality.
Thomas turned the television off. He couldn't pay attention. He got off his couch and looked around the den. The windows were covered with thick blankets. Only a dim glow could be seen around the edges of the windows where the blankets hadn't fully denied the light. He thought backwards to the time when he covered them up. Behind those blankets were venetian blinds. Isabelle and he moved into this house months before Chasie was born and through those first several years venetian blinds were good enough for both of them and often they would be raised to let bright sunlight through. Since adding thick blankets, they weren't once brought down. Thomas tried to remember precisely when he covered the windows with blankets.
He walked towards one of the windows and thought to gather the courage to pull the blanket aside and allow the sunlight to shine through but as the closer he got to the window the more sickening was the sensation within his gut. He started to feel like he was going to vomit. Resisting this urge he advanced anyways another step but then the abdominal sickness spread into his chest, feeling like a grodie wet heat, like his muscles were oozing a slick slobber, he felt nasty and miserable and increasingly sick the closer to the window he went. He soon had enough and turned around, heading towards the couch once again. And like that, in a second, the sickness ceased and he felt fine.
Thomas sat on his couch with his head in his hands, massaging his face and running his fingers through his medium length hair. He retained full mental capacity, he wasn't imagining this. There was no mental or ideological roadblock stopping him from being a hermit. He'd proved that right here, this was a real physical phenomenon. He would get sick the closer he got to the window. He searched his mind for answers but found nothing.
That's right. April 30th, last year. That was the exact day that he nailed the blankets over the windows. He did so in the den, his bedroom and the bathroom that both he and his wife shared. He didn't go anywhere else. Not usually. How did he remember? April 30th was the day he received the surprise check in the mail for his novel, "One Clown In Billings Town". He was out of work for a month at that time, using his and his wife's savings to pay the utilities and lease. He'd been patiently waiting for a response and had shut himself inside the house, trying to build his next classic novel. He knew the clown book was a classic but he was manically nervous that nobody would accept it. In the meantime he wanted to write another book that could be seen as equal. He wrote books before that weren't accepted and at that time he had three novels published and none of them were selling enough to make a financial difference. This was a critical period for him.
He was a mass of raw nerves and emotionally all over the place in those weeks leading up to the acceptance of his clown book. He couldn't calm himself. There was like this unseen entity punching him in the soul and he would go mentally empty and walk around the house like he was remote controlled, saying to himself, "Why did I go into my bedroom? Why did I suddenly leave the den as my wife walked through the door?" His uncontrollable mental and emotional state continued to increase with intensity even when he received the acceptance letter and the check that came with it. He knew that he accomplished his dream of writing a classic novel that a publisher would take but even that didn't stop the worsening haze of insanity enveloping him.
That was until he decided to nail up the blankets over the windows. He did it on a whim while in the midst of the most everpresent wave of heinous nervewracket that he felt in his life. One second he was a hairs breadth away from totally annihilating something and the next second the blankets were nailed over the windows. The third second was the start of the most calm and relaxing peace he felt in his life. And ever since that precise moment that he nailed those blankets over the windows that ominous ruminating disruption within him had never returned.
That was why he was a hermit. That was why he never opened the windows, chosing to live without the sun staring through the windows. His mind subconsciously incorporated that feeling of relief with the action that coincided with it and modified his decision-making through internal means. He couldn't help being a hermit, being a hermit was a part of him much like breathing was a part of him. He didn't think about breathing, his mind would control that part of him without him consciously being aware that he was breathing. And so it was the same with being a hermit.
Thomas got off the couch once again. He had to be sure he wasn't going nuts. He went to the window again but this time much more quickly and without hesitation. He made a sprint to the window with the intent to snatch up the blanket and yank it aside so he could look outside. That same disgusting force of slimy sickness again welled up inside him through his gut into his throat and with greater speed than before and as he clenched the blanket he dry heaved painfully as though he were coughing up a lung, sounding like he was gurgling mud. He was already in motion so now there was no turning back as he yanked the blanket aside. As he did so his skin flared up in excruciating burning pain all the way up his arm and a split second later across his face where the midnoon sunlight touched his skin. He shrieked in agony and fell onto the floor, writhing uncontrollably.
Isabelle and Chasie were then entering the house. Both of them let go of their grocery bags and rushed to Thomas’ side when they saw him trembling in a foetal position.
"Daddy! What's wrong with you?! Daddy! Daddy!" his daughter cried.
Isabelle, being a nurse, was trained to handle health emergencies, but that didn't stop her from being upset like Chasie was. "Thomas?!" she choked on her words, "Thomas? Can you hear me, Thomas? Can you breathe? Tell me Thomas, what's wrong with you?"
Thomas rolled onto his back, tongue out and dry. He nodded but wasn't breathing all too well.
"Daddy, you're skin looks weird! What happened to you daddy? Did you smash your face on something?" said Chasie.
Thomas nodded his head no and took his daughters hand into his. "I'm going to be okay." he said, "Don't you worry." Isabelle was already on her smartphone with emergency services. She brushed Thomas's hair back with her palm to feel his temperature. His skin was hot. She stated her name and nurses identification, requesting a special emergency service in the hopes she could get him to the hospital quicker than normal.
Seven minutes later the ambulance had arrived and Isabelle let them in. The paramedics brought a gurney with them. They asked a battery of questions and Isabelle relayed the symptoms to them, stating that she believed that he had a heart attack and a stroke or seizure or a possible combination of all three simultaneously.
The paramedics lowered the gurney to a floor position and then Thomas said, "You know, I'm not feeling all that bad now. I think that I might be alright." And truly he did feel alright. The intense sickness had dissipated and his skin no longer felt like it was burning. He was exhausted and weakened but overall, not that bad.
The paramedics said, "I know you may think that you are alright but considering the nature of what you suffered it is in your best interest and it is our responsibility that you be brought into the hospital so that our top health professionals can properly examine you and make sure that you are fit to rest at home."
Thomas didn't want to leave the house. He was a hermit and didn't know why. He felt fine.
Isabelle said to the paramedics, "Thomas has a disorder that makes him live like a hermit. He isn't going to agree to go to the hospital no matter what. He wasn't always like this, it’s a recent development." She turned to Thomas and said, "Honey, you have to go to the hospital. Don't worry, Chasie and I are going with you. Please don't make this difficult."
Thomas took her hand in his and said, "I'm going to be alright. You see? I'm fine now. There's no need for me to go to the hospital. I'm worn out, that is all. Some rest and I will be okay."
She smirked at him and said, "You're going to the hospital, end of story. Don't make this difficult."
The paramedics started lifting Thomas onto the gurney and he tried to kick them off of him. He said, "I'm serious about this, I don't need to go to the hospital! You should respect my wishes!"
One of the paramedics said, "Don't you worry, you're going to be alright. Quit flopping around."
The other paramedic said, "Sir, we are going to put the restraints on because we don't want you to fall off the gurney. We are only here to help you."
The paramedics put the gurney restraints on Thomas and had him securely glued in. He tried a few more kicks and he tried lifting his shoulders but there was no use. He was completely at the mercy of the paramedics and it was impossible for him to escape the gurney.
Soon they were rolling Thomas towards the entrance and Isabelle quickly went to the door to hold it open for them. Sunlight shined through the entrance and when they rolled Thomas through the door he immediately started screaming with blood curdling shrieks and yanked his limbs around so hard that he almost knocked the gurney over. The surprise of outrage from Thomas only made them hasten their speed towards the ambulance. Thomas's hideous scream became animalistic and so deep he sounded like he was being torn apart from the inside out. His skin was smoldering and became so bright with redness, blood droplets were seeping through.
When the paramedics reached the ambulance and swung the doors open it was too late, Thomas was spatting up blood and his body fat had turned liquid and started to boil, curdling his skin as it would sag. His scream became a throaty sigh, a long whisper of despair. His eyes shrunk and wrinkled as they dehydrated. The paramedics could feel heat welling up from Thomas's body. They took a step away, raising their arms, a second before he burst into flames. The stench was horrible.
Isabelle was absolutely distraught and half insane with anxiety, crying hard and walking in circles, unable to touch her husband or help him in the least. What happened that day was a mystery that has yet to be solved and most people believed the answer will never be found.
