Snow On The Tombstones: A Collection of Flash Fiction and Vignettes

GRAPEFRUIT

Macy sat at her vanity, admiring her reflection. This was going to be the best Halloween she'd had since the pregnancy. Her body was back to its normal shape, the fat was melted away, and her costume was made to obscure her stomach.

The plan was to cover her body with a large papier-mache grapefruit. She was already wearing a pinkish-orange bodysuit (she had to admit that she admired the way that it clung to her curves, though she knew that, as the night wore on, that feeling would fade).

Macy smiled and lifted a tube of lipstick the color of ruby red grapefruit flesh to her mouth. It was vintage; she bought it at a yard sale months ago and hadn't had a reason to wear it yet. The woman who sold it to her said it had been used exactly once (and the woman who tried it didn't like it). Macy was sure she would, though, so she bought the tube for fifty cents.

She swiped it across her bottom lip and poked it into the points of her cupid's bow. She blotted; she kissed her reflection; she popped one last pimple, releasing sickly pink pus; and, when the pain in her breast began again, she knew that she had to pump some breast milk or something. She sighed and, while pulling down the top of her bodysuit, walked over to the nightstand to get the pump and get this over with.

It wasn't milk that was engorging her breasts, though. That much was evident when clear pinkish fluid began to fill the bottle. Bewildered, she eased herself off the pump and took a sniff.

It wasn't blood in there, either. It smelled sweet. When she stuck a finger in the bottle to taste it, Macy knew it was grapefruit juice.

But... it couldn't be. That was impossible. That was impossible and she must have been going crazy. She couldn't deny the orange tint to her fingers, though. She bit down on her hand and tasted only bitter rind; there was a gap there, like albedo ringed by her orange-red lipstick.

Macy blinked; she rubbed her eyes, smearing thick eyeliner and pink eyeshadow across the back of her fist. She blinked again; her hand was swelling like her wrist was sprained, like her body was filling itself with juice under her now-mottled flesh.

Terror filled her chest, which was bulging, filling, swelling with juice. She could feel it between her bones. She could feel the citric acid sliding between her muscles and the fat that was still there. It was like her stomach was full of water, but everywhere.

Macy lost her balance and fell backward onto the bed, knocking over her bedside lamp as she did, she saw herself in the vanity mirror. Her body was swollen, distended. She resembled, for all the world, a citrus-fruit laying on its side. Macy was losing herself as her brain swam in the tangy, pink liquid of her grapefruit body.