The Incredible Zilch Von Whitstein (#TNTHorrorContest)

The Incredible Zilch Von Whitstein

Chapter 1

HIS DIAGNOSIS WAS the worst kind of surprise. Zilch Von Whitstein had never smoked. Never drank; well, let's be honest here, Whit, as his friends called him, was not a saint. He drank, but never drank in excess. He never did drugs either. He never talked back to his elders, except for that one time when he called his Uncle Carl a buffoon. But let's face facts, Uncle Carl was a buffoon. Whit never crossed the street without looking both ways. He never did anything out of the ordinary. Even his physical attributes were painfully ordinary, with his short-cropped and parted hair, his clean-shaven face, and his crisply ironed slacks and button-front shirts, all agonizingly mundane. In college, he turned in assignments on time. When he began working at Jessop & Nile Bank, starting out as a clerk and working his way up to teller, he had never been late. Not once, always punctual. Took out a 401K. An IRA. Savings account. Charitable donations to the Boys & Girls Club and Wells for Water. He had average medical coverage. Dental. He even called his mom every Sunday. Whit was the picture-perfect moderate, never making waves, neither politically nor socially. His was a face that could be swallowed in a sea of monotony. He'd never even had a tattoo or any sort of piercing, heavens no. And he liked it that way. He found the banality of a repetitious normal life to be soothing, and better yet, precise. He kept his head down, and stayed out of trouble. Never said an unkind word about anybody.

One day Whit felt a lump on his neck.

He decided, after putting off the lump on his neck and the itch in his throat and what felt like dumbbells on his chest, to finally see his family physician, Doctor Steinberg, on a mostly clear somewhat breezy December afternoon. Traffic had been light in comparison to most days. The shopping season was upon the world. Stores lit with every sale and gadget. Yet, the pace of traffic was moderate. Along the way, if one was so inclined, you could count at least seven traffic lights from Whit's apartment to the doctor's office just past Space Center Boulevard, and he had only been stopped by one. Clear sailing, as the saying goes. It was midweek, so there hadn't been as many people out and about as you'd typically find, especially on the weekend when shopping traffic was at its worst. However, holiday break must have started, for Whit spotted several crowds of teenage to twenty-somethings hanging out at the Sonic Drive-In just before he turned off the main road and into the parking lot of Steinberg & Taylor Family Practice. Drinking hot cocoa and talking about what their parents are getting them for Christmas, no doubt. He parked his modest white Ford Accent and unbuckled his seat belt. As soon as he got out of the car, a terrible coughing fit seized him. Hacking and wheezing, tasting iron, he struggled to take back control. His eyes burned and his skin felt unusually itchy, as if some ungodly swarm had fallen over him, eating into his flesh with microscopic teeth.

Finally, the cough passed. Whit caught his breath and then walked across to the clinic entrance. He stopped and hoisted his pants back on his thinning waist at least twice before finally making it past the green holly wreath strapped to the entrance door.

"Hello," greeted one of the nurses manning the front desk. She was pleasant on the eyes, young with flowing curls of sandy brown hair. Whit couldn't tell for certain, due to the reflection from her thick black-framed glasses, but her eyes seemed to glow a radiant shade of bluish sapphire.

"Hi," Whit chuckled, his thoughts muddied.

"Do you have an appointment?" asked the nurse with a sunny, albeit quizzical voice.

"Huh?" he struggled for a thought.

"Do you have an appointment? It's okay if you don't. We take walk-ins."

"Oh, yes. Sorry. I have an appointment. Whitstein, Zilch Von, for Doctor Steinberg." He cursed himself under his breath, blaming his sluggish idiosyncrasy on his sickness, whatever said sickness may be.