Cracked Face

I’m not sure how it started. Maybe I was going to brush my teeth.

“Get your hands off me.”

After applying the toothpaste with a rinse and began, I looked up and saw the first fissure forming, right down my nose bridge. You’d expect to see some blood but it was simply space void and stone.

“I was just trying to help.”

When I pressed on it my finger slipped and upon entry the frostbite was instant. My nail and joint cartilage peeled off by the yank away. There wasn’t bone, but molten cobblestone. Flashed and cooled.

“You’re just trying to make yourself feel better.”

Robotically I grabbed some painter’s tape and slinked it around the finger, and so began the disguising of my impending disfigurement. It was only day one, and luckily enough if I pressed both temples hard enough the fissure fused together and popped another one somewhere buried in my hair. It was enough. I knew it, I knew then, but there’s no point thinking about it.

“That’s not true! I’m here to help you.”

Even though I already knew the ending, I dug in as much as I could simply because it’s ordained. To enjoy the last remnants. A gutter to roll down and I’ll pick up every spat gumwad along my woolen sweater. Finding camaraderie in the chewed and, who knows, sometimes they stick on two dollar bills which I’ll force on the fortune teller; tarot readings have rewritten fates surely.

“You cannot help me. It’s too late.”

Three days more so the next crack was more of a peel. The skin flaked about to reveal barely porous basalt. I went online and bought some beginning paint sets and looked up introductory portrait detailing. But the stupid paint wouldn’t stick.

“I can help you hide it! I’m good at makeup. It’ll be okay.”

Half of my upper face was in the company kitchen sink. What remained of my lips drooped to reveal marble. Spliced lazuli. One of the worst fissures was relentless and I was fending against the nausea and grip strength to keep my forehead from splitting. One hand on the sink to stabilize, the other as a last ditch pinch effort before it’s complete.

But I finally relaxed, relented, and ripped off the rest of it. Slime of crimson, purples. Cracked and mutated mix of stone, flowing, and immediately the cracking flicked downward to tear the neck, to devour. Slowly turning over I sought confirmation in each eye. And it was waiting.

“I can’t hide it anymore.”