{"id":11503,"date":"2014-08-04T05:00:48","date_gmt":"2014-08-04T12:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bullmensfiction.com?p=11503&preview_id=11503"},"modified":"2022-08-03T13:15:25","modified_gmt":"2022-08-03T17:15:25","slug":"head","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/fiction\/head\/","title":{"rendered":"Head"},"content":{"rendered":"

The husband\u2019s head stopped.<\/p>\n

No trauma. \u00a0No pain. \u00a0No warning. \u00a0On the phone, in the middle of explaining to a woman from Duluth that her policy did not cover any act of God involving water, and therefore, regrettably, she would not receive Prime Way compensation, the husband\u2019s words were snuffed out like candles in space.<\/p>\n

He fell into blackness. \u00a0All sound sucked away.<\/p>\n

He was aware of the physical world, but from a distance, as if he had plunged into a deep hole. \u00a0He no longer conceived of either his hand or the receiver; he only sensed, wordlessly, that a distant part of himself\u2014like an old, half-forgotten memory\u2014stood in contact with an object, and that object should be used for destruction.<\/p>\n

On the surface, he roared into violence.<\/p>\n

Two colleagues subdued the husband when he began hitting his computer monitor with the phone. \u00a0While they wrestled him to the floor, the men noticed how his head drooped like a flower with a broken stem. \u00a0Saliva spilled from his mouth. \u00a0They wondered if he was dying, and each privately imagined commandeering his vacated cubicle.<\/p>\n

The coworkers resented the husband, not only because his desk stood nearest the restroom. \u00a0He never took sick days. \u00a0He was always on time. \u00a0For more than ten years, he\u2019d skipped the Monday doughnuts. \u00a0He was supremely disciplined or supremely spineless. \u00a0Either way, they hated him for making them into slobs.<\/p>\n

Paramedics rushed the husband to the hospital. \u00a0Neurologists applied non-invasive tests for two hours, after which they declared his head \u201cno longer viable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bedside, they pronounced the diagnosis. \u00a0The patient didn\u2019t hear.<\/p>\n

Engulfed in blackness, he only felt a queasy, off-pitch drone signaling that his essence was motionless, rootless, and cosmically out-of-touch.<\/p>\n

He bucked and flailed and tore at the doctors\u2019 shirts.<\/p>\n

Burly staffers situated the husband under heavy straps and inserted a pillow behind his head. \u00a0The nurses frowned at him. \u00a0\u201cSuch a tragedy,\u201d one said. \u00a0\u201cStill got most of his hair,\u201d said the other. \u00a0She clucked her tongue at the Rolex on his bedside table. \u00a0\u201cYou can\u2019t take it with you,\u201d the other one agreed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The hospital notified the wife, who left her yoga class to be with him. \u00a0She stroked the husband\u2019s chest and held his hand. \u00a0He lay with his face toward her, his blue eyes wooden. \u00a0It was unnerving, this deserted stare. \u00a0His bloodless cheeks appeared deflated, or perhaps this was an effect of the milky light filtering through the curtains.<\/p>\n

It had been weeks, the wife realized, since she\u2019d bothered to really see him. \u00a0He\u2019d become a collection of parts and impressions: a mouth, an arm, dirty socks, Barbasol. \u00a0Studying him now, he scarcely resembled the man she\u2019d married. \u00a0This thing on the bed was a sculptor\u2019s rendition, a mannequin.<\/p>\n

The lining of the wife\u2019s skirt caused her knees to itch. \u00a0A chill rode her body. \u00a0The diagnosis made no sense. \u00a0A dead head? \u00a0Was this a joke?…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

\"BULL#4covershot\"<\/a><\/h3>\n

GET THE REST IN THE NEW BULL #4<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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