POTATO MOON, Part 11 by David Oakes

Note from PAD: David Oakes currently holds the land speed record for Potato Moon, turning in his contribution less than four hours after getting the call.

Lost.

Lost.

Lost.

Emotionally crushed by Edwood’s indifference, Jakob was thrown under the bus
of time and into the memory of his experiences on the island. When he was
completely isolated. Totally and utterly alone. With no one around to
understand his absolutely unique and inconsolable solitude.

Well, except for the village. But he had good reasons to never talk to
them. In fact he was sure there was as many as six.

It was his curse, to always be truly and horribly alone. With no one to
turn to in the darkest hour of the last twenty-four hours, easy. Lost
forever from even the hope of his fellow creatures.

Lost.

Lost.

Lost.

Where was he again? Recognition came to him in a flash that could not have
been more painful if lightning had come down from the heavens above and
explained in exact, monosyllabic words that yes, once again, Bela had chosen
Edwood’s love over his own.

No, he was not on the island. He was on the porch of Sullen Manor, Bela
holding his potato, Edwood holding his extinguisher. And he was no man. He
was an animal. And he could think of nothing to do except to give in
totally to his animalistic instincts, and slink off into the darkness of the
woods surrounding Sullen Manor with his tail between his legs.

(Which, considering that he was still wearing his jeans, was a very
uncomfortable place to be keeping his tail. He was not able to slink so
much as he judiciously minced over the freshly mown lawn with the careful
trepidation of a man who has ridden hard and then sat on a cactus.)

Edwood and Bela watched as Jakob judiciously minced over their fresh mown
lawn with the careful trepidation of a man who had ridden hard and then sat
upon a cactus. When the last of his furtive, stuttering movements took him
deep into the shadows of the deep, dark, shadowy woods that surrounded the
depths of Sullen Manor, Edwood was the first to speak.

“Was that Jakob?”, he inquired?

Even after all their time together – their eternal eight years, nine months,
and three days that was perfect in its perfection – still Edwood held a
seductive power over her. At the sound of his voice she felt compelled to
turn and gaze upon every sparkle of his golden beauty. “Yes, my love!”, she
replied vigorously!

“Doesn’t he usually come over on Tuesday?”, he pondered?

Bela wanted to shout her support for her lover’s line of reasoning from the
very rooftops of Sullen Manor. But her lungs, her weak and willful lungs
refused to give up even the smallest particle of Edwood borne upon the air.
A breathless “Yes!” was her only retort.

“I thought so,” he mused.

Bela’s kidneys filled with admiration for her lover’s keen intellect and
grasp of the subtleties of their ever-so-complex relationship. “Uh-huh,”
she gushed.

“That means all day tomorrow I am going to be thinking it is Wednesday.”

The anguish in Edwood’s voice was so clear it rang through Bela like a bell.
Her spleen was filled with such bile over Edwood’s melancholy that right
then and there it led all of her organs (especially that one) to swear an
oath that they would never again open themselves (you know what we mean) to
that devil Jakob who had wounded her true love so deeply.

But her heart, that most traitorous of all organs her heart.

Her heart.

.was filled.

.with potatoes.