Beddy started. She had only heard Aunt Simone say that when she really liked something. When Ma would pull out all the stops for Thanksgiving and thank God, follow a recipe, or when they ordered Chinese food. This tastes like more.
“So what else do you have?”
“That’s all I had up here.”
“How about in the kitchen?”
She was old enough to grasp the concept of bargaining.
“If I bring you something else, can I name you?”
He tossed the empty bag over his head onto her bed.
“Ok. But I need something with meat.”
Ma had already gone to bed, so it was easy for Beddy to scurry downstairs – as long as she was very quiet – and sneak leftovers and silverware back to her room. This night it was overcooked spaghetti and Ma’s bready meatballs.
If she thought watching him eat chips was fun, watching him eat spaghetti was delirium. Each bite, he would twist the spaghetti with the fork into a boulder, hold it at arm’s length from his face, then unravel it gradually, the strands suspended like tightrope between his face and the fork.
“I’m going to name you now,” she said.
He burped like a squeal into a tin can. “Knock yourself out.”
“I’m going to call you…Void.”
She waited for some sign of recognition, or approval, but there was nothing. The single spiral continued to whirl.
He finished the spaghetti and dropped the tupperware bin on the carpet. “Okay,” he said. “So I’m Void.”
He placed the fork in his mouth, she thought to lick it clean, as she liked to do, but he kept pushing it further, further, past the point when he should have choked, until it was gone. Suddenly he went entirely white and motionless.
She kneeled in front of him, looked deep into his goggles for some sign of life. If his eyes were closed or open, if he even had eyes, she had no way to know. There was only red glare.
“You ok?”
Then, like milk starting to boil, little black spirals broke at the surface, larger spirals broke between them, and soon he was back to how he looked when he first appeared.
“Does that mean you’re full?” she said.
“For now,” he said, getting to his feet. He walked over to the door and opened it and slipped out, shutting it behind him.
“Bye,” she said to the closed door.
She picked the bag off of her bed and another knock came. She turned, expectantly. Here he was, coming back to say goodbye after realizing he’d forgot. The door opened.
It was Ma. “Toothbrush police are coming in five,” she said.
Beddy nodded, a little crushed. Ma looked at the floor.
“You wanted thirds, I guess?”
Beddy looked at the tupperware. At the chip bag in her hands. Then back at Ma.
“Not me.”
Ma shook her head. “Either way…” She tapped the space of her wrist where her watch sat during the workday.
Beddy nodded and walked down the hall to the bathroom. Throwing away the Doritos bag, she buttered her brush with cookie dough-flavored toothpaste and set to work. She felt full. More so, oddly, than at dinner. Maybe she shouldn’t have had seconds after all.
The longer she brushed, the fuller she felt, until she felt FULL. The kind of full where she used to cradle herself in Dad’s easy chair and regret the decisions that led her there, the extra serving, the second dessert, and Dad would say, “Who’s this thief in my chair?” and tickle her until she forgot how full she was.
She doubled over, and white foam flowed down her chin. Her tummy was stretched further than it had ever gone. She thought of her neighbor Richard making Jell-O water balloons, what happened when he overfilled them. She crossed her arms in front of her to keep the Jell-O in. Ran the water so Ma couldn’t hear her cry.