Hoarder (5 page)

Chapter Six

They were stuck in Missy’s kitchen. Keith thought they were stuck like rats in a glue trap. Meanwhile, the real rats were not stuck at all as they darted from one fetid food source to another.

Will saw movement all over the place. For every rat, there were at least a hundred roaches. Neither vermin seemed particularly alarmed by their presence. Missy let the pests have free reign in her house, and they had no reason to fear humans anymore. Will thought that Missy needed better friends, the kind that didn’t have an exoskeleton or carry the bubonic plague.

The next time Missy went shopping at the Mega-Mart, Will would have to tell her about any sales on rat traps, roach motels, or bug spray. There were an awful lot of gnats and fruit flies swarming around her kitchen. He was about to say something about it when a particularly juicy fruit fly flew into his open mouth. Will spit the nasty little bugger out and kept his lips shut.

It occurred to Ian that the current hoard they stood on was far less level than the basement below. If that was even possible, and apparently it was. This was the first time that Ian found himself nearly eye level with Will. What made this room so different from the basement was the fact that this room was used everyday. Which meant it was piled higher with mounds of ever growing and shifting garbage.

Ian noticed that the kitchen was considerably muggier than the basement below. It had to be at least fifteen degrees hotter in here, which wasn’t a surprise; heat rose. Ian didn’t think that Missy employed any heaters or air conditioners (where would she keep them?), but the hoard seemed to trap and hold the heat. It also explained the enormous petri dish that the house had become. Mold flourished in warm and humid environments.

Regardless of the heat, Ian felt a chill when he thought of how stifling hot the upstairs might feel, like Missy’s Easy Bake Oven. He hoped they would find Fiddlesticks fast and not have to go upstairs and find out.

Dani covered her nose with her free arm as she filmed her surroundings. She was profoundly revolted by the smell of so much rotten food, and something worse –
dead animal
– which she didn’t want to think about –
dead CAT! Don’t think about it, just document it
.

Dani focused her camera in close-up on the filthiness around her. A half hour ago she barely knew what a hoarder was, and now here she was dissecting the details of a food hoard, a concept she had never before considered in her life. She was quickly becoming an expert.

Missy’s menu was scattered everywhere, most of it partially eaten and moldy. From the food scraps on display, Dani knew Missy was not a healthy eater: chicken bones, pizza crusts, hardened donuts, sandwich cookies with the filling scooped out, French fries that looked as fresh as the day they were deep fried, a pie with one slice gone and black, putrescent filling spilling out (she thought the flavor might be deathberry).

Dani’s attention moved from the food to the containers that held it. She noticed a preponderance of fast food wrappers, Styrofoam food boxes, TV dinner trays, and fountain soft drink cups. Every dish and utensil was caked with yesterday and yesteryear’s meals.

Among the littered packaging, Dani noticed the familiar pictures and logos of unhealthy convenience foods that she shared Missy’s fondness for, delicious junk like Kellogg’s Pop Tarts, Hostess Twinkies, and Pillsbury Toaster Strudels. She wondered if she’d desire to eat another Twinkie or Pop Tart ever again. They had been psychologically spoiled.

“I want to puke,” Dani warned the others.

“Use the sink,” Will recommended.

“What sink?”

Will saw that Dani was right. A sink was not visible. Nor were the counters. There were only mounds of kitchen items beneath the high cupboards. One mound, over four feet high, was made up entirely of dirty dishes, as though the dishwasher had overflown. Directly beside the mountain of dishes was a mound of used utensils that had an even higher peak. It looked like every utensil in the neighborhood, perhaps the city, was stuck around a gigantic magnet. Many of the utensils were corroded with rust. The cupboards above were open, revealing shelves that were stuffed with garbage and covered in cobwebs. The cupboards lacked the contents they were made for, namely dishes and food.

Dani removed her arm from her nose. She remained nauseous but the urge to hurl had passed. Dani was more disturbed to realize she was getting used to the dead… the smell.

Dani led Keith and Will through the thinnest of culverts twisting around the mounds. Will wondered how Missy could maneuver through such tight spaces. She could barely be contained in the aisles of his store. Will realized he was probably conflating her size with her big personality, but the fact remained she was a massive and strong woman who moved with the grace of a buffalo.

Ian’s curiosity kept him from following his friends. He turned to the object that intrigued him, Missy’s refrigerator. The front of the refrigerator and the handles were smeared with food. Taped to the doors in overlapping patches were messy delivery menus with fingerprints in Missy’s favorite sauces, some of which smelled spicy. Multi-colored letter magnets were assembled to spell YUMMY YUM BOX.

Ian had seen enough television shows on hoarders to know that the best parts of their hoards were usually inside their bathrooms and within their refrigerators. And by best, Ian meant the most totally disgusting and gag inducing parts. Ian knew Missy was disturbed, but probably not a serial killer. Still, he expected to find some seriously disgusting heads inside her refrigerator, heads of decomposing lettuce.

Keith looked around, just in time to stop his brother.

“Don’t open that!”

Ian’s hand froze a foot from the refrigerator door handle, which was caked with a substance that resembled yellow cottage cheese with black bugs in it.

“I have to.”

Ian was not going to let Keith deny him the satisfaction of seeing the grossness inside Missy’s refrigerator. He grabbed the handle, and as his fingers sank into the funk, he realized it probably
was
yellow cottage cheese with bugs in it. He yanked the door open, and immediately regretted giving in to his curiosity.

Ian’s error was in not considering all of his senses first. On television, he was only seeing inside those rank refrigerators. In person, the blast of rotten, warm air that hit his face was enough to make him swoon. He briefly thought of a giant monster with poison breath blowing in his face. Not only could he smell and feel the spoiled air, he could taste it. Many new species of mold were invading his system to fight for destructive dominance.

As the refrigerator door opened, dozens of little cockroaches swarmed out around every edge. Some of them ran around the handle and onto Ian’s fingers, causing him to let go and shake the bugs off. So Missy’s minions included the roaches, no surprise there. They were only protecting their queen, her palace, and their never-ending feast.

The door settled into full open position, jostling just enough to cause some contents on the inside shelves to fall and slide out. Everything inside the refrigerator was glistening and wet, also like the inside of a monster’s maw. As for the patches of quivering green fuzz, those were the monster’s cavities.

Everything inside the refrigerator was bathed in a sickly yellow light. At least that was working, because the cooling system was not. The shelves were packed with food that had transformed through fermentation. All packaging had erupted with green, black, brown, and pink putrescence, colors that should not be consumed. Solids had become gelatinous jellies or worse yet, soups. Ian was horrified to see some bugs backstroking in these spoiled pools. Food sludge oozed and dripped through the shelf racks.

Ian didn’t have to see a single expiration date to know that none of the food inside the refrigerator was safe. Eating it could not even be a consideration, he thought. Missy must get all of her meals to go or delivered. She must. Nothing inside was remotely edible, except to the cockroaches.

Despite his brother’s disobedience, Keith had his camera held out to record the refrigerator’s interior. He hadn’t counted on seeing this, but he wasn’t going to let such obscene conditions inside Missy’s house go undocumented. Will and Dani moved behind Keith and filmed the foul food storage over his shoulders.

Keith saw something inside the refrigerator that brought back a memory from elementary school, one that he had successfully suppressed for many years. On the middle shelf was a large, yellowish block of cheese, although he suspected that it had started out as another kind of food of a different color. There were countless little bugs, baby roaches he thought, crawling in lines that burrowed into the soft block.

These bugs were so small they reminded Keith of ants, in particular the ants in a glass case that had been temporarily displayed in his fifth grade classroom. The reason it had been temporary was because one afternoon, when the teacher had stepped out of the room, Keith had the not-so-bright idea of picking up the ant farm and shaking it, giving the little workers inside an earthquake. It seemed funny at the time, until he accidentally dropped it. Glass, soil, and ants exploded everywhere, and in his panic to sweep it up, dozens of the liberated little creatures had swarmed onto his hands, arms, and legs and bitten him repeatedly. He didn’t even realize he was cutting his fingers and palms on the broken glass in his alarm.

While Keith’s original intent had been to show off, he had ended up crying in front of everyone: the students, the returning teacher, and dour-faced Principal Haggerty, who had suspended him for two days and made him pay for it, which amounted to a month of lost allowance.

Keith tried to banish the memory as he zoomed in on the block of non-cheese and its minions. He was horrified to discover that the baby roaches really were ants, and his whole body shuddered. He was no friend of rats or roaches, but ants were the only bugs that profoundly disturbed him. Keith turned his eyes and camera away from the crawly critters and took a step back. He didn’t want to be too close, since he was convinced the ants carried a grudge and would want to bite him for killing so many of their ancestors.

The stench of the decomposition overwhelmed the furthest of them. Nearest the noxious box, Ian dry heaved.

“Close that thing!” Dani demanded as she turned her head away.

Ian grabbed the door handle and did just that. What a great idea that was of Dani’s, why hadn’t he thought of that? He was once again faced with the multi-colored phrase YUMMY YUM BOX. Ian understood its purpose. It was encouragement for Missy’s delusion.

Dani looked back, her eyes watering. “That made my eyes burn.”

“I may never eat meat again,” Will joked, and then thought he might not be joking, after all. He was not surprised that nobody was laughing.

Ian was relieved to have the refrigerator closed, and he noticed that he was shaking from his exposure to its interior. Now he knew just how bad it could get inside Missy’s refrigerator, worse than his wildest gross imaginings, but his curiosity was still not satisfied. He had not looked in her freezer. He remembered what had been found in Jeffrey Dahmer’s freezer. They weren’t heads of lettuce.

Keith saw his brother’s hesitation before the refrigerator and predicted what would happen next. He only had time to get out one word.

“No!”

Ian yanked open the top freezer door. He was wrong about this being Jeffrey Dahmer’s freezer. This was much closer to that ridiculous
Blob
sequel he had seen as a kid, where the monstrous slime was released from a similar suburban icebox. That film seemed not so ridiculous now.

The packed, no longer frozen freezer was one big cube of wobbling putrescence. The spilled vanilla ice cream had the same consistency as the liquefied brown meat beside it. White and brown slime oozed toward the opening, seeking freedom along with the little roaches that were in a skittering panic upon exposure to light for the first time. A blob really was on the loose.

Now that Ian’s curiosity had been satisfied, he regretted it. The fridge had been bad, but this was so much worse. That probably had to do with the fact that the freezer stored most of the meat, like Dahmer’s. He let out a lurching retch and slammed the freezer door.

“What’d you do that for?” Keith asked with exasperation.

“I had to see if she had severed heads in her freezer.”

“I’d prefer heads to that thawed diarrhea loaf,” Will admitted in all honesty.

“Damn her!” Dani cried. All of the guys turned to her urgently. “How could she!?”

The guys knew from her tone that Dani wasn’t reacting to the contents of Missy’s icebox.

Chapter Seven

Dani had her handheld camera aimed toward the object of her outrage, and that’s where the guys turned.

Back on one of the garbage mounds, beneath the raised cupboards, was a small cage. Locked in the tilted cage with little room to move was an emaciated cat. There were no water or food bowls in the cage, not that one bowl could fit inside with the poor creature.

Dani was consumed with a rage so pure, it scared her. Her worst suspicions about Missy had been confirmed, and she could not recall ever being so angry in her life. Seeing the cat skeleton in the basement had been bad enough. Seeing a live cat imprisoned in a cage too small for it, wasted away to a barely survivable weight, sparked an unexpected violent urge in her. She was not normally a violent person, and had never started a physical fight in her life, but she wanted to hurt Missy for hurting the cats. And if Fiddlesticks was found prisoner in this cat Hell, how could she possibly be expected to control herself? Torture would be too kind. The hungry cats could feed on Missy’s face after Dani was done with her.

Dani knew one thing for certain; Missy was going to end up behind bars for what she was doing to these cats. Hopefully the cell would be too small for her to turn around in and the bars would be covered in her shit. Dani would make it her own personal crusade to end Missy’s reign of feline terror.

Dani stopped filming, stuck the camera in her front pocket, and climbed onto the tall mound of dishes. Plates broke beneath her, and the mound shifted. Dani’s arms pin wheeled and she started to slide back. Will was there to catch her and aid her climb.

“Careful.”

Dani not so carefully scaled the mound, and more glass broke beneath her. She kept climbing, knocking loose utensils on the taller mound beside her.

Keith zoomed his camera in on the skin and bones cat within the cage. He focused first on the crap-splattered bars, and then on the trapped animal behind them. He had to get detailed footage of this cruelty before Dani set the cat free.

When Dani made it within reach of the cat’s cage, the hoard collapsed nearly a foot beneath her. Dani pitched to the left, just out of Will’s reach. Her empty left hand shot out and punched into a rotten, collapsed pumpkin. It felt disgusting, but it braced her fall.

Dani pulled her hand out of the rot. Her fingers were draped with withered pumpkin guts writhing with maggots. Dani didn’t care, and she didn’t hesitate to reach forward and open the cage. The cat was weak but hungry enough to escape its confines and slink off over the hoard, eager to find its next meal.

Ian was impressed with Dani. She had shown she had bigger balls than him. When his hand had been caked with wet wall rot and roaches, he had danced in disgust and flung his hand around like it was covered in cooties. He’d probably have done the same if he were in Dani’s shoes right now (
maggots, ewww!
). Tough girl.

Dani was relieved to see the cat freed of its cage, but the whole house was a poison prison to any animal stuck within its warped walls. She knew it wouldn’t take long for the hungry cat to find a meal, but it would not be a healthy one. Her anger had dissolved into a grim understanding that their mission into Missy’s house had changed. This wasn’t just about finding her cat anymore; it was about the liberation of Fiddlesticks’ entire species.

“We have to open some windows and doors, to let the cats out,” Dani said.

Dani no longer wanted to find Fiddlesticks here, better that her cat had just run away than become a malnourished prisoner inside Missy’s house. The pound was more humane and hopeful than this. Still, every sad and diseased cat in the house needed to be released, and together they could get it done before Missy returned home from shopping.

Dani realized that with all of the cats and food containers she had seen, she could not recall seeing any cat food, or cat dishes, or kitty litter. These cats had to eat and shit wherever they could. A fresh surge of rage strengthened her conviction of what had to be done.

Ian heard something shift above him, and he turned to the open cupboards. Crammed between garbage on the top shelf was another dirty cage with a starving cat stuffed inside. No food, no water.

“Up there,” Ian alerted the others.

Will’s height made him the natural go-to guy for the cage, and he stepped as close to the cupboard as the mounds would allow. He reached for the cage but came up a few feet short.

“I can grab it,” Ian offered.

“I got you.”

Will grabbed Ian around the hips and lifted him up. Had this been the high school hall, this could never happen without joking around or name-calling. But inside Missy’s house, they worked as an efficient team, and Ian’s added height above Will put the cage within reach. Ian unlocked the door and pulled it open. The cat sprang out of the cage to freedom.

Will lowered Ian back down onto the lop-sided ground.

Dani had to put her outrage into words. “That bitch hoards cats. And she wastes all this food on herself while she starves them.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen her buy cat food,” Will added.

Will was getting some disturbing insights into his least favorite customer. “She’s probably lonely and these cats are her only friends. And she doesn’t want them strong enough to escape.” Will further imagined the cruelty of Missy’s companionship. Crippled kids weren’t likely to run away. The cages were the chains for the ones that tried.

“If she did this to my cat, I’ll put her in a cage and starve her.”

Coming from Dani, Will took that as a guarantee.

Keith understood Dani’s rage, but he wasn’t overwhelmed by it like she was. He saw her seething (
and damn if she wasn’t still pretty even when she’s seething!
), with pumpkin guts and maggots dripping from her hand. She didn’t seem to notice, but he did.

Keith found a not-so-clean towel atop the hoard beside him, but there didn’t appear to be any bugs on it, which made it nearly clean for Missy’s house. He handed the towel to Dani.

“Here.”

“Thanks.”

Keith saw another towel that had been under the first, and he saw blood from his busted nose drip onto it. This towel wasn’t as clean as the one he gave to Dani, but there were no bugs, so it would do. Keith picked up the towel, and it came up stiff with whatever liquid it had sopped up last. He gave the towel a cautionary shake, and used it to wipe the blood leaking from his nose. The towel stunk of mold. The myriad bad smells inside Missy’s house were so potent, not even a broken, blood clogged nose could lessen them.

Dani was grateful for Keith’s offering. As she wiped off the squirming spoilage on her hand, she marveled that she hadn’t even noticed it. She hated any kind of worm or wet, slithery thing on her. She was alarmed at how many changes this dreary situation was bringing about in her, and how fast they were coming.

“We’re not leaving until every cat is free,” Dani stated.

There was not one dissenting voice among the guys. They all looked at each other and saw they shared Dani’s conviction.

Keith understood this change to their original mission increased the danger that they could be caught, but he knew that his well laid plan no longer fit their situation. Denying Dani was simply not an option. Plus, he had seen the squalor and cruelty firsthand. Denying these sad and hurting cats their freedom was not something his heart could condone, or live with.

“Let’s do it,” Keith encouraged them all.

“It’s the great escape, for cats,” Ian joked, although he wasn’t really joking. He expected Will was right about the cats being Missy’s only friends, and he couldn’t wait to see Missy friendless.

Dani led Keith, Will, and Ian through the culvert that served as their path. They passed from the kitchen into the dining room, although there was little to differentiate one room from the next. They were all hoard rooms, receptacles for every kind of junk imaginable, and unimaginable.

Dani was the first to reach the dining room table, which was stacked nearly to the ceiling and over its edges with everything from food and plates to boxes, appliances, books, and decorations, everything but the kitchen sink it seemed. Then Dani reconsidered; the sink could be hidden under the mountain of junk, since she hadn’t seen it in the kitchen. There was some space left underneath, and Dani marveled that the table could stand with a ton of overbalanced weight on top. Gravity was a fragile and extremely threatening force within these walls.

Underneath the table, which was never used for dining, Dani spotted an askew cage with a lethargic cat inside. She stopped to get under the table, and the others had to stop, unable to pass around her. When Dani’s hand landed on the cage door, she saw the reason for the cat’s lethargy. The lazy cat’s hair was a squirming fur of maggots. The maggots had a lot of life while the cat had none.

Dani rose without a word. She was past the stage of shock, but every new case of cat abuse she encountered added another notch to the belt of fury that was tightening around her. She knew there were more cages with living cargo to be found. Dani couldn’t let her rage slow her down.

The guys followed Dani past the towering table, and then they stopped behind her when she reached the next blockade. The next room was raised a couple of feet higher than the one they were in. The floor was not elevated; it was the hoard that was higher. There were no paths through anymore. The hoard was a rocky landscape, and they were about to traverse Planet Detritus.

Now that they were right upon the room, the sound of a television reached them.

“Think anyone’s watching the TV?” Dani asked.

“No, they would have heard us by now,” Keith replied. Ian felt uncertainty at Keith’s answer. Ian knew that the hoard absorbed heat. Perhaps it did the same with sound. He considered voicing his doubt, but he was too late.

Dani stepped up nearly three feet onto the next unstable surface. Will stood behind her, ready to help if she needed it. She didn’t, and Will wasn’t surprised. Ian thought he would go last, which was his permanent place, but Keith stepped aside and let Ian go third. Keith’s reason for standing back was the same as Will’s. He wanted to be in a more helpful spot in case his brother needed assistance, which of course he didn’t.

Keith followed Ian up, and thought it was ironic that he had started this mission with the intent to always lead, and here he was bringing up the rear. Keith didn’t mind, so long as his changed position brought added safety to the crew.

Had any of them known what was in store for them in the room they had entered, they would have aborted their noble cause and backtracked out of the house. They would have crawled back the way they had come if that’s what it took.

The good thing about living with regret was at least you were still alive to enjoy it.