The empirical thumb

“Oh,” spoke Satogata, “what a splendid morning.”
“Nonpareil,” spoke Grunfeld.

Satogata looked around him and all the MPs, physicians, police, barristers were mimicking him. When he farted another farted; when he spat another spat; when he dropped his trousers and pissed into the river another dropped his trousers and pissed also.

Satogata was perplexed.

“Quit the mimicking,” spoke Satogata, vexed.

Inevitably the words echoed for Satogata was situated under the bridge in the muddy puddle.

“I’ve had enough of you lot,” spoke Satogata. “There was a time when this place only received the best.”

Satogata had one thumb up his nose and the other was situated up his arse. He coughed and bellowed but still he could not clear the pipes. He was under the weather and pleased. His arse had been running all night and now his nose was finishing the race.

“Excuse me,” spoke a lady steeping out of the nebula.

Satogata shook his head in disbelief. Perplexity produced a myriad of silent farts, but the thumb saved him from opprobrium.

“I’m not dead,” spoke Satogata, lost in pusillanimity.

“Thank him upstairs for that,” said the lady.

The lady was all smiling teeth and unblemished complexion. Her fur coat emitted rose water. The hair was cut short and purple. She looked as though she hadn’t done a day’s work in her life, but neither had Satogata. Was she a philosopher, also?

“Spare me some copper,” spoke Satogata.

“I’ve no coin,” spoke the lady.

Something metaphysical told Satogata that he was not about to get a free copulation.

“I’m a writer,” spoke the lady.

“What do you write on?” spoke Satogata.

“Paper,” spoke the writer.

“A boring topic,” spoke Satogata.

The writer frowned.

“What do you want?” spoke Satogata.

“I want to ask you a question,” spoke the writer.

“Please do,” spoke Satogata.

“What’s it like being homeless?” spoke the writer.

Satogata took the thumb from his rectum, stood up, and shoved the thumb down the writer’s throat. The excreta upon the buried thumb quickly started to dissolve the lining. The writer gagged, retched, puked. The vomit was futile in removing the excreta from off the thumb. It was concrete. Teeth bit down upon the thumb. But teeth are useless against concrete, I have been told. The vomit warmed Satogata’s thumb and eased the squeeze of the fur coat.

“That’s what it’s like,” spoke Satogata.

Satogata pulled his thumb out of the writer’s mouth with a pop and stuck it in his own. He sucked the excreta and viscera off his thumb and dried the shimmering thumb upon the dirty rag that was his coat.

“I’m going to call the police,” spoke the writer, drowning in tears.

“If you do that,” spoke Satogata, “I’ll be longer homeless.”

“You evil man,” spoke the writer.

“What?” spoke Satogata, incredulous. “For free I have presented you with a great gift. As the acid in your gut works, as shit in your gob attacks your teeth, think of me.”

Paul Kavanagh