“What To Do When You Throw Up Your Heart”
by Wren Campise
I threw up my heart last night.
I was just sitting at my desk when a sudden wave of nausea overcame me. A rush to the bathroom and a squat in front of the toilet later, there it was. Staring up at me, beating and writhing against porcelain.
Ba dum. Ba dum. Ba dum.
For a moment, I just stood there and stared at it. What does one do in such a predicament? I tried googling the answer, but it seemed even those reliable years old forums I always turned to didn’t hold the wisdom I desired.
Perhaps I should pick it up. It is my heart after all, and I might need it later on. If I pick it up from the toilet, should I clean it with soap and water or bleach? Perhaps wiping it down with disinfectant would be enough?
Maybe I should power wash it like the side of a house until all the gunk is gone and you could show it off like a dad at a barbecue. “Looks brand new!” And everyone would smile politely and nod like it was some novelty, acting impressed that you did it yourself and didn’t even have to hire a professional. They’d all conveniently not notice the specks of dirt in the spots you missed.
Or maybe it’d be better just to toss it in with the laundry. My mother would always have me separate my clothes into three piles: whites, colors, darks. Depending on the number of darks, you may opt to have a sub-pile for jeans. As for red garments, they were prone to bleeding their dye into the other clothes. Best to put them with the darks. The heart then, by this system, should probably go in with the darks. Though, now that I live on my own, I tend to just toss everything into the machine in one big pile. If there’s reds, I toss in a color catcher. Perhaps that would be the best method for washing my heart.
Ba dum. Ba dum. Ba dum.
Once the heart is clean, I’ll have to figure out how to get it back into place. The simplest method, perhaps, is to send it back the way it came. If I pinched my nose I’m sure I could bear the taste of soap, but I do have such a horrible gag reflex. I lived nearly twenty years of life before learning how to swallow a pill. And even now that I can, I’ll still end up in pathetic, retching coughs if I carelessly dart my toothbrush back too far when cleaning my tongue.
Perhaps portioning it would be better. I could grab a sharpie and mark it into sections A, B, C, so on and so forth. Or perhaps it would be better 1, 2, 3, so on and so forth. After I have it sectioned I can pull out a cutting board and the kitchen knife and separate it into mosaic tiles. I could then grab a fork and eat it from the bottom section up until everything falls into place.
Though, that squishy texture may not agree with me. Perhaps before cutting it I ought to grab seasonings from the pantry and make a dry rub. Nothing too spicy, I’ve always had a delicate palate. Then I could heat the stovetop and grab a pan. I prefer butter to oil when coating the pan, so I will take an appropriately sized slice of the slippery stick and cover the pan so that I am met with a delightful sizzle when placing the heart in. Once cooked to taste, I could remove it and proceed with the sectioning and cutting and eating.
Then again, one of the pieces may fall out of place, or perhaps the meat will just be too chewy for my taste. Perhaps I ought to take the kitchen knife and instead carve into my chest like a jack-o-lantern. When I was younger, I was always squeamish about scooping out the pumpkin guts and would take the spoon with the longest handle. In this case, a pair of tongs would do nicely to fix the heart into the cavity. Once done, I could replace the removed chunk of flesh to seal up the hole, keeping it in place with tape or glue or needle and thread. Prick, prick, prick, prick, until I have a sealed wound, still bleeding.
Ba dum. Ba dum. Ba dum.
No, the idea of reaching into the toilet bowl at all disgusts me. There’s a red ring at the water line, reminding me every time I see it that a clean is overdue, but I tell myself I’ll do it later. Or tomorrow. Or next week.
Suppose I flush the heart, since I don’t want to pick it up. Would it clog the pipes? Would I have to call a plumber and live with the shame of them seeing that red ring, thinking to myself when I go to sleep at night how it was probably the most disgusting toilet they saw all day. How they probably gossiped and laughed with their plumber friends about it.
Perhaps the blockage wouldn’t be that serious and I could take a plunger and deal with the issue myself. Push and pull and push and pull and here comes the clog, that still beating heart, now stuck to the end of a plunger. Then I can shake it out over the garbage until it plops amongst the used tissues and paper towels.
Would it be alright to let the heart sit in the trash for a while? Like the red ring in the toilet, the trash often overflows, lid on the bin half raised like a mouth screaming. Perhaps the heart would be fine waiting with the other garbage until I had the time or motivation or energy to deal with it.
Ba dum. Ba dum. Ba dum.
I have a headache.
Ba dum. Ba dum. Ba dum.
Looking at it makes me feel queasy.
Ba dum. Ba dum. Ba dum.
Perhaps I could flush it and it would be no trouble at all.
Ba dum. Ba dum. Ba whoosh.
Down the drain it spirals, and a somewhat concerning thump later, all seemed to be normal. The water had risen back up to its little red ring, no lower, no higher. The toilet soon went quiet, and I washed my hands with the gentle foaming soap, and I sat back down at my desk, back to my blue light and hunched back, and wondered if I should post the answer on a forum.
