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Hunger. For the last few weeks, I’d been tormented by hunger. Or rather this is what I call it, because, actually, it’s not exactly the feeling that you experience when you want to eat. I just have a physical craving for something all the time. The problem is that I can’t figure out what it is I want. Now I eat constantly. I constantly eat and drink. And nothing helps. I heard somewhere that sometimes this is how your body tries to tell you that it lacks something – some minerals or vitamins. And once you find the product containing the necessary element, your troubles will be over.
It could be salt used for pickling vegetables or fructose from a strawberry cake. Pregnant women often experience such cravings, and then make their husbands run around the city like crazy in search of some exotic avocados stuffed with herring at 3 in the morning. But I tried everything I could imagine. All kinds of vegetables and fruit; meat, fish, sweets, pastries, ice-cream, the full McDonald’s and Burger King menus; fatty, salty, sweet, sour, cold, hot, and even disgusting food like canned spinach and fish oil.
I did the same with drinks – I tried twenty varieties of tea, several varieties of coffee, plus some strange herb blends and powdered roots. Nothing! I tried milk, yogurts, milkshakes, soy milk, coconut milk, almond milk, ten types of mineral water, and all possible kinds of soft drinks. It made no difference! I felt thirsty while I was drinking! I ate and felt hungrier at the same time!
I’d been searching the internet for several hours to find the answer. I’d looked through twenty pages of results from the search “why do I want to eat all the time” and found nothing useful – only forums for fatties and articles about weight loss. But I hadn’t gained weight! I eat all the time and don’t put on weight! And, strangely, my physique had only improved over the last few weeks! A week ago, I thought that I might get a six-pack any moment; now, I had one. With the way I was looking, I could beat any of those Victoria’s Secret bitches! The only pity was that my boobs hadn’t grown a hundredth of an inch bigger.
I knew that millions of people would kill for the opportunity to eat everything, not paying extra attention to training, and at the same time losing weight and building muscle. But the problem was that I constantly experienced that agonizing hunger that was driving me crazy! All the time! I read on the internet about the worms which Chris had mentioned jokingly. Some articles said that those disgusting creatures could cause increased appetite. However, other sources said that one of the symptoms of helminthiasis (which was the official name of this infection) was loss of appetite. Internet – what can you expect from it? Every issue there always has contrary opinions.
Anyway, I didn’t have any other symptoms – no fatigue, abdominal pain, diarrhea, or constipation. On the contrary, I was healthy and full of energy, more than I ever had been before. The only difference was my desire to eat constantly. I was about to go to the doctor, which, by the way, I’d never done by myself before; but fortunately, or rather, to my great regret, the reasons for me constantly being hungry revealed themselves.
I came home from school and, according to the tradition of the recent days, headed for the kitchen straight away in search of anything and everything I could eat. I had almost reached for the fridge door when my attention was distracted by some smell. It seemed very familiar but at that moment it somehow sparked a particularly strong interest in me. I turned around and found the source of it – a couple of big, juicy, raw steaks were lying in the kitchen sink. Mom had probably planned to marinate them for grilling.
Fresh and juicy. Very fresh and very juicy. I literally saw how they were still oozing with blood. Don’t know why, but I looked at them with acute fascination. And that tickling sensation in my gums – I felt it again for the first time since that disastrous trip to the cliff with Chris! Once again I felt like something was drilling at my gums from the inside. And I was still standing there unable to take my eyes off the steaks. I didn’t want to believe my eyes but the piece of meat I was looking at was definitely becoming brighter every second.
Something quite impossible was happening – I felt stabbing pain in my eyes as if I were looking at a light bulb, not a steak. And that smell! Usually, raw meat has a pretty unpleasant smell, right? It’s a raw, animalistic smell – not the nastiest one in the world but definitely not the one that anyone would put into a fragrance. To me, though, at that moment, the meat smelled amazing! My nostrils started flaring more and more. I tried to breathe in as much of this heavenly fresh meat scent as possible. Meanwhile, the meat continued oozing with blood. A small puddle of blood had already formed in the sink.
I unwittingly felt the urge to touch this blood puddle. I dipped my fingers in it and stirred them in the blood, trying to feel its texture. I took my hand out and brought it to my eyes. Blood stains remained on my fingertips. The blood was an insanely red color and even seemed to glow. I rubbed my fingers together, then brought them to my nose and drew a deep breath. Oh, yeah! That smell! I was lured not by the smell of meat, but by the smell of blood. How pleasant it was!
Suddenly everything reeled before my eyes as if this smell had intoxicated me. My consciousness switched off for a second and the next thing I remembered was standing before the sink digging my teeth into a piece of raw meat. I didn’t want to eat it, I was just clenching my jaws as much as possible trying to suck out all the blood till the last drop.
My inner hunger had awakened! It wasn’t a nagging feeling somewhere in my stomach anymore; it was a sharp, searing pain. But what was most striking – this pain was pleasant! With every bite, with every new portion of blood I was swallowing, the pain was increasing as if someone was stabbing me with a knife in time with the movement of my jaws. This knife was penetrating my entrails and the sharp pain was flooding my whole body with some endearing and tender warmth.
After every flash of pain, there came a moment of bliss. Every cell in my body was trembling with pleasure. I stopped sensing everything around me and at the same time felt all of the feelings at once. I wanted to die. I wanted to live. I wanted both. My God, it was devilishly pleasant! My vision had cleared a little after the original blurring and suddenly my eyes caught that part of the sink behind the tap that was adjacent to the wall. It was a flat surface from stainless steel which my mother polished every day, giving it practically a mirror finish.
I saw my reflection. My hands, holding a piece of meat, were blood-stained and the blood was trickling down my arms. My entire face was smudged with blood. But that wasn’t the most horrifying thing. My eyes…I saw my eyes. They were wild. The pupils had dilated so much that my normally brown irises seemed black. And they glistened… Glistened like they shouldn’t have. They glared like the metallic surface of the sink rather than the eyes of a human being.
Seeing my own reflection was like being punched in the stomach. I recoiled abruptly, nearly losing my balance. My right hand, still gripping the piece of meat, dropped weakly. My fingers unclenched and a steak fell to the floor with a hard smack. I kept looking at my own reflection. My lips, chin, cheeks, and nose were covered in blood. I started wiping my face with my hands nervously, but they were all covered in blood too!
I ran. I ran faster than ever before, even faster than I had run during our last game, where I scored five times. In a flash, I was already on the second floor and nearly broke the door to the bathroom trying to get inside as quickly as possible. I turned both taps on full blast. I didn’t care what temperature the water was – I just wanted to wash off all that blood as fast as I could. I put my face under a strong jet of water. The splashes flew every which way – getting on me, the walls, the floor. But I didn’t care that all my clothes were soaked instantly and the floor had turned into one big puddle.
As if possessed, I was rubbing my face and hands with soap. It was getting into my nose, mouth, and eyes, but I didn’t pay any attention to any of it, and just kept soaping myself as actively as if I were trying to wash off deadly toxic contaminants. Soon, there was not a drop of blood left on me. That calmed me a little. I turned the taps off and suddenly felt pain in my gums. It might have appeared earlier but only now was I calm enough to comprehend such an ordinary feeling as a toothache. This time it was not a tickle anymore, but quite a dull ache, similar to one that I felt in my childhood after losing a baby tooth.
Did I break a tooth on this damn steak? I opened my mouth to examine my teeth in the mirror. Oh, crap! I started back from the sink. I slipped andplopped slam-bang down, like some comedic cartoon character. I hurt my back, elbows, and my head. But it wasn’t time for estimating damage. I stood up quickly and approached the mirror again. “I might have imagined that!” I thought. “This time everything will be different!” I firmly rested both hands against the sink, moved my face closer to the mirror, and opened my mouth again.
Shit! Shit! Shit! I hadn’t imagined it the first time after all. In my mouth, like in that of some freaking tiger, were two pairs of big and sharp fangs and each of them was at least an inch long.
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