“Eli?” Adino rapt several quick successions on the door. “Are you almost done in there? I really need you to see this. It’s an emergency!”

What could be more important than my nausea right now? Elias thought as he watched the now-clear water still. Clarity was starting to return to him, albeit a little slow.

“Jus…gimme a sec—” Elias was cut off by another wave of bile. Except his stomach had already been cleaned out, so only acid came up this time. His throat burned and he felt like he was dying. Dramatic? For sure, but vomiting kept him from being able to breathe, so he’d take a stuffy nose any day over the relentless hell that was throwing up!

“Oh.” Adino said. “Oh, you don’t sound so hot. Are you seriously up-chucking my hard-made curry right now? What the hell, Elias! Shame on you!”

If Elias could flip his friend the bird through the door, he would.

After the second wave passed, Elias wiped his face with a wad of toilet paper that he tossed into the bowl while it flushed for the fifth time or so since he’d been stuck leaning over it.

“Fuck!” Elias went to sit back on his behind, but ended up falling backwards. He’d forgotten about his other problem, so he hadn’t thought to accommodate for the imbalance on his front.

“What are you doing in there, Eli?” Adino sighed on the other side, and it sounded as if he was pacing.

Elias slapped his hands down flat on the cold tiles on either side of himself and screamed. “What the fuck is going on?!”

“Uhhh, how should I know?” Adino shouted through the door, as if Elias was asking him the question and not the universe itself. “You’re the smart one!”

Elias groaned and rolled over onto his knees, careful not to squish his enlarged stomach in the process. He had to force himself up to face the mirror above the sink so he could take stock. Yep, his hair was still black—he’d just dyed it a week ago—and his eyes as green as a fresh lime with the same dark bags he wished would mysteriously disappear. For the most part, no part of him changed; only his belly was blown like a balloon.

And it was heavy.

“Now I know I didn’t eat that much curry…” Elias mumbled as he slapped the exposed part of his belly. The Jersey Devil T-shirt was too small to fully cover him now.

“Eli!” Adino pounded on the door. “Hurry up before I paint this ugly door green…”

“Okay, okay,” Elias sighed. He ran the tap and rinsed out his mouth, trying to wash away the lingering taste of bile. “Two secs…” he gargled the water and spat it back out. Perhaps he should start making a habit of keeping a bottle of mouthwash at work.

Elias opened the door just as Adino attempted to bash it, so the taller man ended up sprawled across the tiled floor.

“Oh sweet Allah…” Adino wheezed and rolled onto his side, hugging his own enlarged stomach. “Why didn’t you stop me…”

“You’re the one who rushed the door,” Elias said and stepped out from the bathroom. “You reap what you sow.”

“Why are you so mean to me?!” 

Adino cried crocodile tears as Elias waddled away from the restroom. He meandered through the break room kitchen and into the mini hall leading to the back part of the store where the pinball machines were lined up. There was a carpet path that edged around horizontal rows of shelves and went straight from there on, kept between the shelves’ ends and the glass case front counter, where it eventually ended at the store front’s exit. 

Elias walked this path to the front counter. He turned to his right—just before the exit—and walked around the counter so he could sit on one of the empty stools next to the newbie at the cash register. The lanky beanstalk hadn’t even bothered to glance up from his phone as Elias struggled to get through from behind him.

Opposite the front display case were the shelves, of course, but also a large eighty inch flat screen mounted to the wall. The placement was super convenient for if the workers wanted to watch a program, but also inconvenient when they had to focus on aiding guests, so Elias tended to keep it on a news channel. At the moment, some talk show host was going on about a random pregnancy, so Elias picked up the remote and changed it to the third channel for Menthol City’s local news station. And for some God-forsaken reason, the newscaster was also rambling on about sudden pregnancies.

“What in the hell is going on…” Elias pursed his lips and was about to change the channel again, when the scene cut to a video of a familiar old man with beady eyes and haggard hair clapping his hands several times and mouthing something inaudible. The footage was being displayed on not just one, but several of the outside screens across certain city buildings in the downtown area. The news cameraman captured both the videos and the horde of people who stopped to watch what Elias presumed to be a live demonstration.

“Wait a minute, I know this old fuck…!” Elias set down the remote and stood up, knocking his stomach into the glass case as he did so. “Son of a gun,” he groaned and slapped his hand atop the display counter to keep himself from falling to his knees. His stomach roiled at the abuse Elias had been giving it within the past ten minutes alone, and he swore he felt something kick from within.

“Eli!” Elias could hear Adino shout from back by the pinball machines. “How could you abandon me when I needed you the most?”

“Shhh,” Elias hissed and pushed himself back up onto the stool. He huffed as he snatched the remote again and increased the volume on the TV. “Not now, Dino. I’m investigating here.”

“What could be more impor—oh,” Adino ceased his waddling when he’d looked over at the TV. “It’s that kooky old man! From the con!”

“Yeah, that’s who I think it is, too,” Elias said. He squinted at the TV and continued to raise the volume so he could hear whatever the old man was saying. The news headliner read, “RETIRED DOCTOR CAUSES MASS ‘BABY BOOM’ USING HERO AND VILLAIN DNA,” but Elias wanted to hear the evidence for himself before coming to any conclusions. “Just be quiet for a minute and let me listen, okay?”

“What are you guys, old men?” the newbie chimed in, and Adino hushed him together with Elias immediately after.

“And there goes another one!” the old man laughed on the screen after clapping his hands. “That one was for Flame On~”

“Yo! Dino, how much did you eat?!” The newbie nearly fell off his stool in his haste to stand up.

“Uh, excuse you, Harvey, one doesn’t gain fat in one sitting!” Adino shooed the newbie away from him, for the young man had walked around the counter to inspect Adino’s stomach. “Don’t you touch me! It’s sensitive right now and I might throw up right on your face!”

Harvey held his hands up and stepped back toward the door. “Nope,” he exclaimed, “don’t want any of that noise!”

“Actually,” Adino flipped his hair, changing his tune on a dime. “Why don’t you go clean the bathroom and let us ‘old men’ work the front?” His smile could give grown men goosebumps.

“Tch,” Harvey clicked his tongue, sticking his hands into his baggy jeans’ pockets. “Always making me do the grunt work…”

“Every experience counts for that resume, Harvey dear!” Adino waved good-bye to Harvey as he passed by to the break room, pants sagging even lower in the process. “That kid seriously needs to rethink his style…”

“Dino,” Elias laughed, his attention long-since torn from the news. “You’re basically a kid yourself! Stop talking like you’re actually an old man.”

“But I have an ‘old soul,’ don’t you know?” Adino waggled his eyebrows as he waddled around the glass showcase. 

“Not with the way you dress,” Elias snickered and Adino smacked his arm after hoisting himself up onto Harvey’s stool. 

“Um, have you seen pictures of the eighties and seventies? Everybody was so colorful!” Adino rotated his wrists in the air, jingling the gold bangles on his arms. “If you wore blouses, then your tummy wouldn’t be showing now.”

“Dude,” Elias shook his head and raised the TV volume higher. “How am I supposed to prepare for freak accidents like this? A ‘blouse’ is the last thing I would think about. Now hush up and let me see what the hell is going on already.”

“Mmm, I wanna know what’s going on just as much as you do, too!” Adino said and readjusted how he was sitting on the stool.

“Gee, I wouldn’t have guessed,” Elias rolled his eyes, “you were only annoying me the whole time I was in the bathroom. Couldn’t even be bothered to ask if I was okay.”

“Yeah, because I knew it would’ve only aggravated you if I was in there, doting over you.” Adino raised both eyebrows, and Elias groaned.

“Oh sweet Mothman, you know that’s not what I meant…”

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While you wait for the next episode, try checking these other entries out. Links below (author desc)!

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