The man kicked his boots against the side of the house. The mud and grime that accumulated over his shift at work tumbled to the ground in chunks onto the snow covered ground. It blotched and corrupted the purity winter painting that surrounded him. His hot breath disrupted the crisp air.

He prepared to slip on his mask once more. It was a mask of his own flesh. He hated it– but wearing it was a skill he long ago learned. He had to. It was how he survived childhood, and now how he functioned in society. No one wanted a broken person, not even himself.

He could feel his soul seeping through. Spreading its miserable rot from the inside out. He felt the decay rake the underside of his skin. Grasping, clawing, gripping… but not breaking. Once it reached the surface something terrible would happen. After all, last time this festering took him wholly he hit a drunken brute and watched that beast bleed out on the floor. That was different, that wasn’t him– that’s what people told him. A beaten child that finally snaps and pushes back isn’t truly cruel– truly wrong. That monster deserved it– for he was the one who viscerally shoved this rot into the man's living corpse. Breaking skin and bone until the innards they were meant to protect melted into a toxic ooze.

Though filth squirmed under the skin, it was contained. He entered his prison. The smell of dinner cooking permeated the air. His wife was a great cook, or so everyone said. And perhaps he thought so in his youth, too. Now, however, the once mouthwater aroma of her stew only made him nauseous. He knew when he ate it later he'd taste nothing but his own bile.

As he took off his boots and put on his house slippers– of which his wife had lovingly made for him on their first anniversary– the woman had hurried to the door to greet him. It was the same thing every day so the man had grown used to this performance. A hug and a kiss as she welcomed him home. She always beamed seeing him, a smile he once thought lit up a room. The man could no longer see that, too distracted by how he wished to peel away every inch of his flesh she touched.

"How was your day?" She asked. Her voice, once angelic and sweet, was grating and shrill to his ears now. Like hundreds of claws trying to carve into his skull.

"Eh. Same shit different day," he replied, "What's for dinner? It smells good."

"Beef stew, your favourite! Come see." His wife had already started back to the kitchen, he followed her.

There their young son sat at the table munching on some vegetables the wife had set aside for him. He looked up from his snack and his bright emerald eyes widened. A gleeful smile spread across his chubby face. The remains of carrots stuck in his little teeth. It would have been heartwarming to someone less broken.

"Papa!" The dirty creature squealed, spit dripping down his puffy lips. He climbed down from his chair to toddle over as fast as his blubbery stubby legs would allow. His feet obnoxiously slapped across the tile floor with meaty thuds the whole way.

The man knelt down and caught his son, picking him up and causing a flurry of much more happy screeching. It tortured the man's ears nearly as bad as his wife’s voice. His disdain for the thing couldn't grow much more. The child was little more than a reminder of how that vile witch ruined his life– used him for her own pleasure and wishes.The only reason it drew breath was because she wanted it. He didn't even see it as his child. It was just her spawn. A manifestation of her desires he once felt he had to help bring to fruition. 

Still, his mask never slipped off his decaying interior. He smiled and gently tossed the boy up, never letting his son leave his hands for more than a second. "How's my little man doing?"

The spawn squealed and giggled, but gave no real answer beyond that.

The man's wife  looked at her husband and son with such a warm, soft expression. Bliss, maybe. No doubt she was admiring her loving, amazing family. The man hated that. He hated that he brought her any kind of satisfaction anymore. Perhaps he could get the axe out back in the middle of the night and free himself from these shackles– from this bitch and her pup. Though he knew deep down in the rotting quagmire of his soul he once loved that selfish woman. He once set aside everything to make her happy– as he thought a normal, unbroken man should.

 Besides, he thought, taking a blade to himself would be far more pragmatic. Satisfying, even. What better way to get rid of rot than to carve it out?