Carpet-Maker

Why am I here, and where is here? Eric thought to himself.  He had awoken to find himself nestled between and covered by several ruptured bags of trash, their dark emerald hues glistening with the morning dew.  The whole alley smelled of that particular odor one comes across when many different horrible scents commingle and merge to form a single, inscrutable foul stench.

He couldn’t be sure if he was what reeked of urine, as a considerable portion of what he could see was covered in various forms of human waste.  Human waste, and dew in various patterns on the ground, all covering what looked to be carpet.  He found the notion of a carpeted alley to be odd, but since he had spent a good many years homeless, he had seen stranger ways for people to bring what little comforts of home to wherever they lived.

As he scanned the area, he noticed a good many of the bags were filled with what looked like ground meats in various stages of decay.  He decided it was remarkable, because from what he could see there was a definite lack of trash, aside from the oozing bags of meat, rolls of carpet, and the occasional items of discarded food lying around.

A wind picked up and blew an even fouler scent from further down the alley, toward a tall, dark pile in a corner against a taller wall where the alley terminated.  It smelled strongly of rot and fungus, which stood out against the ambient stench of the whole area.

He tried to stand up, but noticed he was incapable of moving outside of rolling from side to side.  Attributing this to the mound of trash bags on top of him, he tried to move them away.  It was then that he noticed he was unable to move his arms, let alone feel them.

He looked down at his legs, something that he had previously never thought was necessary, and saw that his entire body was covered in one of the green trash bags.  He tried to scream for help, but all he could muster was a hoarse grunt.  He tried rolling out but he seemed reasonably affixed to the ground.  It was about that time that he heard a rustling sound from further up the alley.

The harder he struggled, the faster and closer the rustling got until the source of the sound stepped out from the shadows of the alley.  A fat, squat man with glasses stepped forward and took a closer look at Eric, who was struggling fiercely.  His shirt had an odd pattern, and he was almost bald, with his head and arms covered in only a scant few hairs.

“My oh my.  It looks like you are awake.  That’s unfortunate.  Another homeless person wandered into Tengenaria’s alley.  I do so love feeding them, but they always get too close and I just can’t help myself,” the man said, giggling with excitement at the sight of Eric’s far more frantic motions.

The man dropped to his hands and legs and began to eat from one of the ruptured bags, gulping and slurping loudly all the while.  Eric stared at him with all the look of disgust and horror he could muster.

“Oh,” the man said, taking note of his guest’s somewhat-apparent look of displeasure.  “Don’t worry your pretty little head about any of this.  I mean, really.  It’s going to pop off eventually.  I wouldn’t worry about it though.  But of course I wouldn’t.  That’s just me, though.  I’m really looking forward to when you are ripe.

With that said, the man went back to eating the meat-slime from inside the dark emerald green bag, its dew glistening in the morning light.  Eric looked around as much as he could before his vision faded and thought to himself, why am I here, and where is here?