He would enter Burger King every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. He was a regular, and I hated him for it. Who comes to a fast food restaurant that much? It made me sick. He’d come thundering in on those giant legs of his, sweating no matter what the weather was like, his rolls of fat lolling under his overly large t-shirt, like it had a mind of its own. He’d come up to me, stare up at the glowing menu, squinting his fishy blue eyes, and order three extra large value meals in his high reedy voice. He would eat it all, shoving fistfuls of fries in his mouth, taking a break every now and then to guzzle from one of his many drinks. Sometimes it even looked like he was crying, like he was that happy to eat the food.

And every time, without fail, he’d come up and order an ice cream cone. He’d shove it down as if eating it was the hardest thing ever, and he would leave looking like the saddest person in the world. It would just piss me off some more. Why eat the cone if you can’t even enjoy it you fat fuck!?

I gotta tell you, he wasn’t always so big. That’s what makes me the angriest of all. It was around three years ago; I started here and noticed him. He looked like any old football player or wrestler, letting his muscle fade into fat with age and apathy. His order got bigger as the months passed, just as his waist did. His blue eyes, once so clear, turned watery and filmy, making him look even more like a dumb shit. But my manager ingrained in my head the idea that the customer was always right. Another shithead there.

How could I tell fatty he shouldn’t eat here anymore?

His name was Ted, Fred, or something like that. Maybe even Bob. He told me once, but I quickly forgot it. I just called him Elephant. It fit him better than any other name I could think of. I tried Piggy for a bit, but I didn’t like it as much, even though he did eat like one.

And then one day, Elephant just didn’t show up.

“Hey, Timmy, you can drive, right?” It was my prick of a manager. I tried not to flip him off.

“Yeah, why?”

He looked around, smiling a little nervously, then he handed me two giant take-out bags. “Could you deliver these… please?”

I looked at him in disbelief. I had to deliver fuckin’ fast food! Whoever ordered this had to be the laziest piece of shit ever. I wanted to punch a baby. They called it fast food for a reason. My manager gave me the address, and I drove to the house muttering angrily to myself the whole way. I jogged up to the door and rang the bell, eager to get the hell out of there.

“Come in, the door is open.” The voice sounded thin and hollow, like it came from far away. I opened the door and stepped into the gloom.

“Please close the door. The light hurts my eyes.” I closed it with an involuntary gulp, and waited a bit for my eyes to adjust. I gasped. It was Elephant! Only this time he was larger than I had ever seen him before, looking more like Jabba the Hutt than a human.

“Please put the food here,” He motioned to a table next to him with one of his arms, an arm that looked freakishly small in comparison to his massive body. His voice still sounded hollow and distant even though I was way too close .

I put it down, and quickly backed towards the door. I couldn’t believe how much Elephant had changed since I saw him last. As he pulled a burger from the bag and shoved it into his mouth, I couldn’t help but be mesmerized by his grossness. I even dared to ask, “Why do you eat so much?”

He sighed, sending a ripple through his body. “Should we tell him, brother?” it was more to himself than me. His belly rippled under his shirt. I took a step back towards the door.

He looked at me with those fish-like eyes, watering already. “I eat so much…so he doesn’t consume me,” he said as he lifted his overly large T-shirt. And there, where his belly should be, was a large throbbing pinkish growth. I was hypnotized by it, watching the slime slide down its side, the bluish veins beat with his heart, the tubes widening as blood rushed through them. A sound that was like boots being pulled from the mud came from the growth, and my stomach squeezed itself into knots. My vision tunneled, so all I could see was the pink growth and its blue veins, lying where the Elephant’s stomach should be. I shrank back when it shifted towards me, showing strange side growths with tiny black dots at the end. Two red lights, glowing like LEDs, lit up on it and I sank to my knees.

Every night since then, I sleep with the lights on, shaking at every small sound or scrape. I don’t care what other people say. They never saw it. I’m just glad that I forgot Elephant’s name, so when and if he finally is consumed, I’d be blissfully unaware. I think I would lose it all if I knew it was roaming out there somewhere.

And as the night deepens and sleep claims me, I always have the same nightmare. I’m always standing in that damn living room, watching Elephant’s pudgy hands lift up that shirt, and seeing that too-human form throbbing, sucking away at his stomach, making a cave for itself in his abdomen. But it’s always those eyes, those damn eyes! They glowed a fierce red, and twinkled with mirth, as if that thing enjoyed consuming Elephant’s body.

Frank Etzler is a junior Biological Sciences and Anthropology major and a Literary writer for Generation.