Hands Off

Christmas, Mineral Man! shouted Twerpie. Get your hand closer to that press, it’ll be off!

What’ll be off? Hand or press?

Hand of course, Yowzie! Many names, have you—you have many names!

So’s ya’ cock!

Hah! Hah, hah, hah, Mineral man—look—boom! Another barrel bottom! Boom! That’s what you’re good for, Mineral Man! Boom! Work the press in the barrel factory. Drums, yah! Ever thought you’d be playing drums for a living? Hah! Get it, get it! Playing drums for a living? Boom! Hah hah hah. Boom! Add to ‘dat stack all day, Mineral Man! Boom boom boom and boom—don’t look away, Yowzie, Mineral Man! Watch what you’re doing! And not so close!

Boom! Hah hah hah hah—

But watch this—eyes closed—and even closer!

Boom! Hah hah hah hah hah hah HAH!

And now even and even closer than closer—

Boom!

GOD! spurted from the sudden spray of blood from the barrel bottom hammer-press.

—and anything created well is never created without a lot of heavy rhythmic pounding!

Lord God, what happened, Mineral Man! snarled Twerpie—your finger, what? Did the press clip your finger?

Jesus Christ, no—my whole hand! cried Mineral Man, grasping a handful of filthy cotton waste from a greasy drum to the side and smothering his injury, splattering the shooting blood out down and around.

Twerpie rushed up and pulled the big waste wad away from the other’s dripping hand, and a bunch of twitching interconnected bloody fingers attached by a thread of stretched flesh as from some huge chop, fell to the floor writhing and grasping and slid about six inches and stopped. The blood squirted from the open nozzle of the cracked open hole in the end of Mineral Man’s arm, and he grabbed the waste back from Twerpie and jammed it on and around and into the hole where the knuckled part of his hand should be, and the warmth came up, the warmth, and he peed his pants, and knew the shit’s next, and wanted to tear Twerpie limb from limb for causing his crushed hand to fall apart—but, we’ve a Mineral Man to rush to the Doctor; actually, to medical! Is medical still viable, what with how budgets are these days?

Come on, shouted Twerpie—let’s get you there before you bleed out!

Bleed out? said Mineral Man—is it really that bad, is it really? With this cotton all around my hand, it looks as a sheep in a great flock of hundreds, in the rolling green meadows, and I hear Sheep May Safely Graze, from my hand in the green, rolling, yes; the green rolling; yes. 

Sorry; not funny!

Twerpie rushed the fading Mineral Man down the hall bringing along the fingery meaty bloody-thing half-fist in a bag covered slimy with the filthy oily sawdust that coated the floor of the barrel-works. Here, there, come on, Mineral Man! Come one we got to get you to Medical, maybe they will Medivac you to someplace where the experts in the body, I can’t remember what they call them what do they call them? You know the ones, they wear white coats and carry stethoscopes and make their living off the sick ones and maimed ones and dying or dead ones who come for their help because of what Eve did way back when with an apple for a snake—come on, come on—maybe they can put your hand together again! If we hurry!

Jesus, Christ, my mother fucking hand hurts like hell! 

Come on man, let’s Rushmore to medical; we’re leaving a big bloody scene around, like we had an intact female cat in bed with us that’s in heat! Hurry up—this chopped off gore can’t be let to get stale. Can’t let it get stale—

Twerpie and Mineral man at last got in a queue behind a line of large men waiting to enter the medical department of the great barrel-works, and Twerpie was worried; very, very worried, that he would fail to get into the Medical Department in time for the slashed away gory hand to be reattached.

Finally they reached the doorway where stood the medical department’s admitting doctor. 

Doctor; this man’s hand has been sliced clean in half! You see, the barrel bottom stamping machine came down and—just look at the pain on his face! We need to fix this fast!

The doctor barely looked up. She just copied the name from Mineral Man’s nametag, looked at her watch, copied down the date, and crisply spoke to the men.

I judge this workman fit for duty. He should see his own Doctor, on his own time. So, go, take that filthy bloody piece of meat with you, and let the line of lazy men waiting behind you advance one notch. This is how it goes. This is how it has always gone. This is how it always will go. These jobs are the bottom rung of the ladder, you know, so what do you fucking want from me? Go. Out. Now. NEXT!

Held steadily up by Twerpie, Mineral Man resisted.

But no, you didn’t see, you didn’t even look! My hand is gone, it hurts like HELL, plus I am now a cripple, fit only to sit, and beg, and never wash, and obtain a mangy skinny dog to have with me to get sympathy, as I beg by the sidewalk on Main Street during rush hour! Look, look, look, LOOK!

The doctor spoke without even looking at them.

Listen son, no matter what you say, it changes nothing; I have spoken, see your own Doctor, on your own time, so do it as it’s always been done. Please leave now, NEXT!

BUT IT HURTS!

The corporate witch doctor had had enough. She turned and said, Leave! Leave now! Don’t raise hell! I will call security. I will see you are let go from the plant. Do not act inappropriately—do not scream! After all, this is a place of business. Now take that damned bloody thing you brought me out, and don’t try to phony up such a stupid injury again! That is obviously some bloody cut of beef you have mutilated to look like half a hand. And that wad of cotton his hand’s wrapped in—can’t hide the fact his hand’s as good as new. So; get it the hell out, or I’ll call! I swear to God, I’ll call. Then they’ll come and get you and you’ll be very, very sorry.

But he may die of blood loss! Look, look—look at the floor, it’s all puddling up—

No! Go! No one has ever died in the plant. Not on my watch. And nobody ever will!

Well, someone may this time!

No. No. Can’t be. Never be! Now go!

The slumped aside and leaned on the wall by the door as the doctor began treating the next man in line exactly the same, and the one after most likely, and most likely every single one. In the standoff of irresistible forces meeting immovable objects down in the gut of the buttcrack factory, pulled his eye. Looking down at Mineral Man, Twerpie suddenly thought something he’d never thought before.

Someone may be dying in my arms today. Right now.

Why are you looking so scared, Twerpie?

And it is after all, just half a hand, Twerpie?

That’s all. 

So.

Back at the unmanned barrel bottom stamping machine, the bloody bottom lay there quietly, until another worker was assigned. He saw the blood; he said, what’s this; and after he sighed, looked away, and murmured, Oh, well, then flung the bottom on the stack behind, pushed the button on the stamper, and everything already going on already, started up again.

Boom!

Boom!

Boom!

An’ et cetera.