A Mixed Bag of Blood by David Bernstein

their sanitary napkins or tampons in his mouth and flushed them. They’d always get caught in his throat, the coppery taste of blood, usually mixed with their urine churning in his mouth, causing him to want to gag, but of course he was unable. Those were some of the times he begged for the janitor to come and plunge his ass clean.
    On the third day, a large beast of a man—easily three-hundred and fifty pounds of blubber—entered his stall. Peter trembled at the sight, trying to run, but of course remained as he always did.
    Most people, not nearly enough though, put toilet paper on the seat. This behemoth did not, simply sitting down bareback onto the filthy seat. Peter was afraid his old, decrepit porcelain body might buckle under the man’s girth, but he held. It was awful. The man let his saggy ballsack droop inside the bowl, touching against the inner lip of the toilet where tons of grime rested. Then the man jostled around for a minute as if trying to line up his gigantic asshole with the toilet’s opening.
    The things that came out of that individual were evil. Only Hell could produce such vile and foul beasts. Each log of shit must’ve weighed that of a newborn infant. It kept coming, like tubes of fudge at a chocolate factory.
    Peter fought frantically with every ounce of his being to run, but he was a prisoner; only able to watch and taste the horror.
    After the man flushed—smears of shit left around the porcelain like a Tupperware container emptied of fresh cake batter—Peter screamed with relief inside his head. But the man had simply flushed to make room for more. How fucking polite of him. Peter endured two more mouthfuls and flushes before the behemoth hefted up his jeans—shit smudges left on his left ass cheek—and exited the stall.
    After two months of enduring ass cheek after ass cheek, having almost lost his mind, Peter had decided he’d had enough. A customer had left the toilet clogged up with toilet paper and waste, not having the decency to flush. Peter, incensed, never having felt so much rage in his entire life, exploded within, and the toilet flushed.
    He’d never been so elated with joy in his life. It was a minuscule amount of control, but nonetheless he’d flushed by himself. He tried again to swallow, to flush, but nothing happened. How had he accomplished it, he wondered. Anger?
    He received no sleep—ever, as a commode. His nightly time was mostly spent alone, staring at the same walls over and over like some comatose mental patient.
    He ate nothing, not needing to, unless swallowing loads of people’s waste was considered eating. He decided to spend his down time thinking about himself, his soul, and his body. He allowed himself to feel the bugs and rodents that crawled on him instead of withdrawing into himself. A fact, it seemed, in which there was nothing he could do about it.
    After numerous tries at movement, his mind reeling from accomplishing so little, he cracked. Not literally, but mentally. Something inside of him snapped, like a brittle twig. His sanity broken.
    Like a mental patient amped up on methamphetamines, Peter went crazy, thrashing around in his mind. He did this for some unknown amount of time. Was it days? Weeks? He had no idea, but it no longer mattered because something incredible happened. The lid on the toilet sprang up. Concentrating, he was able to open and close it. Flushing soon became as routine as swallowing. He still couldn’t leave the stall, but something had happened that allowed him to become more a part of the toilet than ever before. He’d let go. Accepted his situation. In return, he was able to attain a portion of control back. He’d even grown bumps, like sharp plastic teeth that he could extend or protract at will along the rim and underneath the seat.
    Seething with the need for revenge, he waited patiently for the next customer.
    A young man, in his twenties, entered the stall a few hours later. After whipping out his penis, the