May Contain Nuts!

Once upon a not that long ago, there was a 21 year old boy by the name of Jack. Jack had the world at his feet. His life was perfect. He had a great, steady job that made him a nice amount of money and he had a beautiful girlfriend by the name of Jill. Jack was entirely devoted to Jill. They were high school sweethearts and had been together for about six years. They’d first met while going to fetch a pale of water from the top of a hill. Jack had a nasty accident and Jill saved him for certain death. Since then they become kindred sprits, or so Jack thought.

Every relationship comes to an end at some point, and while Jack was thinking that his relationship would end when one of them died; from old age of course, no murdering each other, he was wrong.

It was a cold Tuesday afternoon in February when Jill broke the news to Jack. As they sat down to eat dinner at a cafe. “I think we should see other people,” she muttered after a long sip on her warm coffee. Jack was shocked by the news. His eyes instantly welled up as if he’d just been kicked in the balls, in fact, this pain was worse than getting kicked in the balls, this pain was worse than smothering your balls with dog food then letting a pack of rabid wolves feast on them. This pain was heartache. It greets many a man by the a few words from the female they idolise so much. Instant pain, instant feelings of failure, instant thoughts of suicide – the usual response to this happening. And it’s exactly what happened to Jack. He struggled to find the right words. In his mind he attempted to convince himself that if he said the right thing she’d stay. So he pushed out a sentence threw his blubbering lips, “Me love you, don’t do this. Me! You! LOVE!! PLEASE!!!” This caused an old couple to stare at Jack and Jill as Jack sobbed, tears running down his cheeks and collecting nicely into a puddle on his plate. Jill stood up, “I’m sorry Jack, I really love you. Well no, I really loved you. But I want more; I’m too young to be tied down to one man. I want to enjoy life a little.” It seemed that financial stability, handsome good looks and repetitive sexual pleasure weren’t enough for Jill anymore. As Jill started to make her way out of the cafe, Jack dropped to her feet holding on to her as a child holds on to their mother at their first day of school, not bearing to let go because of the fear of being alone. “Come on Jack, it’s not that bad.” She said, only prompting Jack to re-evaluate what the fuck they’d spent the last six years together for. As Jack’s grip around Jill’s legs loosened she briskly strolled out of the cafe and on to her new life without Jack. As Jack lay on the cafe floor crying like a new born baby, as the entire population of the cafe looked on.

The next few days of Jack’s life were spent sitting on his sofa, self-loathing, drinking anything alcoholic and texting or ringing Jill until she finally blocked his number. His friends had told him that over time he’d feel better, but Jack was thinking more along the lines of a bullet threw the temple would make him feel better. Much fucking better. While Jill was out enjoying her new found freedom by going to raves and sleeping with the first guy that bought her a bottle on Smirnoff Ice.

After a week, Jack was supposed to return to work. He’d managed to convince his boss that he needed a week off for personal reasons. Jack didn’t return to work, so he was fired. After loosing his job, Jack decided to move out of his flat and back in with his mum, seeing as he could no longer pay his rent. After about two weeks his mum got tired of the lifeless cycle Jack was living in and decided to get in touch with her brother, who just so happened to have a holiday home in the highlands of Scotland. Tired of Jack’s constant misery she planned a little get away for him.

Although Jack wanted to stay at home eating cold beans from the can with a tea spoon, his mum forced him into the car and drove him to his uncle’s house in Scotland. The idea was that Jack could get away from it all and get himself back together. His uncle had even set up a blind date for him with a pretty young girl from the next village. She just happened to be a friend of the family.

Jack got dropped off at his uncle’s holiday home and resumed the same position he did at his own house; sat on the sofa watching daytime TV drinking Jack Daniels straight from the bottle. It was a Thursday when Jack arrived. His random blind date was going to be on Saturday. Jack’s uncle had promised Jack’s date a great night in with Jack, they’d watch films and Jack would cook a meal for her.

By the time Saturday morning rolled around Jack was in such an alcoholic state he could barely move. He was wearing the same clothes he arrived in and he had the slight stench of piss about him. That’s when Jack reached the end of all the alcohol in the house and had an epiphany. That the drink wasn’t helping him get over Jill, he needed to try something else. He contemplated the matter a little, trying to decide if he should get on with his life or start self-harming. As he walked into the kitchen to get a knife to cut himself, he stubbed his toe on the door frame and let off a girlish squeal. Jack had felt some much emotional pain recently; he’d forgotten that physical pain still hurt too. So in the end he reconsidered slitting his wrists, maybe it was time he got his life back on track.

It was almost 2.00pm; Jack’s date was expected to arrive at 6.30pm so he had plenty of time to sort himself out. First thing he did was take a nice long shower. After he got out he felt like a new man, the water had washed away the self-loathing and misery to some degree. The shower acted as a cleansing process for Jack.

After his shower, Jack got dressed into some clean clothes and he did his hair. He was looking the best he’d looked for weeks at this point. And as he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, he knew it.

It was 4.45pm by the time Jack started to rummage around for some food to cook. But sadly there wasn’t much choice. He had been told by his mum that he needed to go shopping; she’d even left him some money to spend on food. All Jack could rustle up was some frozen vegetables and a couple of oven chips from the freezer. Everything else was out of date or had already been eaten the previous days by Jack.

Jack had a plan though, he searched high and low for the Yellow Pages and started to look up local takeaways, once he’d found one he copied the number down. He pulled out his phone only to find he had no reception. This was a major problem in his uncle’s holiday house. There was no house phone either, Jack’s uncle only spent around four weeks a year up here so he never saw the point of having a phone line put in. Jack contemplated going into the village to buy some food but without a car or a bike, it would take him about 40 minutes to walk there and another 40 minutes to walk back. By which time he’d be behind schedule.

This is where Jack had a brainwave. He remembered that when he was younger and he used to come to his uncle’s holiday house, his uncle and granddad used to shoot squirrels on the back garden with a pellet gun. Jack darted to the back garden, found the pellet gun and waited.

Jack was just about to spark up another cigarette when he saw two squirrels in the distance, he started to shoot; Rambo style hitting anything that moved. He ran up to find that he’d shot them both; one was dead and the other alive but was in pain. Jack decided to do the humane thing and mashed the life out of the one in pain with half a brick. He walked victoriously back into the house with his kills inside a plastic bag, blood dripping from the small holes in the bottom.

Once inside the kitchen Jack had to skin the squirrels. This was harder than he expected. He tried to grate the fur off first with a cheese grater, which went terribly. In the end he opted for the bread knife. By the time all the skin and fur was removed Jack was left with only a little bit of meat and organs, he wasn’t sure which he could cook and what he should trough away. He picked threw the massacre and began dropping the parts of the squirrels that he thought looked tasty into the frying pan.

Jack had a quick tidy up in the kitchen, mainly cleaning up blood and squirrel brain-matter off the side, and then he went to change his t-shirt, which was also stained crimson. Once Jack returned to the kitchen it was 6.00pm, his date would be arriving soon, but everything was going well; the oven chips were in the oven, the squirrel was frying nicely and the vegetables were waiting to go on the hob. Jack caught a reflection of himself in the kitchen window and gave himself a self-gratifying smirk.

At a few minutes before 6.30pm there was a knock at the door. Jack quickly went to open it, as the door swung open there stood a pretty girl, with long brunette hair caught in the wind was waving across her delicate face. Her cheeks were red from her having to ride her bike up to the house. Her eyes were green like the first leaves of spring. As Jack stood in awe of her, he wouldn’t have even been able to tell you Jill’s name at this moment in time.

After an awkward couple of seconds of silence, in which Jack was just memorised by this girl’s beauty, she introduced herself, “Hi, I’m Louise”. Jack snapped himself back to reality, “I’m Jack, it’s a pleasure to meet you, please come in.” Louise locked her bike to the fence and entered the house. “Something smells good, what you cooking?” Louise asked. Jack struggled trying to come up with a lie, he didn’t want to tell her that he was cooking squirrel, “Erm... it’s an old family recipe.” They made there way into the dinning room, where Jack had set out a table with cutlery and a vase with a flower in the middle of the table. “Everything looks so great.” Louise said. “Why thank you, you just take a seat and I’ll be back with the food soon.”

Jack went into the kitchen and started dishing out the food onto two plates. We carefully carried the meals into the dinning room, clutching the plates tightly so he didn’t drop them. He cautiously placed the plates on the table. Louise inspected her meal; Jack’s heart began to race. He plucked up the courage and asked; “Is everything ok?” Louise poked at her vegetables and the fried squirrel then looked up, “No, it’s fine, it’s just I have a few allergies, but there’s nothing to worry about.” And she smiled at Jack, he smiled back.

They both sat down and began to eat. Jack tucked into his squirrel, and it was surprisingly good, a lot like chicken he thought. He glanced over at Louise as she took her first mouthful of squirrel. He was waiting for her reaction. She chewed it and swallowed it. A massive weight was lifted of Jack’s shoulders, she had no idea, he was extremely proud of himself. But just as he was about to ask Louise about herself, her face started to go red and she began coughing slightly.
“Is everything ok, Louise?” Jack asked. Her face was getting redder with every second that passed, she started to hyperventilate. “What’s... the ... meat?” she asked. Jack started to panic slightly, “Does it matter, it’s just meat? You’re not allergic to meat are you?” Louise shot him a cold look; a chill went down Jack’s spine. She didn’t need to ask again. “It’s squirrel, it’s a long story, I’m sorry! If you don’t like it don’t eat it!” Louise had a look on her face like a judge had just sentenced her to death. “I’m ... allergic ... to NUTS!!” she said, in between deep breaths. “So? What does that have to do with anything?” Jack asked. “Squirrels eat ... NUTS!!” Louise said as loud as she could. “My throat’s closing up!” She squeaked in a high pitched tone.

Jack started to panic; he pulled out his phone and tried to dial 999. No signal, again. Louise reached for her phone, but it had the same problem. Louise collapsed to the floor, clutching her throat. Jack had to do something quick. There’s no way he could call for an ambulance, the only way into town was on Louise’s bike, but he couldn’t leave her on her own, plus it would take too long. Jack dashed into the kitchen and started to rummage in a draw for a pen, he returned to the dinning room where Louise lay on the floor.

“I have a plan,” he said, “I’m going to give you an emergency tracioctomy!” Louise looked deep into Jack’s eyes as if to ask if he knew what he was doing. “Don’t worry; I’ve seen it before on ER!” Jack said. He removed the ink tube from inside the pen and plunged it into Louise’s throat, just above her ribcage. Her chest inflated as she took her first breath. It had worked, but blood was seeping from the hole. “What does it look like?” Louise struggled to ask. Jack was hesitant in responding but finally mustered up something to say, “It looks like your necks having a period!”

What Jack didn’t release is that blood was slowly filling Louise’s lungs. He’d saved her from not being able to breath but now she was going too drowned. Neither Jack nor Louise realised this, it happened in only minutes. After the first initial shock of dodging death they thought they were in the clear. But as Jack sat by her side, Louise slowly drifted off and never came back. Now Jack was left with a dead body and no idea what to do with it. The police wouldn’t believe his story, he’d be going down for manslaughter. He’d only just realised that his life was worth living today, he didn’t want to spend it in prison.

He left Louise’s corpse on the dinning room floor and he slowly made his way to the living room to sit down and formulate a plan. Then there was a knock on the door. Jack sprang to his feat. Panicking, he slowly made his way to the door. “Who is it?” He asked. A million things ran through his head, was it the police? Was it his uncle? Was it Jehovah’s Witnesses? “Jack, it’s me ... Jill! Please let me in. I need to speak to you.” Jack couldn’t believe it, why had she come to see him. This is the last person in the world that Jack wanted to see, he actually wished it was the police. “One second,” Jack said, as he darted back into the living room, closing the dinning room door so Jill wouldn’t see Louise. Jack returned to the door and let Jill in. She simply walked passed him, dropped her car keys on the table by the door and went to sit down in the living room.

“Jack, I’m sorry about everything I’ve done and said to you. Please forgive me. It’s only now that I’ve really understood what you meant to me,” Jill said as she started to pour her heart out, “I love you so much Jack, I want us to get back together. Please take me back!” This is the speech that Jack had been dreaming of ever since that day in the cafe. “Please Jack,” she continued, “I’ve drove all the way here to see you. I know it’s a shock, I’ve tried calling you but I couldn’t get through to your phone. I know this is totally unexpected.” Jack could barely pay attention to what Jill was saying; he was too busy thinking about Louise. He even contemplated murdering Jill, to cover up what he’d done. “Jack, please say something...” Jill begged. Jack struggled to come up with the words, but finally managed to say, “I need some fresh air, I’ll be right back.” Jack strolled out the living room and to the door. He picked up Jill’s car keys on the way out.

As soon as the fresh air hit him, Jack knew what he had to do. He jumped into Jill’s car and sped off towards town, as Jill heard her car drive down the hill she ran to the door screaming for Jack to return.

It took Jack about ten minutes to get into town. He pulled up outside the police station and made his way inside. As he approached the desk, he knew what he was going to say. He was going to admit to what he did, but as he tried to explain to the officer at reception, something different came out of his mouth, “My ex is trying to kill me!” he said. The officer instantly dropped his cup of coffee.

“I beg your pardon, young man?” the officer asked. Jack looked him dead in the face, tears trickling down his cheeks, “My ex-girlfriend has just turned up to my uncle’s house. She found me with another girl. She’s killed the other girl. Louise is dead! It’s my entire fault! Now she’s trying to kill me, but I got away.” The officer radioed all officers; Jack gave him all the details of where to go. A police woman appeared from behind reception and lead Jack into a room to comfort him.

Only a month later Jill was in court going up against charges of murder. Jack took the stand and gave a damning version of what he’d told the police officer at the reception desk four weeks before. But luckily he’d had time to practice. He delivered a tale of a bitter ex hell bent on getting the love of her life back by any means necessary. It was extremely believable, the judge and jury ate it up liked it was grilled squirrel. Jill was sentenced to life in prison. She denied Jack’s story of course, she really was innocent, but so was Jack, why should he go down?

Jack was proud of what he did; he saw it as the ultimate revenge. She’d victimised him, now everyone could see he was the victim. She’d almost destroyed his life when she left him, so she could go out fucking and sucking random guys from nightclubs.

Jack is now in a new relationship with one of Jill’s best friends, he his happy. Jill is now in a relationship with a butch dyke in prison, she is not happy.