An odorless place
"I found some toilet paper!"
"No way!" Said one of my children, David, I think. One of the older ones.
"Is it scented?" Asked my wife, Barbara.
I pulled open the faded plastic packaging and breathed deeply into the soft white rolls. My face dropped.
"That's ok." Said another of my offspring. "Unscented is better than nothing."
"Just kidding!" I say. "It is scented! We found scented toilet paper!"
"Da-ad!" They all groaned.
Despite their reactions, I could tell they enjoyed the achievement that much more because of the subversion of their expectations. But, how had life come to this? Scavenging through old stores and super-markets for hygiene products. Finding joy in scented toilet paper? Well, everything had changed since the event, since they arrived and we had to start hiding our odors.
We began heading back through the deserted streets and parking lots, back to the pool where we lived. If we stayed out any longer in the heat we would begin to sweat.
"Hunny, I'm breaking. Hit me up."
I pulled out my Lynx Africa and sprayed directly down into Barbara's crotch, her most potent region. We hadn't seen any of the smellers in weeks, but that was no reason to get sloppy. Instead we continued to walk single file with the small child, Arthur, I think, at the front. He had lost his sense of smell last year during a freak bottle rocket accident and so it was best to keep down wind of him.
Barbara sniffed the air and became tense.
"Johnny?"
The little child at the front turned around to his mother.
"Did you break wind?" She asked in a whisper of suspense.
He looked confused, scared, frightened, all at once. I could smell it too though. It was shit. The smell of eggs and brussel sprouts. If we could smell it it meant the smellers would be down on us in no time. No sooner than I had thought that thought we heard the horrific sniffing. Sniff, sniff, sniff. The terrifying smellers were here like relentless aliens or maybe genetic experiments gone wrong. They bounded out of nowhere, blindly pursuing the smell emanating from the small child's anus. I tried to fan the air as best as I could, but it was too late. The smellers descended on the smallest of my many children and cut him to shreds with their constantly mutating claws, sniffing all the while.
That happened years ago now. I don't think about it all that much, though Barbara goes on about it a bit. Not even sure why I started my story with it to be honest. Probably could have given some exposition about life before the smellers when I could get away with one shower a week and not brushing my teeth.
"Dad."
"Yes?"
It was one of my children stereotypically breaking my chain of thought.
"It's my turn on the lilo." It said. "The chlorine is burning my skin."
"Sure."
I slipped off into the pool and began treading water.
"Dad."
"Yes?"
"What was it like in the old days, before the smellers?"
"Different."
"Different how?"
"Janey... can you imagine wearing the same pair of pants for a week?"
"No... Should I?"
"I used to have underwear with skid marks on them that could not be removed. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine that for me Janey? None of this washing three times a day."
Samantha had a little think about this, but it was beyond her. Too much had changed in such a short space of time. The world was clean now... It was an odorless place.
"The smellers, they're blind and deaf, right?" She continued.
"Sandra, you don't need-"
"They only have their sense of smell. Which is why they're always banging into things and running around in circles?"
"Yes, but it's a really good, refined sense of smell. They always get you in the end. Even if it takes five minutes or you have to help them a bit."
"But because they're deaf and blind and often miss when they attack, couldn't we-"
"Look, Suzie. You have the lilo, why not try and get some rest?"
"I just think if we got some guns and-"
"Dammit Suzie, don't you think we've tried!" I shouted, splashing some water at her with my fists.
"I don't know! You've never mentioned it!"
"Arggh." I said and swam away furiously.
Later that evening me and Barbara were acting as husband and wife in the shower room. I don't know if you've ever had sex in the shower, but it is not like the movies at all. Water might wash away odors but it is in no way a sufficient sexual lubricant.
"I've been thinking it's time for some of the kids to move out." I said, mid-thrust.
Barbara turned up the power of the shower and, as she did so, I thought I heard something from outside.
"What was that noise?"
Barbara didn't reply. She was oddly uncommunicative during sex.
I stopped making love to her and cocked my ear towards the hall. There it was again. Something like a deafening gun shot, or machine gun fire. And... screaming. Lots of screaming.
"Those stupid kids." I growled, wrapping a towel around my waist.
I found two of my children in the outdoor tennis courts firing heavy duty assault rifles at the smellers. A huge number of the hideous beasts were piling up, but there was no apparent end to their onslaught.
"Dad!"
"Yes?"
"They're not blind! We started shooting from inside with deodorant on and incense burning. They figured out where we were! They're not blind. They've just had their eyes shut!"
"I know. "
"You knew?!"
"Yeah. When they get shot or something they open their eyes. Makes them hella dangerous, but up until that point they just smell everything. It's why we call them smellers. Don't know why they do that exactly. Doesn't make much sense when you think about it."
"Dad!!!"
"Yes?"
But it wasn't a call for attention, it was a cry for help. The most precocious of my children had one of the open eyed smellers biting at her neck, with it's long blood sucking teeth covered tendrils dangling from it's anus.
I did the only thing I could do in the situation; I let lose the big shit I'd been holding in all evening. I did it right there in the towel I had wrapped around my dripping wet waist. It was the only way to save all the stupid children Barbara had kept giving birth to over the years. The fact that my life had become too tedious to bear made it easier, but I can also honestly say it feels liberating as an adult to intentionally shit yourself in the pursuit of saving others.
The smellers with eyes open jumped on me in an instant, tearing into my groin to such an extent that I would not survive, but my blood relatives would escape. In the years to come they would no doubt wonder why I had neglected to mention that the smellers could see but generally chose not to and, for a few agonizing seconds, so did I.
Credited to koalazeus
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