Brad’s alarm skyrocketed as he lay on his back, wings buzzing, six spindly legs twitching.
He knew somewhere Sal was close at hand with a can of bug spray, but it wasn't his sibling that made the next move. Brad watched in horror as his father raised a cheap plastic flyswatter over him.
“Fuck!” The fly scrambled onto its six feet. He recognized the flyswatter – green handle and yellow plastic mesh on the business end – as one he had bought for $1.99 at the neighborhood dollar store earlier in the summer.
Jim had learned from his earlier failures and concentrated on predicting the insect’s path just as his transformed son managed to get himself airborne on unsteady wings.
Brad’s confusing but accurate bug senses warned him that this time he wasn’t going to escape his father’s aim.
Directing the flyswatter ahead of the fly’s flight path brought a triumphant grunt from Jim as the crisscross pattern of the plastic mesh slapped into the insect and forced it down with an even louder slap onto the tabletop.
“¡Tengo el tonto!” Jim proclaimed as Sal looked on with a smirk.
They heard a noise and turned to see Mark looking incredibly pale in the doorway between living room and kitchen, a small paper bag slipping out of his hand and falling to the floor.
Jim lifted the flyswatter off the pulverized remains of the pest.
“Someone’s finally home, papi,” Sal announced.
“I can see that,” Jim said, looking a bit worried as Mark’s body began to heave as the big guy tried and failed in a valiant effort not to throw up. Mark pushed his way to the kitchen sink.
Sal and Jim frowned at the sound of Mark’s violent retching in the sink.
“¡Limpia ese desastre!” Jim ordered Sal as he replaced the flyswatter on a wall hook.
Mark had turned from the sink in time to see Sal swipe up a mangled insect with a paper napkin. In an instant, he had buried his face in the sink, retching again.
He felt a powerful hand slap his back.
“You’re not doing so great,” Jim observed. “Will Brad be home soon or do you want us to stay?”
Mark turned only to see Sal drop a crumpled paper napkin into the garbage. His eyes fastened on the swaying lid on the bin for far too long.
Jim and Sal exchanged puzzled glances, but Mark finally staggered away from the sink.
“Maybe it’s best you go,” Mark said with a husky, strained voice.
With reluctance on Jim’s part, but almost eager readiness on Sal’s, they departed.
Left alone, Mark moved with dread to the garbage bin, pushed down on the lid and retrieved the napkin.
To his horror, Mark saw the lifeless, pulverized remains of something that vaguely resembled a housefly after he unfolded the paper napkin and had to face the reality that it could have all been prevented if he had arrived five minutes earlier instead of stopping for a coffee.