The Day Alfred Hurst Lost His Mind

“Honey, do you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

The first thing Alfred Hurst noticed on the day he lost his mind was the odd noise. An incessant tone that varied in no way whatsoever. It was like the barely there humming of an electrical appliance. Except Mrs. Hurst didn’t notice it. She didn’t notice it even after her husband requested that she put her ear to every single thing in the room that had a current running through it.

“Perhaps you need to pop your ears?” was her polite suggestion. “Or maybe you’re beginning to get sick?”

“Hmph. I take my vitamins every single day. I can’t be getting sick. I must have slept on my ears funny,” Mr. Hurst folded his newspaper and set it down on the table. “No matter. I must be off to work. You know that place would fall apart without me.”

The next thing Alfred Hurst noticed out of the ordinary on the day that his mind escaped from him was the damp spot on the collar of his neatly laundered shirt

            “That’s odd. It’s not remotely hot in here,” he mused while his fingers touched that spot on his jaw. He could feel that he was in need of a shave but that still didn’t explain the unpleasant wetness he felt against his skin. Perhaps it was hot and he wasn’t noticing. A shrug and he turned the fan on before returning to the numbers he was calculating.

Another sign came during his usual lunch at his usual restaurant. A large amount of pepper escaped from the shaker as he flavored his sandwich and this soon led to a sneezing fit. During one particular sneeze that was harder than the rest, he felt something slick come from his ear.

Looking around with bemusement, he didn’t find anything that looked as though it could have escaped from his ear, just a few flecks of an odd colored pink sort of substance speckled on the wall and oozing downwards.

“Ugh. Such a disgusting place. I’ll have to find somewhere new to eat.” Except it wouldn’t be the usual then and that thought made him feel queasy. Instead he ate his sandwich.

After work he went home and took a hot shower. He didn’t notice the next sign in the chunky liquid that swirled down the drain. He did notice an horrible smell that soon pervaded the shower.

“The plumbing must be acting up,” Mr. Hurst sighed. “I shall have to get Susan to call a plumber tomorrow.”

Feeling rather light on his feet and in his head, he strolled to the dining room table just as dinner was being set out.

“You look peculiar,” Mrs. Hurst’s concern was muffled by the beef in her mouth.

“I feel peculiar honey,” Mr. Hurst responded.

“Oh dear.”

“I’ll just drink more orange juice in the morning.”

The final sign was another one that he was far too busy to notice. A faint sloshing sound as Mrs. Hurst and he engaged in their monthly intercourse.

By the time he laid his head on the pillow and murmured an exhausted “sleep well honey” he felt as though he could float away.

The first thing Susan Hurst noticed after the day her husband lost his mind was the empty, cold spot in the bed next to her. This was followed by the sight of a strange damp puddle in on Mr. Hurst’s pillow, little ridged grey-pink lumps sticking out.

It was simple coincidence that the day Alfred Hurst lost his mind was the day that Susan Hurst lost her husband.

Author's Note

This story was the first written for my Advanced Creative Writing class. It is in the process of revision at the moment so any comments would be greatly appreciated.

Reviews

[R J Askew]

This feels more restrained than the stories I read from you a year or two back. i was afraid you might get too much into the course and sure enough this feels, well, restrained. There is nothing wrong with it, it hangs right, but... It doesn't turn me on. They probably set you a task and you wrote to it, but... I mean this guy seems fairly normal to me. I got labyrinthitis last year and really did feel nuts and I have had sex just once this year, so your guy is way ahead of me. People become much, much stranger after say 50. Oddities become more deeply ingrained and exaggerated. And people don't notice what happens to them.

[Mr. Misanthrope]

It's short, sweet, and enjoyable. It contains all the elements it should contain. It's simple and straightforward, though not necessaily eye-popping. For it's length, one can guess where the story is leading to, but this did not diminish any of the fright and shock I had at the end, possibly with the prospect of something as horrifying, albeit farfetched, happening to myself at some point in time. A cute attempt overall.

Luke