WINNER, Summer 2024
The Screw Turn Flash Fiction Competition
BY CHRIS TURNER-NEAL
Honey, don’t pull those straps. You’re not gonna get out, I promise you. Gonna tell you what’s going on, if you let me. But if it comes up again—never take a drink you didn’t see someone make. Anything could be in there.
Now, let’s catch you up. I’ve always been able to do a little . . . trick. I call it “pulling,” I don’t know if it has a real name. I don’t know if anyone else can do it. I can pull hurts out of people. They still remember what happened, but the sting is gone. It’s the difference between a wound and a scar. Here, think of something bad that happened. I know you don’t want to, but do it. I’m gonna touch your hand now.
Oh, that was nasty. I’m sorry that happened to you. But think about it again. Doesn’t hurt, right? Like it happened in a book. Just a fact, not a fear. That’s locked away somewhere in me, balled up tight like a seed.
Now, I don’t remember the first time I did this. I’ve been doing it since I was a very little boy. It may well have been at the breast, taking hurts in with the milk. I know the first things I pulled were from my mama: things from her daddy, things from my daddy, all kinds of nasty. Lot of things. And it helped her, for a while. She got us out of that dump and away from my daddy, and I grew up mostly safe. But she was the kind of person who collected hurts. You know how after you kick a dog, it always expects the next kick? She was like that. And I kept pulling the hurts out of her and the sore places kept closing up, and eventually there wasn’t much of her left but scar. She mostly just looks at the TV.
I like doing it. If I’m careful, if I don’t pull too much, it feels like a good deed. Getting out splinters. Picking fleas off a cat. And it gets me a little high. Nothing wild, nothing like what I bet you get into, but the best hurts, the real sharp ones, burn like whiskey going down. I don’t like trying to figure out what that means, so I don’t think about it much.
I don’t have a boyfriend—never had one who stayed for long. If I’m around a guy too much I can’t help myself, I’ll pick at his soul like paint, pick-pick-pick. Like a fidget. Can’t let that happen too much or they’ll wind up like Mama. And also—guys wind up getting bored. With all their hurts pulled out they finally calm down and they don’t know how that feels, never have before, so they think I’m some sweet, boring guy and they let me down easy. Of course, with all their hurts picked off, I’m getting bored too.
I’ll tell you a secret: I used to pull from guys during sex. Right when they’re about to finish, their eyes lose focus and their strokes get jerky, I’d pull something. They’d think they were blowing the best load of their lives, and I guess they were.
Whoa! I told you those straps would hold. Now you’ve tipped your chair over. You’ll just have to listen to me from down there.
Now, as you might have noticed, people don’t feel it. Can’t tell it’s happening. For instance: remember when you came up to me at the bar? You put your hand on my back. I pulled something little out, then, as a taste—think about that dog that chased you when you were four or so. Not scared now. And again when you put your hand on my leg in the car. I can do it through thin clothes, like a t-shirt, but bare skin is best. Like for other things. And when you held onto my leg in the car, I got a real good look at what you’ve got carried around in you.
Can’t be sure—can’t see the future—but I think you were going to fag-bash me. Beat me up real good, take my wallet and whatever you could find, count on a poor bloody nelly to be too ashamed and scared to call the police. See, the only reason I can see this is that it’s tied to a hurt. You don’t mind that you broke that other boy’s teeth—you liked when you heard that second crack and felt a little more give when you connected with his jaw—what scares you is that you went home and jerked yourself sore at the thought. You sucked his blood off your knuckles, and that’s what made you come. And you don’t want to be a fag.
Oh, that hurt bad, thinking that about yourself. I swallowed it down like an oyster, big and fat and juicy. And I bet it’s not the only time—not the only time you beat the hell out of a guy you picked up, and not the only time you wanted to take his face in those big ole hands and kiss that split lip.
Now, see, I don’t know if this is clear: I keep what I pull. All those rapes and bankruptcies and dog bites and bee stings are up somewhere inside me, like a mess of spider eggs. And they stay locked away, most of the time, but every once in a while I’ll be sick or tired or just have the blues, and one’ll pop. And I’ll feel a hand on my throat or a fist in my kidneys. And this usually isn’t a problem—cost of doing business—but this past year I’ve been feeling full. Full of bad times, full of hurt feelings—puffed up like a big old mama spider, I guess. So I’m not gonna pull from you.
We’re gonna find out what happens when I push.
Chris Turner-Neal is a writer and editor originally from Texas. Formerly an editor at Country Roads and 64 Parishes, he now lives in Buenos Aires, Argentina. “Pulling” is his first published piece of fiction. Follow his antics on Substack.
