Everett had never been adept in the art of being alone. He strove his entire life to find himself in the position of a codependent relationship that would enable him to remain convinced that he was not truly alone despite feeling as such constantly. Almost as constantly as having his balls pecked at by whatever current hen he had settled for in all his wisdom as a man driven to act upon romantic relationships by his loneliness. The latest edition to his ever-expanding arsenal of soon-to-be exes was Valerie, who rather hated the Amy Winehouse song of the same name as it took her back to a certain time in her life that she would have preferred to forget. She would never say what specifically, save for that it reminded her of, naturally, an old flame. Everett surmised that it was something whoever this twat was enjoyed playing for her during his shitty and sparsely attended shows at DIY venues. He was a musician, after all.

This was in sharp contrast to Everett. Hopelessly responsible and tax-paying Everett. He had once dabbled in sculpture and ceramics in his more bourgeois youth, but that gave way, inevitably, to teaching art as opposed to creating it. He didn’t mind, really. Didn’t feel the pull or the urge to return to the medium in his “spare” time, which he settled upon using for the atrophy that came with playing video games. The mind-numbingness of it soothed him, even if it drew looks of contempt from every single one of his girlfriends, Valerie included.

It was, in fact, one evening when she came home to the sight of him tinkering with his “joystick” that she decided she could take his resignedness no more. “I’m leaving you,” she announced firmly and without any delicate segue. “I’ll be out by the end of the week, and don’t bother trying to talk me out of it.”

Everett was stunned by her coldness, just as he had been with every other blunt force trauma of the breakup he never wanted to see coming. How could she? Hadn’t he been kind to her, treated her well? Better than she deserved, even? Apparently not. Or at least, his generosity was never enough for any of them. Never deemed valuable enough for them to see that they ought to stick around. Wouldn’t find a more accommodating soul out there. But with Valerie, he really thought it would somehow be different this time. That she was more intelligent than the others, and would therefore comprehend that a man with his patience and ability to endure suffering would not be so easy to find elsewhere.

Had he let himself go? Was he too fat? Too mentally unstimulating? What could he have possibly done wrong? He hurled all of these questions at her with vitriol as he slammed his controller against the glass window, causing it to ricochet to the ground and break open. She sighed. “You’re simply helpless, Everett. And I can no longer try to help you.”

With that, she stalked toward the exit and calculatedly did not slam the door behind her. He was alone, once again, in the purest sense of the word, though he knew he had felt that way with or without Valerie to provide little better than a cold body to lie next to at night. He, conversely, was hot-blooded. Fueled by passion and romance in a way that no woman he seemed to finagle into his life could ever appreciate. Well, he was done. Done trying to bother with any of them. They who were so falsely deemed the “fairer” sex when it was they who had wrought every injustice upon his life.

He had no choice but to view Valerie’s abrupt departure as a blessing, an opportunity. Yes, he would view it as a chance to throw himself into the art he had so long ago abandoned. He set to work that very night, buying some new supplies and dredging up a few old ones from the closet. As he worked into the late night, he had forgotten all about opening the sliding glass door to the balcony in his state of furor and rage, which only added to the already humid temperature. Because of his tendency to cut costs where he could, he had never bothered to invest in a screen that could be closed while the door remained open. He had moved in during the winter, when the thought of heat never occurred to him. No, only snuggling up with Valerie had. That horrid and ungrateful bitch who he was now making a sculpture of, chiseling away at her finer curves. Obsessed with re-creating her body perfectly so that if and when he felt the urge to hump something, she would be there–whether she wanted to be or not.

When he realized he had left the door ajar for so long, he was, indeed, surprised that some sort of nit or gnat didn’t make its way in. He was oblivious to the brewing storm that had settled above. He worked for about another thirty minutes before retiring, setting his chisel on the counter as though it was an exhausted murder weapon. In some sense, it was. For he had murdered the original body of Valerie in creating this new, more pliable one.

In his state of dogged obsession, he heard no signature buzzing. The disgusting and persistent zzz that did not put the “quit” in mosquito. For they never quit until they had sucked all the blood they wanted out of their target. And tonight, the density of them was bleak in terms of leveling the mosquito to human ratio. Everett, all the while, went about his business, finally turning out the light around two a.m.

***

He awoke around eight to the sight of his swollen member red and raw with the bites of the mosquitoes that had congregated above him on the ceiling, lying in wait like cardinals watching the pope on his throne. They didn’t have to bide their time for very long, for he was asleep within minutes. And those hours of repose would cost him dearly upon reentering consciousness. For as he stared in stunned silence at his purplish-red, seemingly erect member, he touched it to see what would result.

Bursting into a pile of blood, puss and sinew, his member was dismembered on contact. But when he thought about it (as he lay there covered in the remains of what had been his erstwhile wang), he had to admit that he had allowed so many women to castrate him before that this was the only logical physical manifestation to come of it. What’s more, he was now no different than some of his favorite beloved Roman statues, many of which could not be preserved well enough to maintain their penis. Nor, in the end, could Everett’s.