In this tale, Logan, a sadistic executive, orchestrates a twisted reality show in which Melinda, desperate for a raise, becomes an unwitting star.
This medical fiction tale is one of a collection of stories that are like “Final Destination” meets “The Monkey’s Paw” (W. W. Jacobs, 1902). As such, they are tragedies more than either mysteries or horror, and would appeal most to readers who enjoy the inexorable pull of a story arc that leads to doom. In each story, a protagonist makes a wish that comes true with fatal results for someone, often the person making the wish. Nothing supernatural, but just how things work out. (Or is it?) The technical details surrounding the fatal (or near-fatal) event are drawn from real cases in the US OSHA incident report database or similar sources and are therefore entirely realistic, even if seemingly outlandish. The plots draw lightly from cultural beliefs around actions such as pointing at someone with a stick or knife, wishing in front of a mirror, or stepping on a crack.
Logan was a bit of a bully as far as most people could tell, and somewhat of a daredevil in his own mind—the kind of 30-something man who enjoyed reality TV shows in which people have embarrassing mishaps, ingest disgusting stuff, or clamber over obstacles while whacking each other with big earbud-looking things. Logan enjoyed the ones in which women fought or grappled with each other in mud, but truly loved scenes in which people, especially women, were horribly humiliated.
Logan used his relative wealth and status as a member of a rich family to play practical jokes on people with limited means to avoid them or engage in meaningful retribution. While initially somewhat childish in nature, his pranks in his 20s evolved to be less in the manner of stink bombs and whoopie cushions and more along the lines of slipping a strong emetic into someone’s coffee and locking the door of the nearest bathroom. Now that he was approaching 40, his favorite pranks involved things like making his staff compete for their jobs; setting barely reachable targets and then sabotaging them if they got too close to reaching them; or giving them contradictory goals and firing them when one was not met. Sometimes, though, he regressed a bit, and just went for gross.
Logan drove a vibrant green Lamborghini, as was befitting of the VP of marketing for a chain of wellness clinics. He’d been named VP after steadily failing upwards through several companies owned by his family. His tenure as a sales manager for his family’s car dealership had been particularly fraught with incidents. The sales numbers drifted in a slow downward spiral almost as soon as he was appointed manager, partly due to bruised egos and cynicism among the team; two sales team members had fancied themselves possible replacements for the outgoing manager, and the other four just thought Logan’s appointment confirmed the nepotism they’d always suspected. Another root cause was that the sales manager’s job was to wind up his team. It was up to Logan to fire them up about the product line, focus them on their targets, and get them excited about the potential bonus packages, the annual achievement trip to the Bahamas, and the incentive prizes for overachievers. Logan had no interest in being a cheerleader though, and managed to botch the incentive schedule in a way that made basic achievement too easy, and bonus and overachievement targets impossible.
What finally ended his tenure as a manager was his having sex with a member of the sales team and then writing off one of the display room cars during a drunken night out with her.
At Logan’s family’s wellness clinic company, Melinda was a new employee and member of the marketing team. She was dead keen on making a good impression, showing that she was a team player, and demonstrating that she could make something of the opportunities that life had presented her. Melinda poured herself into every task, and her quick smile and happy demeanor belied the fact that inside she was in torment, her home life a wreck. She was sharing a studio apartment and was two months behind on rent. Her roommate was a dancer who, since she’d twisted her ankle, was in no better shape to help with rent. The landlord had smiled understandingly, but nevertheless slipped a notice under their door saying they needed to get current within 30 days or face eviction. The car the two shared had started vomiting coolant, and Melinda suspected the repair was going to cost far beyond the $68.53 in her bank account. Between them, they came up with three options for raising money: They could sell their bodies online through OnlyFans.com; rob a bank; or Melinda could paste on her biggest smile and ask for a raise.
Logan had pitched an idea for promoting the wellness clinics by producing and directing a reality TV show about the lives of young staffers. It was a good enough idea, especially given the lackluster marketing campaigns that ran before his time but, as usual, he was more noise than action. The actions he did take were also more spur of the moment and “gut feel” affairs than carefully planned and orchestrated operations. They mostly amounted to brainstorming and creative sessions in restaurants, the corporate multimedia room, and one of his beach houses. It was at the beach house that Logan had the inspiration to make the reality show one of those elimination games he enjoyed so much, and he knew exactly how to kick it off.
Melinda went along with Logan’s reality show campaign, contributing with a degree of eagerness that made her sigh inwardly. Logan was one of those extroverts that assumed that everyone else enjoyed the hearty backslapping and frenetic party-animal existence that he did. By the end of the week she was exhausted, but she knew that to get a raise, she needed to stay on his good side. If that meant pretending his reality show was wonderful, then fine by her. She hadn’t been paying close attention over the past hour of creative brainstorming, and somehow missed that she and the others in the marketing team were participating in the pilot. Suddenly, all eyes were on her, and rather than admit she hadn’t been paying attention, she smiled broadly and made agreeable noises. Logan squeezed her shoulder while the others looked on admiringly, and she felt a sudden rush of panic wondering if she’d unwittingly volunteered for something horrible.
What Logan had in mind was more gross than horrible but, as he detailed her part, her sense of panic grew. At first it seemed to be just being filmed in a swimsuit and heels while pretending to be a contestant, but then came a grotesque wrinkle. Melinda would be forced to pick a random card from a bowl, a card that would describe her fate: Having a load of mud dumped on her, being violently sprayed with a firehose, or…Logan grinned with sudden inspiration …eating a pile of earthworms.
Over the past week or so, Logan had been planning a fishing trip. He suggested the worm option precisely because he knew he already had a slimy plastic tub of them in the fridge. While he liked the idea of spraying Melinda with the hose or tipping mud over her, he truly relished the thought of her reaction to a choice between eating worms or losing her job.
As the team began shooting various takes and angles, two of Logan’s technical crew procured a firehose and prepared a huge bucket of mud. Melinda, meanwhile, nervously bit her lip while pondering the odds of finding a new job before her eviction deadline arrived.
Before she knew it, Melinda found herself standing in front of the cameras, drawing a card. She’d imagined being sprayed would be unpleasant, but knew she could handle that. Mud was a distant second option but, if it was a choice between mud and the street, then mud it would be. To her horror, the card she chose read, “Eat worms.” The cameras captured every moment of shock and disgust on her face as she backed away from the table, holding her hands in front of her as if she was stopping something, pleading, “No…no…no.”
Logan stepped in smartly and, after quickly whispering in her ear, made a big show of the fact that he would match her effort: If she ate three worms, he would eat a live snail. To prove he was serious, he held up a fresh snail. As the camera zoomed in on the palm of his hand, the snail poked out one of its eye stalks to see what was going on. The result was a suitable chorus of squeals and groans from the team.
Melinda felt stunned, but managed a wan smile. She felt more disgust for Logan than for any of his embarrassing prank tasks, but what he’d whispered to her had been crystal clear: Eat the worms and act the part and he’d give her a 50% raise. Refuse the task or do a poor job of acting and she’d be fired. The smooth, almost-practiced way he’d whispered the threat made her realize he’d planned this all along, targeting her from the very beginning. His manipulative menace and sneakiness turned her stomach much more than the prospect of eating worms. So, she gritted her teeth, clenched her fists, and, with a great show of girlish squirming, let him dangle three worms into her upturned mouth. Logan paused so the first camera could close-in on Melinda’s red, painted lips, the pinkish-brown worms framed by the whiteness of her teeth. The second camera captured her revulsion, then her gagging, and finally her writhing body as she fought waves of nausea and a violent urge to vomit—all as grotesquely entertaining as Logan had imagined—while the rest of the team looked on with a mixture of disgust, horror, and a growing surety that Logan had further surprises in store for every one of them.
True to his word, Logan swallowed the live snail, but as much as doing so disgusted him, the sight of how much more it disgusted his staff made it extremely worthwhile. He let the slimy juices run down his chin, then wiped them away with a theatrical flourish, sending two of the team scurrying for the bushes to toss their cookies. Unfortunately for Logan, his efforts had no effect on Melinda, her being too focused on her own recent disgusting experience while a wish repeated in her mind: That Logan would die in some unspeakably nasty way as payback.
An hour later, Melinda had brushed her teeth three times, showered twice, downed two vodka tonics, and gone to sleep.
While Melinda slept, the rest of her colleagues sat glumly around a table at their usual haunt, muttering to each other that participating in a reality show from hell was not in their job description. Someone suggested that Melinda might file a complaint and get Logan fired. Someone else suggested they do it for her. Another wondered out loud how long Logan would last before his family found him something new. They ordered another round and stole furtive glances at each other.
Back at the beach house, Logan reclined on his imported leather couch, replaying the unedited footage. He paused at the most enjoyable bits and repeated them in slow motion. It was so delicious. He sipped his third single malt whiskey and held his breath as he watched the worms drop into Melinda’s open mouth. He exhaled a long, satisfied sigh as he played frame-by-frame the primal disgust spreading across her face. Hours later, he went to bed feeling the deep, warm glow of satisfaction, success, and victory swelling in his chest. “God,” he thought to himself, “This is better than sex.”
Logan woke at 7 a.m. with a horrible headache spreading from his ears to his temples. He stumbled to the bathroom for painkillers, then to the kitchen for a double shot of espresso, but felt too delicate to eat. After a quick shower he headed to work. The nausea gradually faded, but the headache returned and, by lunchtime, he was in no mood for work. Heck, it was a Friday, so taking a half day off was no big deal. Blinking a bit as he emerged into the harsh noonday sun, he put on his designer sunglasses and drove home.
By the time Logan arrived at the beach house he felt exhausted. He chased down a couple of painkillers with a generous scotch and relaxed on the ample leather couch. Although he briefly nodded off a few times, sleep escaped him, and he couldn’t get comfortable. His left arm had gone to sleep on him, and now his fingertips had a buzzing ache. He decided to go for a swim in the pool to clear his head but, as he leaned over, his temples felt as if they were exploding, his fingertips buzzed, and his head pounded. “Maybe a couple more pills and a snooze on one of the inflatable loungers floating on the pool,” he thought.
All in all, floating peacefully with a cool breeze lightly playing over his face was not a bad way to go, and Logan slipped into a coma with no effort at all. The rat lungworm larvae from the uncooked snail had passed through his intestinal walls, into his bloodstream, and many had invaded his brain. They were almost all dead now, but the resulting swelling at this point was irreversible. Logan twitched a few times and breathed his last breath. He was still floating quietly, a little bloated, when the pool guy found him 2 days later.
