Welcome to
Carnage House

– this is your trigger warning

Through the Backdoor

by Aisling Campbell

“The fuck is that? I told you to get booze.”

“Hear me out,” Sam said. “I read about this thing online, it’s gonna save us a lot of money.”

“...fuck are you talking about?” Riley said. The sweats had been bad -- great discs of sour smelling dampness under his arms, on his back and front. He felt sick, disgusting, and here was Sam holding up a box of tampons like he’d just discovered the cure for cancer.

“You ever hear of an alcohol enema?” Sam said. “Instant drunkenness, and you only need, a fraction of the alcohol. We soak these babies in whatever we’ve got left, shove ‘em up our shit chutes, and problem solved!”

“But we haven’t got nothing left!”

Their empties for the past week were still scattered around the flat, and Riley had checked every one of them looking for dregs, the slightest residue to tide him over until Sam got back with a new bottle.

“I told you I’m skint this month. Had enough to get us a few cans of lager, but we both know that’d be like pissing on a house fire. Or we could try drinking hand sanitizer, the beverage of choice for the alcoholic with nothing left to lose. Trust me, this is the best option. ‘Sides, I might have a little something stashed away.”

“You little bastard, you’ve been keeping--”

“Yeah, yeah, you’ll thank me in, like, ten minutes when we’re both utterly rat-arsed.”

~~~

Sam’s secret stash turned out to be a handful of minis he’d swiped from a hotel in Marbella two years prior. He walked into the bathroom with a fifty milliliter bottle of gin, a shot glass, and the box of tampons.

“This better work,” Riley muttered, standing in his pants and a t-shirt, eyeing up the bottle of gin.

“It will,” Sam promised, decanting a small quantity of liquid into the shot glass.

“Is that it?” Riley said.

“You don’t wanna overdo it, mate. It’s not like when you just drink it -- the alcohol gets straight into your bloodstream, your insides suck it right up, it’s nuts.”

Sam opened up the box of tampons. It took him a while to work out how to get the cottony bit out. The whole time Riley was perched on the edge of the bath wanting to reach forward and snatch what was left of the gin and down it.

It wouldn’t do a lot -- wasn’t really enough to keep him buzzed either. Pissing on a house fire like Sam said.

“How much longer is this gonna take?”

“Guess you want to go first then, mate?” Sam said, dunking the liberated tampon into the shot glass. It chubbed up, juicy with alcohol, and Sam passed Riley the glass. The blessed scent of gin washed over him, calming the knot in his stomach.

“So I just cram it on up there?” Riley asked.

“Yup, you’ll probably want to leave the string hanging out. Y’know, like the ladies do. Fun one to explain down in A&E if you lose it up there.”

Riley climbed into the bathtub, tugging the curtain back around. He pulled down his pants and squatted in the bottom of the tub.

He felt another layer of dignity sloughing off -- the latest in a series of little disappointments, embarrassments, and failures spanning back years. Riley heard that there were genes for this kind of thing -- it all started long before him. Better to think of it as destiny, controlled by strands of chemicals forced on him by life itself. Inevitable.

He picked up the fat gin-soaked tampon by the string, watching it dangle and not spilling a drip. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he could hear his dad scoffing What kind of pansy shoves his drink up his arse. Right, his father had just poured it down his gullet like a regular person, gallon after gallon like a great, fat, old toad that needed to be kept moist.

With a grimace, Riley reached behind him, probing, the tampon string clutched in his hand.

This had better be fucking worth it.

~~~

Riley looked down at the empty soap container by the sink, then down at his hand. Behind him in the shower, Sam grunted.

“Bet this is a typical Friday night for you, Sammy,” he muttered, turning the hot tap on with his uncontaminated hand.

“Yeah, fuck you too, mate,” Sam said.

As he washed his hands, his attention came back to the soft wad of cotton crammed into his rectum. It felt weird -- like the prelude to a moderate-sized dump.

The curtain pulled back and Sam came to join him at the sink.

“You feeling it yet?” he asked.

Riley shrugged. He didn’t feel nauseous, but that was a far-cry from being drunk.

Sam clapped him on the shoulder.

“That better not be the hand you just shoved up your arse,” Riley muttered.

“Well, we can always do another one. Give it half an hour, then we’ll do a top-up.”

~~~

The buzz came creeping up on them, like a feral cat toward a slice of old ham left by the back door. As the world turned soft at its edges Riley tipped his head back and looked up at the textured ceiling. It was more tipsy as opposed to drunk, but Riley wasn’t sure he could be arsed to get up and do another tampon.

There had to be another method.

~~~

When their dole came in the next month, Sam went out and came back with two enema bottles, a big tub of Vaseline, and a selection of gin, rum, and vodka.

“I got whatever was cheapest, it’s not like we’re gonna taste it anyway,” he said.

~~~

“Just breathe, mate, I’m not gonna be able to get this in you if you clam up on me,” Sam said.

“Don’t talk,” Riley said, forehead pressed against the bathroom floor. “You’re making me tense up more when you fucking talk.”

The cold rum squirting into his guts was unexpected, the glug of the bottle unsettling.

“Done, my turn now.”

~~~

As he stared at his flatmate’s arsehole Riley knew a line had been crossed. He’d managed to avoid looking at Sam’s cock and balls but his ring-piece was a lot harder to ignore. He hoped the rum in his rectum would kick in sooner rather than later, so he could purge the events of this evening from his brain.

Riley slicked up the nozzle with Vaseline and got it over with.

~~~

An hour later the room was spinning. Time became disjointed and nothing mattered.

Life was good.

“Why the hell didn’t we start doing this sooner…?” he said, either out loud or in his head. Probably the first one, because he heard Sam say, “Getting a taste for it, are we?” and laugh.

Sure, the prep was a pain, but the benefits...

Someone turned the television on, and Riley turned his head towards it at the sound of moans.

In the middle of the screen was a woman -- at least, Riley hoped it was a woman. Sam better not be making him watch gay porn while he was too drunk to resist. Whoever it was they were flexible as fuck. Her ankles were up by her ears, leaving her spread wide. Riley tried to check for a penis, but all his blurry eyes could make out was the pale pink of naked skin.

“Go on, do it for me baby.”

Definitely a male voice. Off-camera, American, and sleazy. Riley tried to keep his focus on the screen, curious what it was she, maybe-but-hopefully-not he, was gonna do.

There was a cheeky wink of red, and if Riley had been drinking the traditional way he would have thrown up as baby’s arse shat itself inside out, dangling like a pink and red speckled slug for a scant second before it was slurped back from whence it came.

“Again,” the man demanded.

Riley managed to tear his eyes away to ask Sam was the fuck he was playing at, but his flatmate was passed out and drooling on the carpet.

Back on screen, the woman moaned and there were sounds like smacking lips. When Riley looked back at the screen it was still her and the fat, red bundle of lower intestinal tract hanging out of her arse.

Riley flailed his right arm, trying to reach up onto the sofa searching for the remote so he could turn the damn thing off. With any luck he wouldn’t remember it come morning -- or more realistically, next afternoon.

A hand appeared at the bottom corner of the screen reaching out to fondle the misplaced flesh, pulling and pushing it like dough.

Riley gave up on the remote, sinking further down onto the floor. The light from the telly flared and expanded, doubling up, tripling, like it was part of a kaleidoscope. He was sinking down into unconsciousness fast but not quite fast enough to miss the next part. The man bent down and pressed his mouth to the quivering lump, sucking on it, drawing it in, and biting down--

~~~

Riley hunkered down on the toilet and waited for the next wave of cramps. His guts were getting picky, evacuating every trace of the half-price, off-brand vodka. It felt like he was being scoured from end to end. He could hear Sam laughing at him from outside the door.

“We got more of that gin from last time?” Riley muttered.

“Yeah, but I’m not going anywhere near your backside until you’ve got those explosions under control.”

Riley’s reply was lost in a wail of despair as his guts twisted and squeezed, wriggling like they wanted to be outside of him.

“No more vodka… ever,” Riley promised.

~~~

By the time he was done, after several false alarms, Sam was already passed out on the sofa and Riley had to sort himself out.

It was awkward -- he couldn’t get the angle right, or the nozzle deep enough, and most of the alcohol came spilling back out, dribbling over his calves and seeping into the bathmat. He grumbled and loaded up another shot in the enema bottle, managing to get it a little deeper but as soon as he moved he felt his drink sloshing back out. At least the shits earlier had cleaned him out so he wasn’t kneeling in his own shit.

He decided to cut his losses and go to bed. The last thing he needed was to get so bladdered he ended up in hospital again. Most of the nurses were nice enough, but he hated the way they looked at him.

Pity and disappointment, like his mother.

Disgust, like his sisters.

~~~

When Riley woke, he felt better. His backside ached more than usual, but otherwise, he felt good -- right up until he went to get out of bed and his foot met something that rolled. He slammed his palms up against the wall to steady himself. When his heart finished pounding, he looked down to see what he had stepped on.

It was a litre bottle of gin, empty with the cap missing. It was not part of Riley’s current collection of empties scattered around the room. He picked it up and noticed a faint off-white crust around the neck of the bottle. He sniffed, and beneath the ghostly scent of gin, he detected the distinct aroma of arse.

“...the hell?”

It was one of the new bottles Sam had brought home, and the last time Riley had seen it the thing had still been three-quarters full.

“Hey Sam, you up yet?”

Whoever had drained the bottle with their nether cheeks was going to be in trouble -- big trouble of the A&E variety -- and since Riley was currently able to stand, see, and form a coherent thought he was pretty damn sure it hadn’t been him.

Still holding the bottle, Riley stepped into the living room and scanned around for his flatmate. The sofa where he’d last seen Sam was empty.

“Sam?”

“Yeah?”

Riley looked towards the kitchenette to find Sam munching on toast, looking alive and distinctly un-comatose.

“You…?”

Riley pointed and then held up the bottle.

“Aww, mate, is that the gin I just bought?” Sam said, “You drank it all already? I thought we agreed--”

“I drank it? Didn’t you…?”

Sam looked at him. Riley lowered the bottle and rubbed his forehead. Maybe he did drink it himself -- maybe the smell on the neck of the bottle was just his breath. It was pretty rank sometimes.

The taste wasn’t there on his tongue and his stomach didn’t have that tender, slimy feeling he usually got when drinking.

He looked once more at the bottle and then dropped it in the bin.

~~~

The whiskey was beautiful -- pure, golden, full of promise.

“Won it off Rishad down at the pub,” Sam said, beaming. “His dad’s a whiskey nut. This one’s Japanese or something. Wanna give it a try?”

He went into the kitchen and Riley asked “Wait, are we drinking it?”

“Of course. It’s not like your arse is going to appreciate the subtle flavours.”

Sam poured a few fingers of whiskey, handing one glass to Riley. He looked down at the amber liquid -- warm, inviting -- and lifted it to his lips.

The response was immediate. He gagged the moment it touched his tongue, spitting the whiskey back out into the glass.

“What’s your problem?” Sam asked, sniffing the contents of his glass. He knocked back a mouthful. “Nothing wrong with it, it’s good.” He drank down the rest and poured another glass.

“Not...not my taste I guess,” Riley mumbled.

Sam scoffed. “Maybe all that hard drink’s burnt off your tastebuds already. Fine, I won’t waste it on you. We’ve still got plenty of gin lying about if you want that.”

Sam took the bottle and the glass and headed off to his room, leaving Riley standing in the kitchen staring into the glass of spit-tainted whiskey.

He sighed and tipped it down the sink.

~~~

The movement woke him. He went from drooling into the pillow to drooling on the sheets two inches below the pillow. Another sharp tug and the duvet was over his head and his legs were flailing. Another, and he was face-first on the carpet getting up close and personal with a pair of week-old boxers.

Riley tried to push up onto his arms, but another pull sent them skidding out from under him. He tried to grab at the leg of the bed, which was when he became aware of just where exactly the tugging sensation was coming from.

Oh fuck.

He let go, managing this time to roll fully onto his back so he could see what was pulling at him.

In the gloom he could see a thick rope of something stretching to the door, wrapping around the frame with its end out of sight. It rippled as it pulled, like the way a worm moved, and even though it was too dim to see colours. Riley knew that it was pink and moist and pulsing with blood.

This is not happening.

His skin rubbed across the carpet, building up to a burn as he was dragged into the living room. That burn was the only thing convincing him he was awake, that this wasn’t some ultra-vivid dream or hallucination.

He swiped for the legs of the coffee table. Missed. Clawed at the side of the sofa, but failed to stick.

He grabbed for the doorframe and held on for several tugs before his sweat-slicked hands slipped and he was pulled inside Sam’s room.

~~~

It was waiting for him, coiled up on the end of the bed. Sam had left his bedside light on, and Riley saw, with a strange absence of nausea, that he’d been right. Pink and red with some small hints of yellow. A bright, cupcake icing kind of pink. The end of it, or maybe the start -- Riley didn’t know which was which anymore -- sat like the head of a snake, peeking out over the coils. It was thicker than the rest, darker in colour -- a python rather than a corn snake. It bulged and tapered, a snout tipped by a rumple of dripping red muscle.

“Sam, wake up…”

Sam was passed out on the bed, sprawled out over the duvet. The bottle of whiskey sat, mostly empty, on his bedside table.

Riley’s liberated rectum slithered over itself and onto the sheets, turning its puckered attention to the man with a stomach full of expensive Japanese whiskey.

Oh, shitting hell no.

“Sam, wake the fuck up, mate!”

Riley tried to grab it and haul it back in like a fire hose and somehow convince it to go back where it belonged. But it was slick, sliding through his hands.

“No.”

It left damp, sticky patches as it crept onto Sam’s chest.

“Please, no...Sam, fucking wake up!”

Sam slept the sleep of the hopelessly plastered, moving only to breathe as Riley’s gut crept towards his lips.

“Oh god…”

It began to disappear piece by piece. Anus, rectum, descending colon. With each sliding centimetre that vanished Riley felt more dizzy, more feeble, falling back onto the carpet and looking up at the ceiling as his guts unspooled. His hands and fingers felt numb, his head light. He almost imagined he could feel the moist warmth of the inside of Sam’s throat, scent the whiskey lingering just a little further ahead. Almost taste it. He had to forget what was behind him, leave it all there.

He had almost made it when Sam bucked, choking, and his teeth came down.

Hard.


About the Story:
I originally wrote this story for an extreme horror anthology. It was rejected, and I’ve been trying to find a place for it for three years. I’m glad this weird-arse tale finally has a home.