Gina
By: Kaiser Wilhelm II
Beer tastes like piss.
Piss seemed to be a running theme in Sharon’s life.
Sharon, the perpetual taker of piss.
Flattering.
In the 3 months since she had moved into her apartment in the most dingy of Pittsburgh’s downtown residencies, she had fully succumbed to alcoholism, lost her job, broken up with her girlfriend, and lost her dad, her only companion left in the world.
It was safe to say life was very much taking the piss out of her.
“Guh… ffffffffuck… what time is it?”, the lonesome woman mumbled, mindlessly slapping her hand around her desk, knocking over half-empty bottles of days old beer and spilling them onto her carpet. Not that she gave a shit. At last, she grasped her cracked Blackberry, and peered at the time. 2:04 A.M. Time to get wasted.
The hand let go of the phone and reached for one of the unspilt glass bottles, only to stop short of it.
Knock, knock, knock.
“Wha- oh god, fuck, hang on…”
Retreating to the bathroom ever so briefly to puke, Sharon halfway hobbled, halfway shambled to front door. “Who the fuck knocks at 2 in the morning on a Tuesday in Pittsburgh?” she mumbled aloud.
A fluffy, apparently.
“Hewwo, nice wady! Can 'ou-”
SLAM!
Sharon was decidedly not dealing with this right now. She had bigger fish to fry, like her lack of booze in her system.
Knock, knock, knock.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”
Throwing the door open, Sharon gave the small purple and blue pegasus a death stare, and much to her chagrin, the pest neither died nor seemed to register her immense aggrovation.
“Can 'ou wet Gina stay wif 'ou? Gina pwomise to be weawwy quiet!”
Sharon rolled her eyes so far she could see the inside of her skull and groaned. “If I do, will you knock off the fucking pounding?”
The fluffy nodded eagerly, and with much disdain, Sharon allowed the animal entry into her home.
To her moderate surprise, the fluffy made no remarks on the state of her habitat, instead vying to sit next to her dresser and absentmindedly stare out the only window in the room.
Refusing to acknowledge the rodent any further, Sharon went back to drinking, passing out shortly after in a drunken haze.
Morning came, and with it did an odd feeling.
“Thi-urp!… this place is a mess.”
To Sharon’s surprise, she felt a desire to straighten up a little bit. Getting up slowly, she trudged about her lair, slowly putting away clothes that needed washed and folded into their respective bin and dresser, wiping down her window, even making her bed.
“God, this place is a fucking wreck. I can’t be- hey, where’s…”, mumbled the woman.
Turning to see where the fluffy went, Sharon was surprised to see it help clean as well, taking beer bottles by the neck in its mouth and dropping them into the trash can.
“Uh… thanks, rat.”
“Ou’ am wewcome!”, beamed Gina.
Sharon decided to ignore the fact that the fluffy wasn’t acknowledging her hostility, on account of her beating headache. Instead, she continued to clean, and after a solid 4 hours, she found her home to be in actually presentable conditions. It looked like someone actually lived here.
“Wow, that feels… better. Whatever, I don’t know why I did it. It’s just gonna get trashed anyways.”
Swiping a beer, Sharon took to the bottle and finished it quickly, followed by another couple. However, she decided to take to her bed instead of her desk. More comfort, right?
Another morning came, and with it another odd urge.
“Fuck, I look god awful.”
Peering into her mirror, Sharon finally grasped how corpse-like she had become. Sunken cheeks and eyes graced a pale visage, all surrounded by long, unkempt and dirty black hair.
All in all, still better than most people living in downtown, but not by much.
A shower and much, MUCH maintenance later, and Sharon found herself looking, at the very least, clean and human. Better than nothing. The fluffy had been kind enough to bring her a towel, thankfully, considering she had forgotten where she kept them. An odd gesture of goodwill considering her treatment of the fluffy, but at the very least it was still goodwill.
With that, she realized it was time for lunch. But… fast food sounded terrible. No, she was going to make something.
Salvaging what she could of her last grocery trip that was half-spoiled, she managed to cook herself a decent chicken salad and poured a quick glass of water, assisted by Gina’s reading of an old cookbook Sharon had stored somewhere in her drawers. How she got it, Sharon didn’t know, but she did know it was a serious help.
It was oddly tasty.
2 weeks came and went, and with them, Sharon found herself slowly getting back on her feet, literally and figuratively. She finally looked like a person again, with a full face, healthy hair, and eyes that weren’t permanently glazed over. And with that, came a job interview at last. The big day.
Anxiously, Sharon boarded the bus to the interview. She found clothes out from the night before, perfect for an interview, though she didn’t recall pulling them out to wear. Then again, she did have a long day, so perhaps she was just too tired to recall. As she dressed, Gina assisted her still, bringing her some makeup, socks, shoes, all so she could be ready in time.
As much as she hesitated to admit it, she was growing to like that fluffy.
“…well, Miss DeCarlo, I think you’ll make a fine fit. Will I see you this upcoming Monday?”
“You bet!”
Sharon found herself practically bouncing back to the bus stop. The interview went flawlessly, and now she had an actual job again, even better than her old one, and she liked the job as well. Crunching numbers was one of her few abilites, and she had a fondness for mathematics dating back to homework with her dad, so to score a job that actually suited her perfectly felt like divine intervention.
The bus ride home was a pleasant one, and for the first time in weeks Sharon noticed the beautiful sky overhead. She didn’t know why, but she thought about her girlfriend again.
“So, uh… Lola, hi…”
“Oh, uh, Sharon, hey. You, um, you called?”
“Yeah. I, uh, I just wanted to talk for a minute. I know we broke up on not great terms, but I-I, um, I was thinking, maybe you and I could-”
“Bae Bae’s. Tonight. 7 o’ clock. I’ll see you then.”
No, this didn’t feel like divine intervention.
This was divine intervention.
Sharon leaned against her wall. This was incredible. She was actually gonna have a shot, as slim as it may be. She had to tell Gina.
“Hey, Gina! Gina! I got Lola to go out with me tonight! Isn’t that amazing or what?”
Silence ruled the house.
“Giiiiina? Gina, where are you?”
Sharon hadn’t counted on Gina disappearing.
2 years later…
Sharon sat back on her couch, absent-mindedly watching some television. Some cooking show. Good programming for her, cooking was becoming a real hobby of hers.
“Hey, honey.”, a voice from behind purred.
Sharon jolted a bit and giggled as she playfully pushed her newly-wed wife Lola away
“Ugh, you are such a dick!”
“Yeah, but you like it.”, Lola smugly retorted. “Whatcha watchin’?”
Sharon shrugged. “Some dumb show about cooking. It’s okay I guess. I could do better than some of these losers.”
“Oh, I bet. Speaking of…”
Sharon turned around to face her wife. “What’s up?”
Lola rested her chin in her hands. “You never did tell me how you got into cooking and stuff. You, uh… weren’t into the ‘healthy lifestyle’ stuff when we split up.”
Sharon paused and thought hard. “I… don’t really know, actually. I just kinda moved on from being a sadsack. Same with Dad, I guess.”
“I see. Oh well, if it means good food for me, I’m down. Now move over, fatass.”
Sharon half-heartedly grumbled as she scooched over and let Lola sit, just in time for a commercial about fluffies to come on.
“Aw, look at that one! It’s just like my old fluffy!”, Lola pointed to the screen.
Sharon gave her a side glance. “Wait, since when did you have a fluffy?”
Lola turned to her wife. “I didn’t tell you? I had one for a bit after we broke up, but she died, like, a month before we got back together. Shame, she was a real cutie, always super nice and trying to help others.”
Sharon looked a bit surprised. “Uh, what was her name?”
Lola smiled and reminisced. “Oh, I named her Gina.”