By: Larissa Pace

It was a dark and stormy night. Mr. Brian Whitfield was making his weekly rounds as a Mary Kay salesman with dismay. He was a little depressed because the night before, he’d had a fight with his wife. She had said she wanted him to get a real job so they could move up on the social ladder. Move up and away from their apartment under the stairs of the local bakery. Forget all those great deals on rye bread and cinnamon rolls. She wanted a home of her own and ,by golly, she was going to get a home of her own. With or without her husband.

It was with these morbid thoughts crossing through Mr. Whitfield’s mind that he realized he was at the last stop on his route. He sighed heavily and slowly trudged up the steep and crooked stairway that led to a huge, stone almost castle-like house. Mr. Whitfield hated visiting this place. No one was ever home and there always seemed to be a large thundercloud with lightning shooting out of it directly over the building, even if it was sunny everywhere else in the neighborhood.

Mr. Whitfield rolled his eyes as he walked up to the door, lifted the heavy gargoyle like knocker and let it fall with a loud thud. He unexpectantly put his ear to the door to listen for sounds of movement from the inside, just like he always did. And when he, as always, heard absolutely nothing he turned to leave. But before he could take a step, a long, bony arm shot out of the doorway, grabbed Mr. Whitfield and yanked him into the house, shutting the door behind them.

“Hey what’s the big idea-” Mr. Whitfield began but a cold hand covered his mouth.

“Quiet, Mr. Whitfield.” came a raspy voice from the darkness, “You will understand in due time.”

“What are you talking about?” Mr. Whitfield asked, “Why is it so dark in here? I can’t see a thing. I don’t even- hey how’d you know my name?”

“I know many things about you, Mr. Whitfield.” replied the voice, “Now come with me”

Mr. Whitfield felt the cold hand grab for him again but this time he jerked away.

“Listen,” he yelped indignantly, “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me who you are.”

“Very well.” said the voice

Mr. Whitfield watched as a match was struck and lit...and held up to the ugliest, most deformed face Mr. Whitfield had ever seen.

“My name is Dr. Vonkerbean.” said the owner of the face, “I am a scientist. I must apologize for my frightening appearance . My face was badly scarred in an experiment on the nature of killer bees gone bad. I understand that you are a scientist as well.”

“Uh....no....no actually I’m not.“ he explained apologetically, then quickly added “But I took chemistry in high school!”

Dr. Vonkerbean paused.

“...close enough. Now would you allow me the pleasure of showing you around my humble abode?”

Mr. Whitfield was hesitant.

“Well actually, I should probably be getting home. Tonight is meatloaf night and I don’t want to miss it.”

“It will take but only a moment, Mr. Whitfield.”

“Um...ok.” Mr. Whitfield slowly agreed.

He followed Dr. Vonkerbean through a tall and dark corridor into what appeared to be a study.

“Wait here, Mr. Whitfield.” Dr. Vonkerbean commanded.

Mr. Whitfield watched as Dr. Vonkerbean limped over to a Big Mouth Billy Bass hanging over the mantle and pushed the red button on the mount. As the mounted fish broke into it’s rendition of “Take Me to the River” the fireplace suddenly swung out and revealed a winding staircase leading down into darkness. Dr. Vonkerbean gestured for Mr. Whitfield to go first. Stupidly, he obeyed and began to trek down the dark, spiral of stairs that was illuminated only by a few candles, with the doctor following close behind.

When they reached the landing Dr. Vonkerbean pushed passed Mr. Whitfield to what looked like a toy piano. Mr. Whitfield watched as Dr. Vonkerbean lifted up the lid from the keys and played “Chopsticks”. As the last note ended, two huge wooden doors opened and Dr. Vonkerbean led the way through them, into another room.

The room turned out to be a laboratory. A very strange and detailed laboratory. Mr. Whitfield stared in awe at all the tubes, wires and chemicals. But it was then that he started to worry. Why had Dr. Vonkerbean brought him down here?

“I suppose you’re wondering why I brought you down here.” Dr. Vonkerbean said, reading his thoughts.

“Yeah, as a matter of fact I was.”

“Well...not very many people come around here. Actually, no people come around here. Nobody but you. I can always count on you to come by here once every week to try and sell me your various merchandise.”

“Then you are home when I come by! Why don’t you ever answer your door?”

The old doctor scoffed.

“I got enough junk as it is. Well anyway, I have this new experiment I’m working on and I need a human guinea pig to try it out on. So...I grabbed the first available person. You.”

“Are you saying that you want me to be a guinea pig for an experiment concocted by some eccentric psycho that I don’t even know?”

“Yep.”

“Well, ok.” Mr. Whitfield agreed, “But on one condition.”

Dr. Vonkerbean cringed.

“What’s that?”

“That you let me give you a full facial with my Mary Kay products and tell me if you still don’t want to buy them. Because believe me, you could use some. But you have to let me give you the facial before any experimenting.”

The doctor smiled, amused.

“Very well. It’s a deal. But first I want to show you something”

The doctor limped across the room into what looked like a closet. After a minute or two he reemerged holding a large cage with thick steel bars. Sitting inside the cage was a big, pink, slimy blob.

“Eew, what’s that?” Mr. Whitfield asked.

“I’m not sure.” replied the doctor looking intently at the blob, “I found it lying outside in the courtyard of my house, so I took it down here to study. It appears to be some sort of alien life form.”

Mr. Whitfield examined the mass of pink closely.

“This thing is alive?” he asked.

“Oh very much so. But that’s about all I know about it. Right now I’m trying to figure out how it sustains itself. Find out what it lives on.” The doctor shook his head, “It’s a real mystery. You see, it has no digestive tract. No stomach, no heart, no brain. Yet it is indeed alive.” He shook his head again.

“Hm. Weird.” Mr. Whitfield carelessly remarked. Then he clapped his hands and rubbed them together excitedly. “Now about that facial...”

Dr. Vonkerbean rolled his eyes.

“Yes yes, of course. A deal is a deal.” he said, settling himself in a chair while Mr.Whitfield draped a protective towel around his neck, “But afterwards you must help with my experiment.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Mr. Whitfield reassured him, “I always keep my word”

And with that, Mr. Whitfield proceeded to fully makeover Dr. Vonkerbean. He washed, he toned, he moisturized. He put on foundation, powder, lipstick, rouge, eye shadow, mascara...the whole nine yards. And when he was done he proudly presented Dr. Vonkerbean with a mirror.

As Dr. Vonkerbean looked at his reflection a plethora of emotions crossed his mind. But his most prominent one was “I look ridiculous.”

“Well, what do you think?” Mr. Whitfield asked gleefully.

“I think I look like a clown. Get this stuff off of me!”

Mr. Whitfield’s face fell.

“You mean you don’t like it?”

“That is exactly what I mean.”

“Well...ok, I’ll take it off.” Mr. Whitfield grudgingly agreed. He took a step and stopped short. “Uh..um...”

“What seems to be the problem?” Dr. Vonkerbean asked, blinking his now dark and curled eyelashes.

“I...I don’t think I know how to get this stuff off. It’s pretty strong.”

“Well, you BETTER get it off, buster!”

“Alright, alright.....just...just let me look around and see what I have here.”

With that Mr. Whitfield began looking for some sort of removal product. But after only a few minutes of searching, he looked up when he heard a muffled cry from the doctor.

He looked over and, to his horror, he saw that the pink-space-alien-blob-thingy had attached itself to Dr. Vonkerbeans face and was making a sucking sound.

“It’s eating the doctor!” he shrieked in alarm, “I’ve got to get it off of him!”

And so, he plunged both of his hands into the creatures form, but the blob just slipped through his fingers, leaving nothing but traces of iridescent bubbles on them.

“What am I gonna do?” Mr. Whitfield thought out loud. Then his eyes lighted upon a vacuum that was conveniently leaning against the wall.

“Ah-ha!”

He ran to the vacuum, plugged it in and attached the nearby hose attachment. Then he slowly approached from what he figured to be the back of the creature, since it looked the exact same, no matter what angle you were looking at it from. He carefully placed the opening of the hose over the top of the alien and he switched on the vacuum. As the vacuum roared to life, the blob was helplessly sucked into the confines of the machine. Triumphantly, Mr. Whitfield turned the appliance off and turned to the gasping Dr. Vonkerbean.

“Are you alright?” Mr. Whitfield asked

“Why...yes, I think so.” said the doctor “I dare say that was the strangest experience of my life.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet it was.” Mr. Whitfield replied, chuckling. Then he noticed something. “Hey your face! It’s clean! The make-up is completely gone!”

“It is?” the doctor asked, grabbing a mirror, “Why indeed it is! Nothing but a few bubbles and a fresh, clean scent!” He took a finger and rubbed it across his forehead, making a squeak. “It’s even squeaky clean!”

“That’s amazing!” Mr. Whitfield exclaimed, “I didn’t think anything could take that stuff off.”

“What did you do with the animal?”

“Oh, I sucked it into the vacuum.”

“What?!”

The doctor frantically grabbed the vacuum and unzipped the vacuum bag. After a few seconds of looking he found the blob and placed it in a box

“Phew.“ he breathed, gratefully, “And now for your end of the bargain.”

“Alright. What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to....wash your hands!”

Mr. Whitfield did a double-take.

“Excuse me?”

“Yeah!” The doctor said getting more and more excited “ I want you to take a chunk of this alien and wash your hands with it!”

“Um...alright...whatever you say...”

So Mr. Whitfield gingerly took off a small piece of the blob and began to wash his hands in the doctor’s sink. After he finished, he wiped his hands off on a dishtowel and presented them to the doctor.

“Well?”

“It’s just as I thought!” the doctor exulted, examining Mr. Whitfield’s hands, “They’re clean as a whistle! Do you know what we have here, Mr. Whitfield? We have a new soap!”

“Soap?”

“Yes! I never would have figured it out if it weren’t for you! Oh bless you, Mr. Whitfield!” With that, Dr. Vonkerbean took Mr. Whitfield’s face in his hands and kissed both of his cheeks.

“You’re welcome but...don’t kiss me anymore, ok?”

“Whatever you say, Mr. Whitfield! Your word is law. Come on we have a lot of work to do.”

“’We‘? Where do you get this ‘we’ stuff? I helped you with your experiment. My work here is done. Now I’m going home. I‘ll see you around, Mr. Wonderbean or whatever your name is.” Mr. Whitfield turned on his heel and prepared to leave.

“But Mr. Whitfield, you don’t understand.” Dr. Vonkerbean called after him, “We can make a fortune selling off of this stuff!”

That stopped Mr. Whitfield in his tracks.

“A fortune?” he squeaked as he turned around. All he could think about was his wife back home and the argument from the night before. “How do you figure?”

“We could mass-reproduce this stuff, sell it to public restrooms around the world and make millions! As my partner you‘d get 50% of the profits.”

Little dollar signs appeared in place of Mr. Whitfields pupils.

“I’ll do it! I’ll help you! Now come on, we have a fortune to make!”

And so, through a process similar to mitosis, the two men reproduced the alien...and reproduced it and reproduced it until they had a several tons of pink, alien blob. Then they sold it to public restrooms all across the world and, as promised, they made out like bandits. As for Mr. Whitfield and his wife, well they never had to worry about money again. Last I heard they were living the big life in a lush Park Avenue Penthouse. The doctor used his profits to continue his research on the mysterious animal.

Which brings me to the moral of this story. And that is to appreciate that alien life-form that you’re so carelessly washing your hands with. Try thanking it for giving little bits of itself just so you can have clean, bacteria-free hands. Remember, soap is your friend. It will help you lead a happy and productive life.

The End