What could only be described as a blinding pain wracked Remy’s brain as he was stabbed in the eye with a fork. If his eye-socket had taste-buds he’d be able to taste an unholy aioli of oil, garlic, and viscera . No doubt he would lose that eye. Yes it seemed Lefty’s days of gawking and gandering were done for. Which was a shame. That was Remy’s second favorite eye.

It seemed a bit unfair to Lefty, god rest his soul, to be taking the heat for a fight the mouth had started.  The mouth of course would blame the hands for not stopping the fork in time and the hands would blame the brain for not getting its shit together. In truth, they were all equally complicit in the untimely demise of Ol’ Lefty. But back to the other matter at hand.

Remy needed to learn to keep his fucking mouth shut. A lesson that could have been taught without the punctuation of a punctured pupil but Wally was a big believer in visual learning.

As for the other four tenants of the share-house seated at the dinner table, their circumstances gave them pause. Each of them held down jobs that were objectively integral for a functioning society. So of course they couldn’t afford a decent house without combining all of their salaries. Remy, as awful as he was to share air with, was a necessary evil in their financial ecosystem.

Then again, it cannot be understated that all of this was the result of Remy’s own words. Had Remy said what he said to any of the other tenants, he still would have been stabbed. In fact it probably would have been the same eye, just a different fork. Which is why everyone empathized with Wally’s actions. However, in the end, they still needed Remy’s money. So they couldn’t afford to just stand by and do nothing.

Given his proximity, the first to act was Conrad, who desperately tried to pry Wally off of Remy. Now one would think Conrad, being an English teacher, would be a big fan of crossing his t’s and dotting eyes. Evidently this was not the case. As punishment for acting out of character, Wally delivered a swift elbow to the throat.

Fulton, who was a big fan of Conrad’s throat, vaulted over the table seeking vengeance, but what he found instead was a knife to the thigh and a haymaker to the temple. The ol’ after dinner special.

Wally reached back over and twisted the fork in Remy’s eye like a volume knob. Incidentally Remy’s incoherent screams increased by several decibels. 

Brandon ran from the room.

With three down and one out the only one left was Jenn. As the most reasonable and level-headed member of the household, her decision to stay on her side of the table and chuck china at Wally was a prudent choice. Wally ducked behind Remy’s chair, making most of the plates rightfully hit Remy. 

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Conrad started to recover, his choked spluttering upgrading to ragged gasps. Ever the Samaritan, Wally braved the porcelain onslaught to open his airway with a soccer kick to the teeth.

Fulton groaned, still lying on the table with a knife stuck in him like a thanksgiving turkey. He made the mistake of sitting up. Wally caught an errant flying saucer and made him see stars by breaking it over his head.

Not to be outdone, Brandon returned with a gun. The gun had come from the living room and was an amenity no one else in the house was aware of. He barely even rounded the corner before firing. He missed wide and blasted Remy, who had no one to blame but himself.

In response, Wally took his chair and threw it over the table at Brandon, knocking him down. Jenn also picked up a chair and threw it at Brandon. Wally then walked around to the other side of the table and kicked the gun away from him. 

Then he picked up a chair and threw it at Remy. 

Jenn and Wally’s eyes met— well first, they both gave Brandon one more kick for good measure, a liver and kidney shot respectively. Afterwards, their eyes met. The physicality of the fight had started to catch up with them. Their chests heaved like bellows, sucking in as much air as they could take. It would take a while before they were both ready to go again. Wally gave Brandon’s head another halfhearted kick to pass the time. 

Eventually, Jenn offered a handshake over the crumpled form on the floor. Wally accepted, albeit after a long pause. They had reached an accord. Tenuous peace once again graced the share-house. The fight had come to such an abrupt end for a couple of reasons. For one thing, Remy was dead. Fortunately, aside from a few plates, nothing of value was lost. Secondly, while that had been the spark that started the fire, it wasn’t the fuel that had kept it burning. 

Each of the tenants had their grievances about one another. Wally never did the dishes, Fulton and Conrad were too loud, and Brandon had guns hidden places apparently. Not that any of that could even compare to being around the absolute waste of carbon that was Remy.  After years of whining and bottled up bad spirits, it all aged into an intoxicating animosity. All it took was Remy’s dumb fucking mouth to uncork it. For most of the fight though, they were just drunk off the catharsis of release. 

But funny enough, that same shared hatred for each other was also what ended the fight. Their impromptu alliance had been born from a mutual distaste for Brandon’s penchant for escalating. That little moment they shared over chair throwing made everything else take a back seat. It was hard to go back to fighting after finding a brief respite of common ground.

That actually didn’t stop Jenn though, who proceeded to yank Wally forward for a palm strike to the nose. Wally fell backward onto the floor. Before he had a chance to recuperate, Jenn straddled his chest and started wailing on him without mercy.

The fight to save Remy might have been over, but Jenn still had her own shit she needed to work through.