Bambi Almendinger

Consecration of the House

Ludwig van Beethoven pretended to be deaf so that he didn’t have to talk to people anymore. He talked to his two cats. They were named Bleach and Ammonia. He said, ‘One day, I’ll combine them and get Hazmat.’ They were biting cats, their teeth left scars on my legs which ruined my modeling career. Ludwig told me, ‘Bite them back.’ We’d bite them back on their pliant ears and then we’d feel bad, so we made it up to them by taking them out for walks. We took them to the aviary. In memory of all the birds killed, Ludwig and I got birds tattooed up a leg, over a shoulder, across a stomach. We covered up the pain with our clothes. Ludwig said, ‘Something’s right, because it’s wrong and we know it’s wrong since it doesn’t hurt or make us suffer.’ I concluded that, ‘Everything always goes wrong,’ and it came true. A batch of pfeffernüssen baking in the oven caught fire and everything was gone, including the cats. My absent-mindedness was one symptom out of a long, trailing list of others. Lead had entered our bloodstreams from the tattoos and we became depressive insomniacs. We joined the sleepless wildlife and left off living as human beings it seemed. The washing and shaving of hair was left undone. The lingering of our lives wasn’t watched, but the end was in sight.

Bambi Almendinger was born on Edwards Air Force Base. She is earning her B.S. at the University of South Florida and is a day-time vegan.