Wetlands by Charlotte Roche

that’s a small amount of pain medication. To be honest, yesterday evening I had pictured a more difficult night ahead. In a shotglass-sized plastic cup on the nightstand is a pill. Another one. Very generous, Peter. Pain medication, I assume. I slurp it down. Today I’ll try to stand up. I also need to go to the bathroom. Bad. It doesn’t smell good in here. It’s not gas this time. It can only be my ass. What else?
    I feel around in back and find it wet. Blood? I look at my fingers. Not red. A hint of light brown. I smell them. Definitely crap. How did that get there, inspector Helen?
    From the container on the windowsill I pull out gauze bandages and wipe myself up. It’s brown water that smells like crap. In the photo yesterday my butthole was wide open and I think everything must just be running out because the hole is still not tightly closed the way it normally would be. The seal isn’t watertight. I christen the stuff coming out “ass piss” and I’m already used to it. I figure out a folding technique for the bandages: I hold my ass cheeks apart and shovemy folded masterpiece up as close to the wound as possible so it stems the flow of ass piss. When I touch the wound itself with the bandages or my fingertips, it hurts bad. I gingerly let go of my ass cheeks. They hold the bandages in place. All set. Problem solved.
    It really doesn’t smell too good in this room. I’m afraid my ass is definitely air-incontinent. A constant flow of warm air is coming without warning out of my intestines. You can’t even call them farts. My ass is just wide open. Farts have a beginning and an end. They noisily find their way out, sometimes with a lot of pressure. That’s not the case here. It just billows out. And fills the room with all the smells that should stay inside me until I decide to let them out. It smells like warm pus mixed with diarrhea and something acidic that I can’t seem to identify. Maybe it’s from the medication.
    Now when somebody enters the room they know as much about me as if under normal circumstances they had shoved their head up my ass and taken a big whiff.
    I’m in a good mood because I slept so well, I think. The next problem: going to the bathroom. I lie on my stomach and drop my legs slowly toward the floor. It’s a long way down. These tall beds. Bad. My feet touch the ground. I brace myself with my forearms and lift my upper body upright. I stand up. Ha! Turn around and slowly shuffle with tiny steps—otherwise it hurts my butt too much—what seems like a long way to the bathroom. Three yards. Plentyof time to think of something nice. The smell of this watery ass piss seems familiar to me.
    When I know I’m going to have sex with someone who likes anal, I ask: with or without a chocolate dip? Which means: some guys like it when the tip of their cock has a little crap on it when they pull it out after butt fucking—the smell of the crap their cock’s pulled out turns them on. Others want the tightness of the asshole without the filth. To each his own. For those who would rather have it clean, I ordered something from an online gay sex shop. It looks like a dildo with holes in the tip. It’s made out of surgical steel. I don’t know what that is, but it sounds good—and looks good.
    First I unscrew my friendly showerhead so I can attach the threaded base of this device. It’s handy that everything is standardized. Then it’s time to clean the rectum. I smear the tip of the steel thing with Pjur lube. Then I work the thing past my cauliflower and shove it in as far as I can. At least that’s the way I used to do it—the cauliflower’s gone now. Should make it easier. Pushing it in turns me on—sually when something goes up my ass like that it’s a cock. Is that Pavlovian conditioning?
    The device is colder and harder than a cock. I turn on the shower full blast, but not too hot because I don’t want to boil my innards. This is the best part of my internal cleansing. It