Paul Tanner

pervs without sluts 

mum’s got a job in a morgue. 
she’s not trained or nothing, but they’re letting her help out
as some trainee assistant blood drainer, or something like that.
she said she’ll take me some time to watch.  
if she leaves the room to go the toilet or whatever,
I could suck a tit. maybe stick my fingers in the corpse’s fanny.
maybe more. 

jesus, don’t you have any imagination? I asked.  
wank about it if you have to. 
but you don’t have to actually do it. 

it’s ok, he said. they’re dead. they can’t fight back. 
and anyway, you don’t need their permission,
cos it’s not them anymore. it’s just a body. their soul’s gone. 

or, I suggested, you could just, you know, 
go and meet someone real and maybe charm them? 

he shook his head. you’ve got no ambition, he sighed. 

look, if it’s the lifeless thing that does it for you,
at least, I don’t know, get a mannequin or something. I don’t know. 

a mannequin! he clapped his hands. shit, of course! 
bit hard, all that plastic, like. but I can always drill holes in them 
and put like, cotton in them or something, can’t I? no, 
not cotton, fluff would stick to me bell end. what can I …

warm jelly? I proposed, before I could stop myself. 

warm jelly! genius! he hugged me. you’re a genius, you are! 
can you get me one? your shop does clothes, doesn’t it? 
they have mannequins, don’t they? you could get me one,
couldn’t you?

I didn’t say anything. 

or do you have already have one? you do, don’t you? 
you’ve already nicked one. 
that’s how you knew to use warm jelly, wasn’t it?

I didn’t say anything. 

and you can’t steal another, because then they’ll be onto you. 
well that’s ok, I can just borrow yours. what’s her name?

Rosanna, I said.  

nice. nice slutty name, that. so can I borrow Rosanna? 
I’ll put my own jelly in her. 

she left me, I said. 

he narrowed his eyes and studied me.
you’re weird, he concluded …

couple of days later, I’m walking to work 
and a car horn beeps.
I turn and it’s him and his mum.
he waves out of the passenger window. 

they on their way to the morgue? I wondered. 
wait till Rosanna hears about this.