Meat

“The meat on this kebab is tough,” I said.
I heard Slick sigh over his frying pan. “Just shut up and eat it.”
I missed Jimmy’s cooking. He’d mixed it up a little. Slick only fed me meat. I dragged a chunk of beef from the skewer.
“What part of a cow is this?” I asked.
“How the Hell am I supposed to know?”
I squeezed the lump between my thumb and finger. Red in the middle. Juices seeping out. Just the way I liked it. I picked at a bulge in the slimy grey skin with my finger.
“That looks like a…”
I stopped. I knew what it was.
“Do cows get verrucas?” I asked.
Slick kept his back to me.
“Considering they don’t have feet,” he said, “I’d say not.”
There were more bulges, like mould growing on a dead man’s back. Bazooka that verruca. Cows didn’t get verrucas, I thought. But Jimmy had. He used to complain about them all the bloody time. Slick never did like his whingeing.  I knew that’s why he’d had to go. My stomach didn’t agree with me though. I looked at Slick. He turned and met my gaze.
“Haven’t you always wanted to try it?” he asked.
Funnily enough I hadn’t.
“Jimmy’s got nothing on beef, has he? Not on my cousin’s beef anyway,” Slick said. He looked at the meat on my plate. “I got them both mixed up in the freezer.” After a long silence – “so, what do you think?”
Jimmy had settled terribly in my stomach. His new resting place.
Great. Now I had indigestion.
“I think,” I pushed my plate away and pulled out my mobile. “I think we should get a take away.”

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