Sewage Incarnate

Before leaving me in charge of his apartment for the month, the principal of the school warned me about his kitchen drain: "It exudes a vile stink."

I wish he hadn't also told me that "it's a result of the fact that my plumbing goes straight into the sludge river flowing beneath Tokyo, instead of bending somewhere first like a normal drainpipe does," because I just now heard a noise coming from his drain.

Perhaps it was the sludge monster who lives suspended there. Sludge monsters, I read, are born when you eat lots of fermented foods and wash their remains down the drain (the principal of the school does that). And they eat espresso grounds for breakfast, after soaking all night in goma-dunked soba noodles. They rustle and belch when you flush the toilet, and it stings their sagging orifices when you bleach the sink. But they never die.

I really did hear ours clawing for an escape. I don't want to walk past the kitchen sink to use the toilet. He's going to jump out, dark and slimy, and try to become part of my life. I'm going to reject him (he's married!), but it will be too late. His mucous will already have soiled my clothing and outlook.