This is another one of those “Sam was sick” stories. It was a normal
night in the Cleland/Pryzgoda household. Our mother had decided during the
divorce that she was going to keep our father’s last name. She said she didn’t
want a different last name than her children. I think that gesture speaks
droves about our mom.
Anyway, normal night, I think it was Friday. Sam had been sick all
week, and at this time we were sharing a room and bunk beds so while she was
upstairs in bed, I was avoiding the room. As I mentioned, we rarely could agree
on what TV show to watch and at that point Mom had set up a TV and VCR to watch
in our room while Sam was stuck in bed. Needless to say, when she was sick I
always lost the argument of what we were going to watch. So, tonight I was
downstairs with Grandma and Grandpa watching Fawlty Towers rather than bothering with the upstairs television at
all.
Earlier in the evening, Grandpa had come home with a platter of shrimp
cocktail. Sam’s favorite. Sam LOVED shrimp. It didn’t particularly matter what
form it was in. If it was shrimp, Sam loved it… so obviously being presented with
an entire platter of shrimp sent her into a euphoria of crustacean joy. She ate
the whole platter pretty much by herself. After that, she wandered into the
living room with her heart blanket and passed out on the love seat.
We were about halfway through an episode of that zany British show,
giggling at Basil’s antics, before Sam appeared at the base of the stairs. She
had her heart blanket clung to her chest and it was the first time I’d ever
seen anyone look GREEN. She stood there a moment in silence as the three of us
slowly turned our attention to Sam.
Grandma finally spoke up, “Honey, are you feeling ok?”
Sam shook her head and when she opened her mouth, no words came out.
Instead a steady pink faucet of chum projected in an arch across the family
room, even going so far as to cross my line of sight to the television. Not
only was the arch of refuse bright pink, but the sheer smell of dead fish and
bile easily could have turned the most stalwart man’s stomach. So, weird color,
terrible smell and it just went on.
She puked in one steady heave for, I swear, thirty seconds. It just kept coming
until it began forming a chunky pile about three feet in front of my sister.
The monstrosity of a moment finally drew to an end and my sister was
again standing in silence, pink goo dribbling down her chin and tears in her
eyes. We all sat in silence, staring at Sam. It was our Grandfather who finally
spoke up, “You feel better now, sweetheart?”
Sam bobbed her head and he stood to carry her upstairs to clean up and
put her in bed, leaving Grandma and I still in a stunned and disgusted silence.
We both covered our noses and stood to begin cleaning up the mess.
There was a massive pink stain on our family room carpet up until the
day we actually moved out. Like a disgusting testament to the capability of the
human body and will of a little girl.
