“The Rubberist” by Molly Miles

Ottery St. Mary Tar Barrels [Event]: On November 5th, or thereabouts, of every year the inhabitants of Ottery St. Mary, a village in Devon, strap barrels of tar to themselves and set them alight. They then run through the crowds of people, who gather in the village for the event, while the barrels burn. The origins of this event are unknown.

I live with my wife and my wife’s child. We wear matching Halloween costumes when we trick or treat. I eat my dinner at the television while they eat theirs at the table. We live in the village, where we have always lived. I work in the shop, where I have always worked. I let myself have only one coffee a day when, in my previous life, I would drink five. My wife drives her child to a school near the city. We hold our daily rituals close to our chests.

My wife has not touched me in years. Not since we married, not since she brought her child to live with us. At night, while we share the same bed, I have to listen to her child scratching on the walls while he sleeps, dragging his nails down what she painted bright yellow. Her child shows me the artwork he made at school, and I say nothing. Her child tells me about his day, and I say nothing. Her child wants fish fingers for dinner and she is out at her book club, so I cook them with peas and say nothing. Her child asks when the tar barrels are going to burn, and I tell him not yet, I tell him to be patient. My wife’s child talks and I say nothing and I say nothing and my wife’s child talks.

That is how it has been for as long as I can remember. I would spend my evenings glued to my office chair, looking at the computer like a mirror that does not reflect. A mirror that is moreso a window, that is a part of my guts and completely separate from my body all in one. Inside my screen, I would see people how I wish to be seen. I could reject the foul skin that my bones cling to, no longer sweaty and sour against the leather office chair I have shaped a dent into. Here come the images, framed and looking towards me in a glowing white light.

I see a person with their body encased in latex crawling across a dirty floor. On their belly, they slither across the room, their only exposed flesh a wet pink tongue that lolls from their shiny black lips. The images are silent, but I know their sounds all too well. Squeaking latex, the smell of sweat against sweat against something more than flesh. If I thought hard enough, I could imagine myself in the place of the body. My lungs breathing a coarse air tainted with the feeling of hot rubber, my intestines rubbing together with the friction of latex, my skin not dry with flesh but smooth with something beyond the body I was confined to. My real body would begin to twitch, unsure of how else to cope with the fuzzy delightful nausea that began to take over my veins.

As I reached the heights of euphoria, my climax would be cut short by the gnawing realisation that I still have a penis, that my cock sits small, flaccid, and pathetic between my milk-coloured fleshy thighs. I want to shred it into ribbons of meat that fall below my feet to leave me naked, bare, and nothing. I desire another, I was born flesh but I crave rubber.

Now, though, I find myself halfway towards my new body. I have been confined to the candlelit spare room. I have taken down all my mirrors. I have swallowed my teeth. I have pored over every instruction. When I first confined myself to this space, my wife banged on the door for what felt like days but could have been hours or could have been moments. I heard my wife’s child cry, and she did nothing to prevent his screams because she was screaming too. In a fleeting moment of weakness, I wondered if I opened the door and hugged my wife in a tight, warm embrace that this would all pass. That I would push myself out of this phase of my life and repress everything I had ever hoped to become. But this would mean returning to the man I had always pretended to be. To the greasy sheets that my wife would never leave if it were not for her child. I push through the screaming and retreat to the furthest corner of the room, blocking out the sounds with each memory of what giving in would mean.

But I am talking about who I was, not who I am. Not my becoming, not my rebirth. The body that came before and the person that never was. I think it is raining outside. Maybe it was always raining, and I just never noticed.

The day I was contacted by someone I have named ‘The Rubberist’, I had clocked off work early, but without the desire to see my wife or make true contact with another living soul I found myself in the belly of the village pub. At the sticky dark wood bar, I hazily eyed a sign tacked to the wall that read ‘after my shift ends, I am going to have a mental breakdown! I’ve worked hard for it, I deserve it, and no one is going to deprive me of it!’. The men next to me were swaying, red nosed and gargling, and the one woman with them was yelling about the tar barrels and I was stuck with the pressing sensation of piss against my bladder.

When I was a child, in order to get to sleep, I would fantasise about my cock being eaten by the neighbour’s dog. I believed it to be a vicious thing because it was confined to their back garden in all weathers and all seasons, running circles while it snarled its teeth. During my many sleepless nights, I would imagine it leaping through my window and tearing my cock clean off, leaving the space between my legs bare and free of any impurity. Closing my eyes I no longer had to look at the Transformers or teddy bears my mother had filled my room with. I was not bound by the posters of action men looking down on me, their own crotches smooth. Instead, I would dream of the dog and of its teeth and my own smoothness and I would rub myself up and down and cry at the knob of flesh that still resided there. No matter how clean a urinal is, needing to piss in public forced me to look at my flesh worm and the pathetic stream that trickled from its head.

Even as I swayed across the pub floor to the bar, I felt all eyes that were not on me on me, burning a hole into my flesh. Get to the bathroom, do not think about my cock.

My phone had been buzzing incessantly in my pocket all day. Usually I’m one to ignore it, yet that day I could not. That day each buzz reverberated through my body, bubbling through my veins and over my coarse, goosebumped skin. I was becoming the pain in my chest, as I thought of my wife and what she could be saying to me. As I stood over the urinal, half a cock in hand and an entire lifetime of flesh stretching out before me, my piss erupted suddenly out of me in one painful spurt. Like an orgasm, but with none of the pleasure. I shook and I shook and my phone buzzed and buzzed and I thought of how my neighbour’s dog eventually crawled underneath the porch to die. Do all dogs crawl underneath the porch to die? Am I going to crawl underneath this urinal, its ammonia seeping into my skin and leaving me to rot?

I checked my phone.

There was one email. Or rather, there were fifty emails which all read the same.

Subject line:

Body of the email: SO? I HEARD YOU WANT TO BE MADE OF RUBBER?

I looked at the email and the email looked at me. That was The Rubberist. That was how they contacted me. That is how I entered this candlelit room, how I closed myself off from everything else. The hundreds of notifications were not from my wife, nor my child’s school telling me again that he has talked of nothing but the barrels burning and leaving me to fight the urge to inform them that he likes them in a way he is not yet capable of understanding. I had no reason to believe this email was anything more than a scam, some form of cruel trick. But I had to take The Rubberist at face value. Otherwise, I would have spent my lifetime wishing for an escape from the tomb of the womb for nothing.

Reading that email, I was a child again. I know this place well, I know the dog next door was probably driven mad by the cold wet winters and the hot dry summers. If it was starving, perhaps it would have eaten my penis for breakfast, but I know now that I desire more than its simple removal. Here is a cock, it flops back and forth and it has been inside of my wife and it has been inside of others and I do not know it. It is not mine, but I bear its sacrilege as if it is my birthright. Who are you, where did you come from, how did you choose me, how can this be happening to me. I typed out my reply slowly, but without hesitation. I have wanted this my entire life, and I wanted it and I want it and I needed to know if I could touch it.

By the time I was out of the bathroom and ordering another pint, hands shaking, The Rubberist had already replied. I needed to prove that this was real, that these offerings could become mine. My wife was not in my mind, my wife’s child was not in my mind, I did not think of the burning barrels, I thought only of my body, placid and ready to be moulded. I had to hold these beliefs to myself and, phone under the counter top so nobody would see me typing, I had to hold them to my body as well.

SO? I HEARD YOU WANT TO BE MADE OF RUBBER!

I typed and I waited and I knew, somewhere deep down inside the folds of my flesh, that I had found the dawning of myself inside of something other than an end.

***

Today I had to eat my hair. For the first few days of my time here, I think my wife left me meals or drinks or other provisions, though I cannot be sure. I would hear her clattering while her child, presumably, ran about her feet as he had done to me before my self-imposed transformation. She did not know that I would be digesting myself. At least, that is how The Rubberist had told me it would happen. It was one of the first points they explained. How my teeth would fall out, pushed out of my gums as the wet flesh became solid, sleek, latex, and I would swallow them down. If it were not for a gnawing hunger that made my stomach fold in on itself, stomach acid pouring out of the lining and burning what was left of my insides, I do not know if I could have done it. Each tooth got lodged in the back of my throat, and I choked it down between half taken breaths.

My hair had not been especially thick or thin, light or dark, although you could not call it mousy either. I did not have it in abundance but it wasn’t thinning, and while I could grow facial hair I never chose to. Sometimes I would wear it long, though usually it would become too greasy and I would shave it shorter. Much like the rest of my body, my hair had simply been there.

Except, now it isn’t. Now my hair is sitting in a pile on the floor. From the thinnest pube to the thickest strand from my head, I had swept it all into one clump. Yesterday, I took a sniff at the hair, gagging as mould and rust and stale coffee hit the back of my throat, burning into what was once flesh replaced with rubber. The pubic hair is much darker and thicker than the rest, and even through the candlelight I can see the white grease stains clagging the knots together.

The Rubberist told me I had to swallow everything. That, in order to complete my transformation, I had to digest what I shed. My cock is still flesh, I can feel it throbbing down there like a witch finger grape flanked by two melons. I take it between my sleek fingers, and feel close to tears at how pale it has become without a hint of natural light. The Rubberist told me I had to swallow everything.

I push the ball of hair between my rubber lips and roll it into my mouth, eyes closed. Immediately, the hair tries to spread out inside my mouth like a greasy spider, one with a thousand legs and a body thick with fur. I try to lubricate my throat, but the rubber has made it near impossible to create any saliva. As I instinctively try to pull the hair from inside of me, I discover that it has tangled around my teeth and caught in my throat as though I am a clogged shower drain. Tipping my head backwards, I matt the hair in my mouth until I can wrap my tongue around it and choke the ball down my throat. Gagging, the familiar stomach acid burns at my throat, sharp with what I can only assume are the half-digested remains of my teeth trying to come back to the surface. I resist, I resist, I resist, forcing my jaw to unclench so that the hair can pierce through the acid, now acting as lubricant, the hair tickles me as it slides down my throat, wrapping around what is left of my stomach.

Eyes watering, I blink and find myself staring at my cock. For a moment, I look away, and then I stare again, but I do not have to stare for long. As I have discovered, the experience is almost instant. My cock shrivels before me, as though it has been placed inside a dehydrator that can retract my body inside of itself. It is not painful, but it is not pain free. I stand and stare at the new smoothness, my crotch like the action men, my crotch bitten by the dog. For a brief moment, it is flesh coloured, but soon my body begins to mutate into a sleek surface that could not be considered skin. I could cry, if my tear ducts still worked. I could hyperventilate, if my lungs were not going to give in. I am becoming everything I ever hoped I would be.

***

Do you know how much skin you have? That was the first question The Rubberist asked me. When I told them, no, they responded: you will want to know, it will make a difference when you are swallowing it. I was back in the house I shared with my wife, looking at our emails on the computer. I asked The Rubberist what they meant by this, and they explained:

In order to become made of rubber, you will have to lock yourself in a room. Black out all the windows, remove all the mirrors, bring your favourite rubber images (you know the ones). Light one candle when you wake up and watch it burn. When it has burned to the bottom, sleep. Repeat this until all the candles are gone. Do not eat any food or drink any liquid. You will notice your body start to shed itself. Skin first, then nails, then teeth and hair. Your tongue too. You will have to swallow all of it. It will be hard at first, believe me, but you will adapt. The way your stomach will begin to eat away at itself will ensure that.

When you emerge, you will be new. I can imagine your flesh breathing, as mine does. Watching it rise and fall, smooth and featureless without a single flaw. Your breath will be reduced to a hollow wheezing, but you will be more alive than you ever have been. There you will be, as you have always seen yourself others will see you too. Your flesh will breathe for you. You can birth yourself.

That was when the searing doubt began to creep in. I asked, through the computer screen, how The Rubberist could prove this was true. How did they even find me in the first place? The walls around me began closing in, as I thought of my wife lying in bed next to me, a lifetime left of her hand brushing my arm and not understanding why I flinched.

Except, the answer was simpler than I could ever have hoped for. The Rubberist sent me a series of pictures. In each one they are wearing a simple, thin, fabric hood and standing naked in front of a light blue wall. They were saved with names such as ‘dayone.jpeg’ or ‘dayfiveiseesomechanges.jpeg’. At first it was them and their pale body, appearing almost translucent against the wall. However, as I scrolled through the images The Rubberist’s body began to change. What once was flesh became replaced by oily, thick, black rubber. It crawled up their body in patches, weaving over their skin. There were ten images in total, the final ‘iamrubber.jpeg’ showing them grinning a toothless shiny grin at the camera, their mouth now a black hole against their completely smooth face and sleek, glistening body. In a previous image, they had put on a pair of oversized silver goggles to show me where their eyes were, to show me that they were looking towards me. The images glowed, warm, through the screen and into me.

Do you understand now? The Rubberist asked. I met you before, you visit me on my blog every night. I had to reach out, because I have found the kind of happiness I never knew was possible.

The Rubberist knew me because of course they did, I knew them too. Those heavy nights spent hiding on the computer, hoping my wife would not wake up or that my wife’s child would not pad in demanding water, were nights spent with them. They had wrapped me up inside the computer screen before, they had held me in ways that my body never could. 

In the days that followed, I took The Rubberist’s word as gospel. My wife did not take notice of my online order of candles, but when I told her I was going to quit my job she panicked. She asked me if I was leaving her and I told her no, well, not exactly, but that I was going to go away for a while. I thought about showing her my exchanges with The Rubberist, but that would mean admitting to her that the man she married never really existed. That she had slept every night next to someone wishing for death so badly they had begun to die a new kind of death with each passing day. The day we got married, my wife’s father drowned in a swimming pool. We should have taken it as a sign.

***

The Rubberist has forbidden me from putting any mirrors in the room, so for the past few days I have been observing my new flesh under candlelight. You already heard about how I ate my hair, my teeth too, but I have ingested my skin. I settled in, and in return my body has given to me what was always destined to be mine.

Each day I light my candles, and each day I watch myself transform. At first, I would look over the images The Rubberist suggested I bring with me, some were even of them. When my wife was screaming, I could see them and imagine them here. What we would talk about and how their rubber would feel against mine. Did they also have a wife, and did their wife also have a child, and did they also sit and stew and wait in the pale glow of the television over everyone’s favourite late night game show? Did they feel the fish fingers, slightly burned, scratch at their throat, painfully scraping against the flesh? Did their wife’s child ask them over and over about the burning barrels, did they look at his face half formed to theirs and have to fight the urge to tell him that he loves their flames in a way he cannot yet understand?

 I do not know how long I have been inside this room, but I know that my wife has stopped screaming. I have not heard the cries of her child, and the final candle is burning. The Rubberist requested that I not let any light into the room, so during my preparation I spent a day covering the only small window with thick black duct tape. I think, at some point, my wife wanted to make this into an at home office so she could spend more time with me. Not that it matters now. I have ingested all my skin, I have let my hair fall out and my body contort. I have not experienced pain as much as I have experienced resurrection. The candle burns to the ground. There is no sound. There is only myself and my new body. Although my ability to breathe deeply has been replaced by a hollow wheeze, I try anyway.

I do not know if the village will take me as I always have been, but it does not matter. The future belongs to me, not to the imaginary self I had to rely on to survive. I am not thinking of them. I wheeze once more as I unlock the door.

Upon leaving the room, I am not hit with the expected blast of sunlight but with the smell of smoke. My urge to look in the full body mirror in the bathroom is, momentarily, pushed aside when I realise that today is the day the barrels are burning. Peering out of a window, I look down at the throngs of people milling below, cheering and laughing, their skin shining through the window and piercing my field of vision.

There is no second thought; I move as quickly as I can to the bathroom, feeling dizzy with excitement and with the reminder of how much space there is outside of the room I transformed in. I push the door open and, for the first time in my life, am confronted with myself. It is not that I had never looked in a mirror before, but each time I had the person I was seeing was not me. It was a ghost, a knot of bones and skin made to look like a human but which was not a human at all. I touch my reflection in the mirror and it touches me back.

In the room’s candlelight, I was able to see parts of my rubber. Now, I can see just how successful the transformation has been. My facial features, all my lumps and bumps, the mole just above my belly button, all are gone. I nearly cry when I see how smooth my crotch has become. There is no cock, hanging there limp and pathetic, gawking at me while it swings back and forth, content in its paleness. I run my hands over the rubber and notice, for the first time, how clean it is. How sleek and squeaky, and how it pushes back as I push against it. Growing this new flesh did not hurt, and the swallowing of the self is a distant memory. All is fading as I realise, truly, that The Rubberist was right about it all.

Grabbing my phone, I take one final look at myself in the mirror. A part of me wants to slam my head against the wall because this dream cannot be true. I cannot believe I am what I always dreamed I would be. I cannot believe that my body can belong to me. I cannot believe that I am no longer alone.

In my excitement, I forget my keys, I forget to see if my wife or my wife’s child have left for the barrels yet, for a split second I even forget who I used to be. The streets smell like smoke, but I know that I smell clean, that my latex shimmers against the flames and that I smile a smile that no one else can see.

I move like an animal, something that once was human but which has now transcended. The streets are compact with people, but I manoeuvre through them with ease, in part because they move for me. I know my wife is here somewhere. I wonder if her child will hug me when he sees me. Usually, the smoke from the barrels would choke me but my lungs are so constricted by the rubber inside that the air does little to affect my breathing. Instead, it is the flesh of others that is winding around me. Knowing that it is no longer me releases me from any kind of fear and I can face the judgement of the world without paralysis.

Moving through the village, trying to find a good spot to watch the barrels, I notice the wide eyes of the people who think they have spent their whole life knowing me; the way mothers clamp their hands over their children’s eyes and the way the men in the beer gardens of pubs I once drank in look even deeper into the bottom of their glasses.

I take my phone and email The Rubberist a simple thank you. If I still had flesh, I am sure I would get goosebumps. If my body was trapped in the way I had been before, it would be shaking here in the street. With each mother who makes what she believes is eye contact with me, with each child they prevent from looking in my direction, with each passing glance that grows to become a stare, I feel every semblance of my old self die. This is the smell before the Christmast lights are put up. As I walk through the village, through the flaming barrels, I feel nostalgic for a life I have only just begun to live.

This is my village of Chamounix. I am anointed beneath these burning barrels. My entire life has followed the forming of a wound, and I have moulded the wound to me. In the glow of the burn, I am witness to myself and I am witness to the world.