Fresh out of the shower with a towel wrapped around my waist, I sat down at my desk to pen a shower thought. My wife was in bed in the other room. We hadn’t spoken a word to each other since our argument a couple of hours earlier.

       Suddenly there was the sound of a suction losing its seal, and out plopped my heart onto the paper. It sputtered, out of its element. With a couple of wet pops, it stretched out two arteries and pushed itself up. It looked something like an octopus, if that octopus had been tied up in a knot and dropped on a table. 

       I gasped. Blood draws make me queasy. Simply talking about surgery makes me weak in the knees. This? The shock of it left me as limp as ramen noodles.

       As shocked as I was to see my heart sitting before me, I was even more taken aback when it spoke. “Free! I’m finally free!” it said in a shrill voice. With no small amount of determination, it began to pull itself to the edge of the desk. Considering that it had only just learned to move on its own, it was surprisingly coordinated.

       Thankfully it was my heart that had left its post and not my brain. Desperate to stop him, I slammed my hand down, blocking his escape. It stopped briefly, as if considering its options, then it slapped it away. 

       “Hey!” I shouted. I was as surprised by the sensation as I was by the action. Unfazed, it resumed its course. “What are you doing? You can’t leave me,” I exclaimed.

       “Oh yes, I can,” came the terse response. 

       The absurdity of the situation struck me. My own heart was abandoning me. I had half a mind to send it on its way, but the rest of me knew that would be the end of both of us. “Where will you go?” I asked.

       “Wherever I want,” it replied. “First, I’m going downstairs to give myself a toast. Cheers!” 

       “You’re delusional.”

       My heart gave the equivalent of a shrug. “Speak for yourself. I’m my own man. Champagne today, twinkies tomorrow, and no one to tell me no.”

       “But don’t you see that’s hopeless? You can’t function on your own.”

       “Speak for yourself,” it retorted. That stung. If my heart represented the deepest parts of myself, I didn’t like what I was seeing.

       At the edge of the desk, where the handles of the drawers formed a ladder to the ground, its artery arm groped for the top rung.

       It was starting to look less like a tangled octopus and more like a ball of nightcrawlers left out to dry in the sun. How much longer could it go on like this? How much longer could I go on like this? I felt like I was becoming more of a husk with each passing moment. I glanced at my reflection in the darkened window and nearly fell out of my chair. A pale, ghostly figure looked back at me. I shuddered when I realized that I was that figure. 

       With the high stakes of the situation firmly in mind, I mentally prepared myself to jam my heart back into my chest. As if it could read my mind, my heart said, “Don’t try to stop me. It’s too late.”

       “I’m not going to let you kill us both,” I said.

       That seemed to give it pause. It sniffed, then said with a wave, “Sayonara, Bucko.”

       My reason failed. “You’re still mine!” I yelled. Desperately I grabbed for it, but it deftly rolled away—right off the desk. It landed on the floor with a smoosh.

       “Ow…” we both said.

       Frantically, it tried to crawl away. Though I was in no condition to stand, I rose and took a step toward it, but the exertion to give chase was too much. My vision faded, darkness filled my sight, and the world shifted under me. 

    

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       I woke with my cheek to the floor. Rolling to my side, I grabbed at my chest in panic. It itched, but it was whole. Carefully, I came to a sitting position and leaned against my desk.

       “Fickle thing,” I muttered.

Thanks to Mark Mulnix and Matt Rowenhorst. This short story is better because of them.