She became caretaker for the woman who gave

She became caretaker for the woman who gave birth to her; a woman whose brain was being relentlessly ravaged by prions attacking and rearranging the very proteins of her

dna. Base pairs twisting out of shape, becoming disjointed, like every conversation they'd had of late. Would it have been a relief to know it was an alien infestation, not

intoxicated fornication. But that's what it was. I was not born from alien stock, just loser stock. Christmas card buying, Schlitz guzzling, porky, faded copy cat loser stock. I am

quite sure this has chicken stock in it, but mind you it's the low sodium kind. Fran always used low sodium - well ever since Archie's coronary.

Some neighbors whispered that Archie's heart condition had worsened since he married Fran and started eating her dinners. She did like to season with arsenic to "spice things up."

Archie was a man of taste. He had a style and panache equaled only by his highly developed palette. But Fran's dinners challenged him. The flavors melded such that

It was fairly exotic with an undefinable Green taste. It reminded me faintly of fresh Fenugreek but not quite. Whatever it has it gave the Linguine a Mediterranean flavor I hadn't

ever sampled in Soviet Russia. In my humble opinion, linguine like this should be bronzed and set in some museum. However, as he was the only food critic this far North, it didn't.

matter any more. He set down his fork, brushed the remaining crumbs from his lapel and, taking one last look back, calmly strode from the building. I didn't try to stop him.