Masterson Boner-Whitson got Covid playing Donkey Kong at the Estranged Horsie pool hall in downtown Pherryville, Kentucky. Three days later his joints ached, and there was a wispy tickle in his throat; so he administered one of the tests he’d hoarded from the family business, Boner-Whitson Coal, sneezing like a banshee throughout, then returned to an online cooking course he was taking to perfect smoking a turkey, meat he considered dull, but had to prepare for his premier as host of the extended family’s Thanksgiving. An hour later he returned to the test on the kitchen table, and saw the pale, tell-tale red stripes. 

He ate a pint of Häagen-Dazs Mint Chip ice cream, then called his brother Jim Junior. 

“Hey, Girl Arms,” said Jim Junior.

“Hey.”

“Thought you were taking the day off?”

“I’m off.”

“Then why you a-calling me for?”

“Got Covid.”

Jim Junior inhaled like a fireplace bellow. “Ain’t you done had it three times?”

“Twice.”

“Well.”
“Don’t reckon I can come down to the mines next week.”
“You only come down Mondays and Wednesdays anyway.”

“Well, I guess Monday and Wednesday are out too.”
“Alright then.”

--

Two weeks later Masterson exited his white Toyota Tacoma in the company parking lot. Boner-Whitson Coal is located in Maugh County, southeast of Vaunce and McQuarters counties. Years earlier, Jim Boner-Whitson had relinquished control of the family business, making Jim Junior, the eldest, president and Masterson, the baby, chief operating officer.

Masterson’s skin was paler than normal when he shut the pickup’s door and walked through the silent parking lot. With an effort he always considered untoward, he pressed the door’s thumb latch and pushed, then let both hands dangle below his waist; his gangly, slight arms, like a bouquet of ribbons hanging off the slumpy shoulders of a small, stout man.

When he reached his office, Masterson plugged his laptop into the monitors on his desk. The pale light from the screens lit up his wan face in the dark morning. His mouth curled slightly upward, eyes pinched together contentedly, shoulders at rest. As his computer came to life, Masterson grabbed a package of Ding Dongs on his desk and leaned back, letting the cool headrest greet his bald spot. His lips rested on the hard exterior of the Ding Dong for a moment, before he bit into the soft cake and creamy prize. Masterson chewed, closing his eyes for a luxurious second, but his taste buds registered nothing. He sat up, chewing more rapidly, then swallowed. He scarfed the remainder of the Ding Dong; still nothing. He catapulted out of the chair, and grabbed an open Nehi on the table. A long chug, and – just room temperature, sparkling wet. He turned on the remaining Ding Dong, eating it in one bite, but he experienced only a tasteless mélange of textures.

He called Gina. It had been two months since she’d gone to her mother’s in Boister. She’d discovered  a site called Cock-Luvving Cuckbois open in one of their home theaters, then asked him with the bated breath of an overripe virgin if he wanted that. He’d lied, said it was kind of hot but kind of gross, and seen her chest collapse. She asked again a few weeks later, then a month after that and again on a few occasions after; each time her breath evened out more, but he always prevaricated. Sex ceased; when she drank she called him dishonest, a coward once.

Each ring rippled the surface of an uneasy pool in the pit of his eggy belly. When the last ring produced the ineluctable relief of voicemail, he peered out at the parking lot, full of steel and rubber and pavement, quiet and lifeless, safe.

Will I ever taste kimchi again? he wondered. 

He packed up his laptop, walked out to the parking lot and drove the hour home with the stereo off and the windows rolled up. He called Jim Junior on the ride back and canceled Thanksgiving.

 “I can’t even taste, man.”

--

Masterson rarely drove in to work the next month. His taste and smell came back intermittently, but altered and anemic. 

He still hadn’t spoken to Gina. Infrequently, he’d ensconce himself in  magnanimity, hoping she’d found a new man, someone who enjoyed missionary position and Christmas and Cracker Barrel. But a handsome, rangy cowboy – was she with him now? “Just tell me you want it” : her mock echoed around him like a sound installation until … bloop! Out it sprang, under the shower or in his home theater cave; no matter where the fantasy started, it always ended there. He’d exhale deeply, like Jimmy. 

Jimmy? What if he? He’d be the type to … but no … He pulled up his phone. Jimmy had texted him an article claiming that surprising your taste and smell could jolt them back, like a defibrillator. He cleaned up, then consulted the fridge and the cupboard, putting frozen taquitos, Easy Cheese, Texas Pete and soy sauce in the blender. Masterson closed his eyes and drank the concoction, just noticing the hints of a gag reflex! He spat the rest back and pumped his fist. But then the next day he tried something similar, and it was as bland as porridge. He persisted; and sometimes smell or taste would return briefly, but like a jilted pet, they refused to stay, preferring whatever cold void lost senses find themselves in. 

After another blender experiment, Masterson realized that in all these months he hadn’t been to his favorite restaurant in the big city to the west. A college friend, an exchange student from Seoul, turned him on to a Korean grocery store in a stripmall, where, if you knew how to ask, a feast awaited you at one of the humble tables in the back; his friend swore it rivaled the food back home. 

Masterson drove there the next day, and the older couple who owned it welcomed him back. There was no menu; you just told them how hungry you were. This time he was famished. The banchan arrived on plates adorned with the same periwinkle-on-cream calligraphy as always; he went straight for the kimchi, slowly raising a sliver of cabbage to his mouth, anticipating its funky spiciness and contrast of texture. The pearly red cabbage touched his lips, climbing up to his nostrils – and he smelled! When he put it in his mouth and chewed it also had taste – just different. Bad actually. Less spicy, no fermentation and … antiseptic? Yes, like a Bandaid. He pinioned another piece with his chopsticks, and another and another – but alack, all astringent. He sampled the dishes in succession, and while the kimchi was the sole possessor of this odd flavor, the others tasted like a dampened version of themselves.

Masterson nonetheless finished, then took a sip of beer. He exhaled like a wheezing hot water bottle. His shoulders relaxed. The man returned with main courses, smiling, and Masterson smiled back. 

He nibbled around, and some of the dishes tasted close to normal. His appetite grew, eyes became wider and his pace quickened. By the time dessert came, he’d invited the old man and woman to join him for shots and tea.

--

In the stripmall parking lot, he rolled down the windows in the Tacoma, and put on some Big L, something he and his old buddy used to jam, eventually pulling onto the interstate to take him home to Appalachia.

Halfway there, “Gina” lit up on his phone’s display. 

He fumbled for his phone and answered. There was her face; her voice boomed on the car’s audio. 

“Hey, Gina,” he said, voice buoyant, Big L behind it.

“Hi, Masterson,” she said, breath short.

“Good to hear from you. How’re things?”

“Fine. Look, puppy,” she said, and his stomach flipped, “I’m going to give you what you wanted.”

He slammed his phone in front of his face and was confronted with the largest penis he’d ever seen. “See that, puppy?” she said.

“Yes,” he mumbled.

“Good. You can’t have it, but keep it in your mind because the camera’s going off. I’ll leave the phone on so you can enjoy yourself, Girl Arms. Ha.”

He slowed down to 55, mounting the phone on the dash. Her moaning started immediately. The man moaned too, and Masterson’s downcast eyes spied at the humble, unstoppable tent in his pants. 

“Fuck it,” he said, and pulled onto the shoulder. “Y’all watch this.” Parked, he turned on the Facetime camera, exited and climbed onto the pickup bed. There, in the sunny cold, he pulled down his pants, standing up but with the camera positioned on the bed so they could see him, just as the slowing drivers did. 

“Woo!” he yelled. Then, moaning and whining and smiling, his eyes clear and bright, he spit on his right hand and started working his irrepressible manhood; with his left hand, he twirled an invisible lasso over his head, Slim-Pickens-rodeo-riding his hydrogen bomb, eastbound lane, Interstate 64.