A Thousand Bulging Eyes

Trigger Warnings: Animal death (frogs) and paranoia/obsession

You really are a fool, you know. You can't get rid of a fact of nature, no matter how many pesticides and mouse traps you use. I mean, really? Mouse traps? For frogs? Of course, I know what obsession can do to someone's mind, I've seen it firsthand over and over again, and I&pos;l continue to. You definitely know what it's doing to your mind, I always appreciated your straightforwardness with yourself. We both know that being straightforward won't fix anything for you, though.

The slimy, nasty little things must've only really entered your perception when you were a rather young boy, just entering adolesence. As people do, you thought that meant they had only started appearing then. You were hanging out with one of your friends, another boy maybe a year or two older than you. You always looked up to him, he made you feel like you were so cool for a big kid wanting to hang out with you. You don't even remember what you had been talking about. You imagine it was probably something or another about a movie you had just watched or a video game you had been playing, or whatever you spoke about when you were that age. He had told a joke about whatever neighbor kid was fun to mock at the time and you were laughing. That's when you realized his eyes were fixated on something between you.

He picked up the slimy, croaking, relatively small frog between his fingers, squeezing harder when it attempted to wriggle out of his grasp, punishing it for doing what any animal with any survival instinct would do. He held it up to the light to examine it, a cruel grin on his face the entire time. After that, he beckoned you to come take a closer look. You refused, you already hated that little thing with a passion that would only grow with you. Shrugging, he lifted the frog up to his mouth and started chewing, no signifier of hesitance in any of his movements as the poor little thing still squirmed in his grip. After an eternity that was probably closer to fifteen seconds, he swallowed the chewed up remains of the frog.

"Fingers crossed that one wasn't poisonous," He joked, still smiling as the blood dripped down his chin.

You would've convinced yourself it was a dream if it wasn't for your parents reminding you of it every couple years. You remember seeing that boy after that, so even if it was poisonous, it didn't kill him. You didn't want to hang out with him anymore after that, though. Either way, you didn't stop seeing the frogs. After seeing them enough times, you did some research and found out that they were pretty common in your area. You didn't like that idea. Over the years, you started to consider the very idea of frogs as something inherently repulsive and unsafe to be around.

You had to dissect one in high school biology, didn't you? At that point you knew all there was to know about them, thought maybe it'd make you feel more secure. It didn't of course; none of your research ever told you how to get rid of them. I don't think you learned much from the lesson, but you definitely thought a lot about your old friend. The frog you had under your scalpel was much larger than the one your friend had devoured for the cruelty of it, and it didn't bleed. Shakily, you examined the organs, identifying each one with relative ease, despite your anxiety. You were beyond cautious about touching the skin even with your gloves, so convinced of the possibility of its nonexistent poison being able to seep through.

You vomited as soon as you stepped away from the tray—unable to be proud of yourself for not vomiting directly on the frog—as you could've sworn you felt the frog twitch as you poked at its heart with a scalpel.

Despite that, for several years, maybe a little bit short of a decade, it was fine. They were common but you didn't see them all the time. You were free to live a pretty peaceful life that for most people, wouldn't have been made any different by a couple more frogs than usual showing up. It really was only a couple at first. Two of them in the bathroom around midnight, a handful scattered around the living room, one cupped in your daughter's hands that you definitely reacted to far too harshly for her to understand. Was that the tipping point for you? Seeing that your damn obsession could affect not only yourself but her? Is that when you decided you needed them all gone?

Even with the resources you had gained over the years, nothing you tried would work. If anything, the homemade solutions after soutions that you put all around the house only attracted more frogs. Or maybe they were just attracted by your fixation on them. In your defense, using pesticides without anything suggesting that they'd work was a last resort. You had a child to take care of, a child that—as much as you had tried to keep her from seeing—was very aware of how poorly her father was doing. No one her age should have to worry about her only parent like that. It wasn't always easy raising her on your own, that isn't unusual for a single parent, but you had always managed to be a good father, at least by my standards. You couldn't take care of her in this state though, and you most definitely couldn't keep her in a house you were going to spray down with pesticides. Your friend from work offered to let her stay with her for a while, an offer which you took, even if you couldn't miss the look in her eyes when you told her you didn't know how long it would be until you could let her back home.

A night or two later, you had all the supplies you thought you needed, all stored in a corner of your bedroom. Every time you turned your head, you swore you could hear a chorus of croaks coming from behind you, a sound you'd never get accustomed to. Almost every step was accompanied by a slimy, squishing feeling under your feet which you could do nothing about besides hope weren't poisonous to the touch. You couldn't even lie in your own bed due to the entire colony of multicolored frogs of all sizes that had completely overtaken it. You would've screamed if this hadn't been your every day life for weeks. You didn't dare to look inside your daughter's room and see what she had been living with. You wished she had complained and you knew it was your own fault that she didn't.

Before you could think about that for much longer, an overwhelming nausea and agony in your stomach akin to that which had occured when you had gotten severe food poisoning as a teen brought you to your hands and knees on the floor, groaning in pain. You heaved and retched, desperate to get whatever was causing it out of your body, something eventually getting caught in your throat. You tried to push harder, only growing more erratic without the ability to breathe. Collapsing fully to the ground, you tried to push at your throat and stomach, desperate to dislodge the horrible mass. Your attempts only grew weaker as the seconds passed. On the brink of unconsciousness, your throat began to relax, not having the strength to continue contracting. Whatever was stuck began to move slowly and deliberately to the front of your mouth. With the last remaining bit of strength you had, you spat it out. Focusing your eyes was a lost cause, but you could see the outline of a large, slimy bulging frog in front of you.