Fiction: No One Knows About the Termite That Lives in My Left Eye

By Tyler Plofker

No one knows about the termite that lives in my left eye. The termite that lives in my left eye is middle-aged and unemployed. The termite that lives in my left eye lives alone. I call the termite that lives in my left eye Frank. I’m not sure what his actual name is because he doesn’t speak English; he is a termite. He moved into my eye about a year ago. Before that, I assume he lived in various wooden things. 

 

Frank sometimes nibbles the inside of my eye in an attempt to increase the square footage of his room (i.e., my eye). I tell him to knock it off. Frank usually does not knock it off. Frank drinks upwards of seven beers a night. Once, when I was sleeping, Frank caused a prostitute termite to enter my eye. The prostitute termite wore a hideous yellow blouse with pickle-green “roses.” I woke up to their termite fucking noises. Not great noises to wake up to. I pretended I was still sleeping so as to save us the mutual embarrassment. When she left, Frank puked into his own lap and didn’t clean it off until morning.

 

Frank spends most of his afternoon each day jacking off. Some things he has jacked off to recently include the following: various photos of Casey Anthony; video footage of a captured Saddam Hussein; a youtube clip titled “DBZ - Goku Goes Super Saiyan vs Yakon (Part 2),” where Yakon, a frog monster thing, is forced to suck in energy until it explodes. My theory is that Frank only likes to jerk off to people or things he feels bad for, people or things he feels bad for because most other people revile them. Just a theory. It’s possible Frank simply jerks off to things he thinks are hot. The inside of my left eye smells like cheap beer, sweat, puke, and termite jizz. Often when I’m out on a first date, Frank will start taking a number two, and then my date thinks it’s me who smells like shit, and then there is no second date.

 

Frank is patiently waiting for his parents to die. He wants to commit suicide but doesn’t want to make his parents sad. He hopes his parents die soon. I know this not because he tells me—again, Frank is a termite that cannot speak one word of English—but because he often holds guns to his head before putting them down and then holding photos of his parents and crying. Frank feels bad about being the type of termite who could wish for his parents to die soon, which makes him want to kill himself more, which makes him wish even harder that his parents would die soon, and so on. The reasons I know this are complex and multi-variabled and involve confidential USPS communications and are too long and convoluted to even begin to get into, but trust me that I know this for sure.

 

Having a termite living in my left eye is not something I’m fond of or would like to continue. I went to a doctor to discuss removal, but when the doctor looked at my eye, Frank just moved inside my skull for a bit, and the doctor said he didn’t see anything in my eye, and I told the doctor that Frank, the termite, just moved inside my skull for a little bit, and the doctor looked at me like I had eleven heads.

 

Frank has continued to nibble the inside of my eye and now my eye is almost entirely hollow. If I press on my eye, it pushes in and pops back into place like the outside of a plastic cup. I feel bad for Frank but wish he would leave my eye. I am very concerned about the thinness of my eye. I am very concerned Frank may shoot off a small gun while he is inside my eye. I am very concerned Frank may hang himself using my optic nerve which could potentially have devastating impacts on my ability to see things. 

 

I do not have a real solution. There’s no way I can kill Frank without damaging my eye. I’ve begun watching videos of drug-induced suicides / deaths in the hope he might see them and decide to kill himself in a way that is more conducive to my future health. I’ve watched “The Fentanyl Generation: America in Crisis” fourteen times, and “Woman Overdoses on Heroin With Dog in Car [GRAPHIC IMAGES]” twenty-seven times. I’ve purchased three separate documentaries on Phyllis Hyman. I hope Frank’s parents die soon and Frank kills himself using a drug-related method before he nibbles through the outer layer of my eye. If Frank nibbles through the outer layer of my eye then everyone will know that I have and have had a termite living in my left eye, which would be extremely awkward and embarrassing; it would probably also be horrifically painful, and I would probably also no longer be able to use that eye. I would probably have to get the eye removed and walk around with one eye like some kind of freak.

Tyler Plofker is a writer in NYC. In his free time, he likes drinking water.