Later Grater

It was 6pm before the fog settled in over Petenwell Lake, one of Wisconsin's 15,000 bodies of water. The deserted cabin was devoid of people but full of outdated magazines and fast food wrappers. In the distance one could hear a freight train whistle.

With a squeak, the backdoor creaks ajar, and a damp night wind seeps into the kitchen. Moonlight illuminates the way as Steve peeks around the door, questioning whether he should enter.

He tentatively nudges the screen door forward, immediately struck by a stench— a gag-inducing mix of Cuervo Gold, pizza, weed and Old Spice. Apparently a hazing ceremony had ended just hours earlier and he discerns shapely shadows of drunk coeds strewn on the sticky floor.

“You hungry?” One of the coeds asks him with a foggy look on his face. A sloppy half slice of pizza sits on the table. “No thanks, man.” The idea almost makes him retch. The group seems surprised to see him there. Not sure why, he was an invited guests after all.

The whole room stared at him with suspicion. To cut the tension he picked up one of the pizza scraps and ate it with a forced smile. He swallowed the greasy morsel, doing all he could not to throw it up. “It’s nice to see you all again,” he lied. “It’s been what, fifteen years?”

High school reunions could be awkward, but this was painful. You’d think after all those years, and with them all being dead anyway, he’d have an easier time.

Yet their heinous and freakish deaths only heightened his sense of pain. When industrial-scaled cheese graters act up, the human carnage becomes ghoulish grist for social media. And that pain exacts a price.

#nogratershame