Melted

The stench wallops my nostrils before I turn the corner.
'Something is not right!' I exclaim in a French nun accent.
While my family was off eating our way through Maine,
something foul was feasting on, or dying in, a leaky bathroom sink.

For the ten days we were out of state, a house party broke out.
A 4-D experience, whiffs reminiscent of wet rodent hair paired with grease trap
coat my throat, obliterate my nasal passages, 
sting my eyes, prompt my muscles to shudder. 

The dystopian blend assaulting my orifices and aura
hails from a microscopic Burning Man, a pop-up community 
that arose suddenly in the desert of a forgotten sink.

Belching bacteria were head banging with yeast 
and dosing on 'shrooms with algae, 
leaving for me unholy contrails of their out-of-hand bacchanal.

While I reveled at weddings on rocky shores, 
my head was turned, they were here:
Party On, Wayne! Party On, Garth!
Circle dancing and interlocking hands, 
they co-created a slippery sluggy-black lining, choking my P-trap.

My chest shutters; I breathe through my collar. 
I serially consult: Google, ChatGPT, Claude; my mother. 
I gather that it's biofilm that's attacked my unguarded home, 
surely rife with e.coli and other Trojan Horse gifts.

Quiet stoways, they have been here, all this time.
Dining on toothpaste residue, 
shaving cream streaked with facial hair
and semi-frequent dousings of soapy water
interspersed with the grime it washed off our hands 
and funneled down and out from view.

In our absence and a dearth of washings,
they lost their biggest enemy: pressurized streams of water.
And, like Kevin McCallister, 
"This is my house; I have to defend it."

I whip up every elementary schooler's dream, 
a volcano of white vinegar and baking soda.
Let it soak, soak, soak, 
and then pour a kettle's worth of boiling water down.

I dislodge the slimy drain, putting my shoulder 
into the force to overcome the partygoers' resistance.
I soak it in a similar solution, in an stainless steel vessel. 

I rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat, 
even more than the Clairol Herbal Essences bottle 
of my youth recommended.
And then I storm its skies with Drain-O.

After, the drain is white, flecked with black.
If not for the smell, I'd swear someone dumped a bowl of an ice cream and left.
Along the basin, chunks and bits of biofilm shine in the chemical bath, 
falsely advertising itself as melted Breyers Mint Chip.

And there it is, 
the last of my senses, 
my thoughts, my vision; 
melted.