Great Depression Gross-out Stories:I Ate Fred

Special to The Brutal Times, By James Muchen,114 – In the house I grew up in we weren’t nothin’ but us kids, pa & ma.

Ma wan’nt home much a the time, and pa used tuh beat us every chance he get.

Then came the Depression an’ things really started tuh get bad.

I remember one morn all I had was shoes on my feet an’ I run down the street – wan’nt even a street, was more of an alley – screamin’.

I was just screamin’ in those days – most people was. Every second day or so I’d wake up screamin’ an’ hollerin’ an’ I’d go on over an’ meet my neighbor Fred who was screamin’ an’ a hollerin’ and theyr’d just be the two of us screamin’, for hours. You ain’t never seen nothing like it, less you’re a hundred, hundred and ten – like I am.

Anyway, one day, it must a been about a hundred and twenty degrees out, I ran outta my house an’ i saw Fred, and he just…looked so good tuh eat an’ so I up an’ ate ol’ Fred.

We used hot water tuh boil folks ‘fore we ate ’em in those days, so I had tuh go tuh the hot water store an’ buy some water tuh cook ol’ Fred with.

Then I ate with all the lights off ’cause of ‘lectricity bein’ so darn expensive in those days.

Well, a number of days go’s by an’ sure ’nuff some friends uh Fred’s, come up from the insurance company where Fred used tuh work as a aromatherpist.

Man, was they steamed. One big ol’ lady name a Carlotta Sinclair she stomped her foot an’ pumped her fist in the air shoutin’ an’ cursin’.

But damned if I wasn’t sayin’ nothin’. Think I may’ve burped one time, but some things just beyond a man’s control.

Fred’s gizzard was choice meat I tell you.