A bad case of salesman’s toe -- flash fiction

Mick had been selling door to door for over two hundred years. His toes had taken a real beating in that time. You don't get company provided steel toed shoes until you hit the two hundred and fiftieth year; that is unless you decide to pay for them out of pocket and Mick had always been a cheapskate.

Even though his flimsy shoes offered little to no protection, Mick would slide his right foot over the threshold as soon as the mark opened up, and leave it there no matter how many times they slammed the door. Oh, some of the musicians and artists recognized a kindred spirit right away and swung the door wide, but when he was confronted with the eggheads and the inventors they often resisted his charms and really put wear and tear on his foot.

But Mick would keep on spewing his spiel, until something caught their interest. Mick knew that the best thing he had going for him besides the lack of feeling in his foot was that his product never went out of style. If he could just keep the sucker interested long enough they invariably bit.

Who wouldn't want eternal life? Oh, not the kind you get from King James, or the kind that demons are said to offer from time to time to hapless goofs who sell their souls willy nilly. No, what Mick carried door to door was something that every mortal lusted after.

Fame.

That thing that every soul at one time or another had craved….. be it fifteen minutes worth or not.

Mick had been bitten as a young lad with the need for fame and after he'd signed up had been elevated through the ranks of indentured servitude until he was so useful that his immortality now had staying power. He was famous for all time. No one hit wonder was he. Mick had even worked the problem with his dead right foot into his act. It had morphed in to his signature cock of the walk dance.

He only had a couple of regrets. He regretted signing on for a three hundred year stint, it could get grueling touring the globe while he was supposed to be on hiatus from touring with the band, and he regretted not taking the Dorian Gray clause. But he consoled himself with the fact that even if he had, he would never have looked as good as Sting, who was a goddamned alien after all……and he'd never, no matter how long he lived or how long he toured, look as bad as Keith.