As best put by Ludo in Labyrinth.... Smell Bad!

Well, then next day I got to go on my first removal with Ben.  The mortuary I worked at was special because in the town we lived in the coroner's office did not do their own pick-ups.  A coroner investigator was on the scene but the mortuaries in the city took week long rotations taking the bodies to either the coroner's office if more information was needed or taken back to their mortuary if there was nothing suspicious.  The first call came through the printer and Ben said, "here we go!"  We went outside and got into one of six Chevy 1/2 ton vans parked along side the preproom.  (That was just the van this particular mortuary liked for running.)  Each van was unmarked except for a personalized license plate with a name and number on it.  Inside the vans the front two seats were the only thing left factory.  The back is gutted out with a metal plate lining the floor.  On the end of the metal plate by the back doors there are two metal cups affixed, these hold pegs on the underside of the gurney.  Two gurneys go by the back door and a shorter 'straight cot,' meaning it only is up or all the way to the ground, goes in the side door.  Three bodies can be picked up at one time while a driver is out on the road.  As we started driving to who knows where I was looking around at what was in the van.  There was a cardboard box between the seats that held plastic books.  Inside these books there was the first-call handouts.  Pamphlets to hand to the family with information on what happens now, cremation, burial, death certificates, etc.  There was also a tote bag laying beside the box.  What's the tote bag for?  Well, I learned it's the most dreaded going through a hospital.  The tote bag was for infants.  When a tiny baby dies it's very hard for a family and seeing a huge gurney rolling down the hall with a little bump is extremely unsightly.  So, if the infant was small enough they could be carried out in a tote bag.  Most people wouldn't even think twice about what it would be unless they were familiar with the ominous tote bag.  The first-call wasn't far away from the mortuary.  A low-income housing park is where we ended up.  A couple cop cars an a coroner vehicle were parked in front of one unit and Ben said that must be it.  We backed into an open space left right in front of a walk way leading to an open unit.  We walked up the sidewalk empty handed at first, except for the first-call book.  As we neared there was an unpleasant smell.  It's also not good when the police officers are gathered outside a residence and not inside.  Ben turned through the doorway with a big last breath.  Yup, it was a decomp.  A decomp is a decomposing body.  Mortician's don't use that word lightly.  You have your nice, clean bodies.  Your soiled themselves, haven't bathed for a while, normal bodies.  There are your have been sitting around and skin is starting to blister and fall off with a smell of sulfur slight-decomps.  And then there are your yeah, they have been sitting around for quite a while, turned green, bloated with tissue gas, when you touch them the skin sloughs off decomps.  Finally there is your was a decomp, now has maggots, lost all the bloated gas they had because the pressure has forced it out of any open orifice or weak spot and now they are a total decomp.  He was a decomp.  We walked into the cluttered, tiny apartment and there he was lying on the sofa.  Green, bloated and smelling oh so ripe I just wanted to run.  I had to touch that thing!?!  Ben said this would be the perfect case to break me in and laughed.  Because of the degree of decomposition the coroner investigator estimated he had been there for about a week.  With that degree of decomposition it is also hard to determine cause of death by sight so he needed a more thorough once over.  We were going to have to take him back to the coroner's office.  We went back to the van, got three clean sheets, a body bag, two pairs of gloves each and went back in.  To make a call as easy as possible you want to be able to get your gurney directly parallel to the body so you just have to transfer straight across to it.  We moved a coffee table that was piled high with porno mags... some still in the packaging, he must have been a collector.  The gurney then was right next to the couch.  The adjustable cots could go down at different levels unlike the straight cots that were up or down, we used the adjustable this time.  With the gurney lowered to the proper height we put on our two pairs of gloves, opened the body bag with the zipper flap on our side to protect our pants from any body fluids and laid one of the clean sheets in the bag.  Then it was time to roll the man into one of the other clean sheets.  We tucked one side of the sheet as far as we could under the man on the side we could reach.  Then we had to roll him forward to bring the sheet up his back.  We took the third sheet and opened it up in front of him.  Ben said we were using this one to hold onto his wrists and legs while rolling him.  You see, once decomposition is that far advanced if you pull on the persons skin it will tear and start pulling away from the body.  What is left is like a severe burn without the skin, a wet and slippery mess.  As soon as I grabbed his ankle to pull him forward I felt the skin give under the sheet.  It is the weirdest feeling to have what you know should be solid in your hand give away.  It was almost like the sheet was covered with Crisco and my hand was slipping off the body even though he was dry and it was his skin sloughing off under the sheet.  Slowly forward he went and we could start seeing the sheet under him.  Then, it happened.  There was so much gas built up in him that it had to escape somewhere and the pressure in his belly made him pass gas, except there was a slight problem.  A rather large blue dildo shot almost a foot from his rectum!  Ben and the coroner investigator started laughing as I looked in horror.  I was naive and had never seen one in a picture let alone fly out of a dead mans ass!  Ben moved it to the side and we finished pulling up the sheet and used it to pull him on the gurney.  Removing the first pair of gloves that were now covered with decomp juices we zipped up the body bag and hurriedly took him to the coroner's office.  Have you ever been on a long car ride where someone with you farts in the car?  Well imagine that but they have been holding that fart for weeks and had eaten only Mexican food the whole time.  It's not a pleasant car ride.