A Very Tight Place (from McSweeny's #27)

by Stephen King

Spoilers here. This is a short story (72 pages) from McSweeny’s issue #27. Two older men hate each other because of a real estate dispute, and one of them (Grunwald) installed an electric fence that killed the other’s (Johnson’s) dog. Grunwald convinces Johnson to meet him, then forces him at gunpoint into a construction site portable toilet. He tips it on its side, door down, trapping Johnson in there to die. Most of the story is Johnson stuck and trying to escape.

This approaches Palahniuk levels of gross, and there’s not much payoff. Johnson rips the toilet off and shimmies down through the opening into the tank, then uses his dog’s old tag to unscrew some screw heads on the bottom and eventually escape. Supposedly, this transforms him from a compulsive neurotic into someone well-adjusted, but this is more declared than demonstrated. Grunwald shoots himself off-screen on the last page.