“Stop micromanaging my diet.” 

“Actually, I’m micromanaging my diet.” 

“Semantics,” I say, shoving him back. “Had your fill?” 

“For now,” he acquiesces. “I’ll need more soon.” 

“Find somebody who eats red meat.” 

“Oh, but you’d miss our little get-togethers.” He’s grinning like he knows something, like he thinks I’m attached. 

“And you wouldn’t?” Don’t dish it if you can’t take it, buddy. Fresh with blood, his cheeks flush. He breaks eye contact, turning to grab his coat. 

“I’ll drop some supplements off tomorrow night. Will you be in?” 

I sigh and cast a glance at my calendar. “I think I can make that work for you.” 

The sun has not yet risen and still the interior is illuminated bright enough to fool circadian rhythms, to jump-start routines and start warmup sequences for brains. 

They want to lean against the window, rest just a little more, but the jostling of the bus prevents it. Instead, they simply slouch, resigned, and glare at the unwanted reminder of the continual passage of time. 

Even the lichens looked duller than normal.

If he hadn’t known better, he’d have thought the Ashfalls came early.

But no, those weren’t due for another two weeks. News of the eruption out east hadn’t been a surprise but despite their preparation nothing felt real until the messenger burst into the center of town, crying the contents of the telegram message at the top of her lungs.

All that was left to do was enjoy the last few days of sunshine, pick the last few crops, double-check the stores and the hatches, and wait.

I cannot tame the behemoth, but I can trim a claw. It will grow back, there is no question. But for now, she scratches a little duller and it is a pain that I can take.

The chill is ever-present, deeper than the burning in my bones. There is time, here, trapped in each moment. There is silence, here, beneath the peaks and troughs. There is memory, here, as my body begins to weaken.

Dishes piled in the sink like communion wafers. I pull one out, wash it, use it, put it back.

Pyrex, fresh from the baptismal font. I don’t think they keep the babies in there for a few hours at a time the way my dishwasher keeps its offerings.

Rosé and sangria, flowers and blood, left unopened and near-forgotten. I’ll share them with guests. The ciders are for drinking alone.

Onion skins, scattered on the kitchen floor. Cathedral windows shattered and dust-covered. Both easily swept into a dustpan. Only one will cut you. Both can make you cry.

I spiral through what-ifs in daydreams, positing impossible hypotheticals. I play them out behind the closed curtains of my eyelids and ask nothing of the actors involved. I let go of the childhood I wish I’d had. It can collect dust next to the childhood I lost.

You shudder away, hands up in a defensive pose. As if that could stop me. Foolish.

“What do you want?” you ask. I smile.

“Just to talk.”

“I don’t trust your kind.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to.”

You lean against the balcony rail, relaxing your stance without letting me out of your sight. Clever.

“So if I were to acquiesce, to … talk. What would you want to talk about?”

I hum. “Oh, this and that. How are those frogs you’re raising? Any exciting holiday plans? How is the rebellion coming along?”

“How do you know about that?” you demand.

He wonders how they get enough light.

 ~

The cicadas are distant, peripheral, humming in the outskirts of the forest. They stay where the sun is bright, where the shadows are scattered across sunlight instead of the opposite.

He wonders why they don’t venture this deep.

 ~

Animals pass through, careful steps following the winding stream further in. They stay alert, stay together, and never stop to drink.

He wonders what they fear.

 ~

He stares up at sun-backed leaves, blanketed by flowers, surrounded by cicadas, overlooked by animals. His life leaks away into roots and streams, stains white petals deep scarlet.

 -

The universe began with a single clarinet. The universe’s first word was a concert B flat. It expanded as the instruments joined in. It grew with arpeggios and tritones and the fine-tuning of scales.

 -

The universe settled into its seats, quieted down as it felt prepared to begin.

Then, and only then, did the conductor walk out, accept his applause, and hush the universe and its observers with a raised baton.

He did not design the universe – or perhaps he did – but he puts it into motion now with an inhale and a downbeat.

 -

The universe is timpani and trombone, galactic French horn and black hole bari sax. The universe is the flutes on their descant and the trumpets’ narrative cry. The universe is the audience brought to tears, to smiles, full of emotions that offer no explanation.

 -

The storm I should’ve died in. The storm that failed to take me.

Why me? The lone survivor, the miracle child.

They herald me a mystery, a blessing, a sign. I fail to see how a merciful god could leave my family tree so barren.

What empty platitudes, what hollow reassurances will you offer me? I wake up and think I shouldn’t be alive.

I won’t be so callous as to waste the chance I’ve been given. Even still, the passive ideation of the undoing of creation tempts me.

The first thought of many is crucifixion, but you wouldn’t have brought your warmest coat if death was the goal. It’s something much softer this time.

As easy as it is to forget, life can be soft sometimes.

The transition from afternoon to evening, for example, is draped in wool. The broad petals of blooming flowers, the warm paws of comfortable cats, the first bites of fresh-baked cookies are all buried in a haze of gentle smiles.

Hugs, you think, are maybe the softest things of all. They’re big and warm and you are so very, very small.

“You are.”

“Do you know what comes after?”

“There are things hidden from even us.”

“Will you ever die?”

“None like me have ever passed on, as far as I know. I’m not sure a ‘beyond’ even exists for us.”

“Oh. That’s sad.”

“I suppose by some considerations, yes.”

“What will you do, after we’re all gone?”

“I presume I’ll be able to find something else to fill my time. I was here long before you were, after all. I’ve observed a great many things.”

“What’s your favorite?”

“My favorite … thing?”

“Yeah.”

“You, so far.”

“Oh.”

“Indeed.”

“When the constellations turn to dandelion dust, will you remember me? Will you remember what we had?”

“Oh, that’s dramatic,” my coach says. I blink out of character, surprised to be interrupted so quickly.

“It’s supposed to be.” I try to keep the defensiveness out of my voice.

“Maybe not that quickly, though. Let it build a while. Leave that line for the end of your intro at least.”

I’m not happy about it, but I make the note to revise later. My coach is usually right once I separate myself from my work far enough to see the truth in their words.

“Continue.”

I pull my cloak a little tighter and lock the door behind me. A deep breath later and I have a scent to track. The pond sits still on the back of my tongue, but it can’t dissuade me from the earthy, metallic trace I seek. I set off with single-minded purpose, suddenly unbothered by the lingering chill and the appearance of darker clouds on the horizon.

The world isn’t ready yet, you say, or they don’t understand the bigger picture. You tell the reporters that the news skews so much of what I do, you know, and that everyone will understand eventually.

It’s not as reassuring as you’d like to think it is. No one has the power to stop you – you’ve made sure of that in a variety of creative ways – but you still can’t control what others think. Not yet.

You will not be the solution. You will be naught but a pawn. They’ll wring you dry and convince you there’s more left to give. Strung tight like that, surrounded by propaganda you aren’t old enough to dissect, propped on a pedestal that isolates you from all you once held dear – well, anyone would break from that.

You’ll miss it.

You sigh as you sit down, pulling on leather gloves to avoid freezing your hands to the steering wheel while the car heats up. The drive home feels so much faster, somehow, now that you know it’s the last time you’ll do it.