The carbon dioxide leaving his lungs seemed to take up space.

Surreal was the only word for it, he had to keep breathing, every gasp continually reminding him that he must be somewhere.

No up, no down.

In attempt to silence the growing paranoia, he knelt to his feet and was mortified as his fingers reached lower than where he “stood”

Blink as much or as little as he pleased there was no difference. Not a breeze.

Each breath left him, dissipating into the vacuum, but it was not like space. He had been there before, floated from station to shuttle tethered in between.

This was empty. The kind of empty that took on form, draining. Eerie beyond belief, it—because it must be an it not merely a where in which he now existed—seemed to be extracting the very life source from the souls of his feet.

6 o’clock.

I was still in bed, Listeria could sing her heart out for all I cared; I was going to get my 12 hours.

Maybe this was my fault for being cheap but how was I supposed to know there’d be any real difference between the 50 den siren and the 35–their bowls looked exactly the same.

Marketing failure.

It doesn’t much matter now that I’m late for the third time this month, today might just be the day Mr. Finn makes good on his promise and finally fires me—

“Could you guys move any slower?” A minuscule nail poked somewhere inside my open mouth,
“Ow, watch the tongue,”

I could sense the unrest, but they’d have bigger problems than a poor work environment and if they made me any more late and we all ended up on the pavement together. And it would be all of us together, lord knows no one’s hiring.

Humans. Never thinking farther than a few moments into the future.

“Alright, alright I’ll just go, get down!”

Several pairs of groans chorused before they made their way to my open palm.

“Really, when did you all get so sassy?”

I hopped into some jeans and a t-shirt I hoped looked good enough and flew out the door.

Or at least I tried too.

“Jeffrey, wake up!”

His repteilian eyes just barely opened before he went right back to sleep, blowing a stream of smoke in my face.

I sighed.

Left. Right. Left. Right.

Each step was wide, toes spread deep in the sand but no body attached to them, not a soul was there but me. I had staked out the spot for hours, watching from a near by ridge, from which I still stood now, and not a soul was there but me.

Regardless, the steps continued, Left. Right. Left. Right. Like a soldiers march, on time and in step.

The water licked at the nearest prints then arced around what was not there. I saw the water part around legs that were not there and then a splash and what still was not there disappeared.

I can’t attest that it was out of the realm of possibility as it obviously was not, I simply failed to think of it.

As I stood still watching, camera lying dumbly at my side, the prints vanished foot by foot as if they were small mistakes on an artists’ canvas, sketches meant to be erased and painted over.

Regrettably, valuable seconds passed before I caught my breath and started rolling.

I blame myself for the oversight.

I saw it yesterday, maybe the whole package too.

I’m not sure what/how the whole clothes/covering situation works for creature-y beings and honestly, I don’t really want to know. This entire thing is freaking me out.

I just about lost it, couldn’t even tell what it had been, rancid and rotten and raw—and it was eating it.

Ravenous.

There I was, innocently walking outside my own house and I’d seen it.

Always said I was going to move to the suburbs. There is absolutely no reason to have a forest in the backyard.

My therapist has been saying for the longest that I need to “start taking care of myself” and whatever.

Of course the second I try I get flipped off by the universe.

I wish I could trick myself into thinking I’d seen a wolf.

I tried, I really did, but wolves don’t have eyes with cracked purple pupils, I’m sure they don’t and if they do, Google failed me too—

“What did he look like?”

“It **It. **Sherlene, don’t play with me. I’m opening up to you and you’re here making googly eyes for a mythical creature!”

“No, for sure but—“

I knew.

I knew the moment the words left my mouth that they should never have been said. They should’ve been bottled up and thrown into the nearest lake.

I should throw myself into the nearest lake.

He could smile and look perfect all he liked, I knew. Even as he spoke of gratitude and happiness I knew all the while that this was very last thing that would ever be so much as a possibility to him.

Looking at him, I was shocked at his ability to mask his own shock. Surely he had never even seen me in any other light and here I was, revealing that I, somehow, for just a moment, had.

Somewhere between the late night religious talks, the drives from here to there, the friendliness that had bordered—that I had thought had bordered—

Idiot.

Her throat was dry from singing—singing and then humming as the hours passed. The same tune over and over again, just as he had directed, yet the horizon had still remained completely out of view.

Beside her, touching the hem of nightgowns the grass waved in the breeze tickling her feet as she walked by. Step after step note after note , the fog did not lift. Surely she couldn’t sing forever.

Her mind wandered momentarily back to fact that her throat was still dry and she tried to forget it, there was no water here, the man had not given her any or anything else for that matter.

The wind picked up,tosseling her hair and irrating her eyes and yet not at all effecting the fog. Through squinted eyes she peered into the abyss, no more than a few feet of the path were visible to her eyes and she was all but certain that only a fool would venture in that direction.

But then again, she was one singing bearfoot and alone in the woods.

I could not hate myself anymore than I did right then as I paddled for my life.

Between the mosquitoes dancing in out of my ears, the thick wood threatening to slip out of my hands, and my complete ignorance of how to steer at all, I had more than once contemplated simply letting it happen.

My arms were burning something awful and I was sure I was going nowhere. Somehow my heart managed to sink even deeper into my chest.

Due to my inexperience, I was really struggling to use both oars while I not such a numb skull as to believe I could accomplish anything with just one, I could barely lift them together.

At some point in my frantic and blind race back to the shore I adopted a very slow left and right motion, one arm and then the other.

With each splash, which I could nothing to silence, the shrill note rose in intensity, more than once I had felt jolt from beneath the hull.

The drumbeat tapped incessantly fading in and out of timing with that of my heart.

They were still screaming.

I watched as each drop sizzled and bore straight through before collecting on the ground. They wriggled and fought against the restrains in vain.

The lightshow continued above, flashes of pinks and greens as the sky folded in on itself, lightning splitting it in two.

I watched the display for a few moments before returning my focus. I was just now beginning to see the bits of white I had expected minutes ago, yet the noise was still above what I had hoped. I needn’t worry about exscape but they were being most loud.

“It isn’t personal” I lounged to say, “I did warn you,” and I had, rude as they were, I had.

“My babies must eat,” I had told the biggest man. I had not even screamed when he and his companions flipped my dinner table after I had been so gracious as to let them in.

“My babies always protect me,” and he had laughed in my face.

Thunder bombed above and from the half open window where I sat, I sang, the notes long and despairing. After a minute or two, I heard the responding chords of my children.

In another moment, the screams ceased.

“Humans,” I sighed, “So arrogant,”