M/other

In a dense wood, my sister and I visited the bruise of land where our house once stood, gated and foreboding. The plot now defined only by crime scene tape, we aspirated and expectorated the past on its sacred wounding site.

“Can you believe we used to live here?” one of us asked.

“No,” quoth the other; “it looks like nothing ever stood here at all, let alone an entire house.” [Beat.] “Such awful things happened here.”

The sky shone white through the dense brush; telltale leaves crinkled brownly under the staccato of our feet. A stillness fell upon us, and we gazed with wonder at the same sky we used to look to on our hardest days for comfort.

Then, at an alarming rate, a darkness spread over us like ink in water, punctuating the peace with a palpable air of foreboding. The very atmosphere trembled; birdsong soured and stopped, usurped by the chaotic crescendo of rustling and panting, the syncopated snaps of sticks and saplings, a shriek that permeated the very bones of us. It never occurred to us that something stalked the woods—some desperate hunter with a homing device for our exact blood.

It careened out of the dense brush, and sped right for us. I saw its fur first, flashing through trees. I saw long, wild, teased, bleached hair snag branches. Its face, bald and fleshy, caused me to crumble in ontological terror, under my inability to interpret this aberration of the known world. Gravity intensified as I tried to get up and run after my sister, who now sprinted through the trees. Sustained by the frantic desire to live, I dragged my two-ton body through the dirt. The creature leapt before me and stared down, salivating vengeance and hatred. I saw her wild eyes, her loathsome snarl, her fangs dripping: M/other. M/other has found me, and rendered the quixotic fantasy of escape lifeless, my body soon to follow. I shut my eyes and screamed, bracing for impact.

I woke up clenching my entire being, dewy with sweat. Shaking. Unwilling to ride the tide of sleep. The image haunted me for days. My very genetic makeup lived in terror of her memory. My only respite, I knew, was to exorcise the beast: to manifest it here in the physical realm. Thus.