When S speaks blood spurts all over my collared shirt. She sits on top of me and I say even less than I did before. She pulls me in and pushes me out, all at once. I couldn’t wrap my head around getting such an up close look at someone darker than I. When S sobbed (the sound of her crying was the most beautiful) it took me back to childhood, when I would look at the girl next door, bewildered as she wept after tripping over her bicycle. No one cried let alone allowed crying in my home. It was the first time I’d seen tears.
I’d come to feel less grief around her, less strife. She added up to everything, and meant nothing, all at the same time. Her brother would sometimes phone to ensure I hadn’t yet swallowed the blood she exerted. You don’t know how dangerous S can be, he’d say. Please protect yourself.
Of course, I didn’t listen. S was different. She set things on fire with her words and I didn’t know how to stop it when she got started, but maybe that wasn’t the point. I’d stare at S’s naked body late at night as she lie next to me, the two of us atop blood-soaked sheets. The way she winced reminded me of all the people I’d been with before. They begged and I said no. S was the talk of the town and I couldn’t believe she let me take her home. I couldn’t believe she let me take her the way that I did, every time. She’d sit quietly and let me taste her. And into the abyss we’d fall.
—
Thank you for reading. Some updates:
I have two new zines coming out in the next few months: Emotional Horrorshow and Please Just Let Me Die.
I will be a vendor at my first witch market this summer, details to be released upcoming.
You can buy my first zine, Devil’s Manifesto, here.
My poetry books, Folk Horror and Rural Horror, are also available here.