“Upended, legless. Sunk. Where’s the surface? What’s left?”
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kids, are they? Where are the kids? A bump from behind. So I turn, can’t tell if I’m turning. What I’ve turned into, not a kid. Moved into. Big green hair sticking out of a hat. A black hat ‘cause I can’t see it. Another bump. They want something. My clothes? My guts? They want my guts. There’s a hand. They’ve stolen the sheets. Baby sheets. They eat the babies and wear the sheets. Where’s the road? Above me, swim upward. A short one bumps against me, moves off to the side. E.T. head, but too tall to go home, waves bye-bye. Said something. “Not funny,” that’s what it said. He she dead. “One of us.” Someone says no. A mistake. Hands withdrawn quickly. They move away fast. Must have seen, what did they see? Don’t want to know. Where’s the road? There it is, sliding under me, raw footing. Eel people, tipping me over. Upended, legless. Sunk. Where’s the surface? What’s left? Mashed orange leaves lifting me up. Schools of the damned eddy past in the other direction. Which way, though? The others go there. Stitched-up plastic maskitated universal dummies. A wolf dummy. Horror is funny, it says, and universal. The lost children of the Nam. Where’s the screen and where’s the road? That way, dis way. Dressed up messed up in a dress. A lady in distress. A lady in dat dress. Trees undress in front of me. Heads in a box eat the mail. Intestines hang out of an open zipper. Cat people snatch the guts and breed. They shove me around. Voices interrupt me, wrap me in sheets. Go away, they tell me. The bar’s that way, take any road, find one. ¤
FICTION
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