Gift of the heart. Image courtesy of Louvre Museum
, JLYH KHU WKH ñRZHUV WKDW KDYH now turned boneless. “They were a lot more upright when I found them,” I say. ì:KDWâV WKLV"ú Tuna holds the tank up. “Um.” ì:KHUHâV 7RDGHWWH"ú The heart wilts behind the glass, shrivelling until its wrinkles look like fault lines buried deep into WKH ñHVK “She’s just — away.” ì$ZD\ ZKHUH"ú “In the…. crawl space.” Tuna’s expression is unnervingly EODQN ì8QGHU \RXU KRXVH"ú “…Yeah.”
on piss-slicked concrete, it’s traumatic. The male unfurls, SUHHQLQJ WKH KXPEOH RσHULQJ tucked into his wing. He’s charming. Juicing himself of maltose and maltotriose for a FKDQFH RI FDWFKLQJ KHU DσHFWLRQ The concrete is so dark. They look slimy in the night. The cockroach curls over the RWKHU 7KHLU ZLQJV ñXWWHU LQ D dampened harmony. Every slant of lamplight resurrects them — ORYHUV EHQHDWK RQH ñLFNHU VWUD\ Mars wrappers in the next. The thudding in my chest turns slippery. It moves like it’s discovering spaces between my ribs and lungs. Ninety minutes. Tuna said they go for ninety minutes. My heart beats too fast. It swells unlike itself.
She’s swift out the door, leaving the weedy bouquet scattered by the doorway. Grabbing the tank, I try to yell after her, but the sound is garbage. Syllables pulped with EUHDWK DQG ZKHH]H 6KH ðQGV WKH VKRHER[ ñLFNV LW RSHQ DQG bursts into tears.
5.
It’s Valentine’s Day, Tuna is FRPLQJ RYHU DQG WKH ñRZHUV ,âYH torn from my neighbour’s garden Toadette was so slimy, so vapid. are being wound up into a purple It’s not a big deal. But Tuna cries ribbon. into the cardboard like she’s emptying out her viscera. There must be love behind my computer screen, somewhere “It was just a toad,” I say. beyond the sliced body of the Then it happens all at once. monitor, because the heart is beating relentlessly. Or it must MXVW EH WKH GDWH WKH ñRZHUV DQG My chest caves like it’s gripping RQWR RQH KXJH EUHDWK 7KH ñHVK\ the romance of it all. partition between my trachea and oesophagus dissolves. My When Tuna comes in, she presses a jar full of paper into my airways squeal shut. I try to gag chest. “Some reasons why I love out a breath, but it’s seized by you,” she says, but the jar spans a throb. My chest is too full. My pulse is layered. A twin beat the entire length of my torso. punching my ribcage. ì6RPH"ú I look behind me. The tank is She laughs, a pretty sound, and empty.
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