A human dreams crazy dreams. Horrible dreams. Great dreams. Like flying. Or teeth falling. Or people long forgotten who pop up as if they never left. They dream of what they were and what they could become. And the dreams seep into their meat. Like a delicious marinade.

My arm-tail uncramps. I unhinge my jaw. Let my mouth stretch as wide as it will go. Soon I won’t feel the cold anymore. My body is already regrowing its patchwork of fur. The world lightens before me and reveals its edges. Its shapes and in-between spaces. I step forward.

Blood drips from my nose and mouth. Mostly mine, but I savor the remains of his. He will hit again. Until he’s full. Like eating.

So pretty a dread grows right in my chest. Monstrilio loved this light the best. Night is when we’re hungriest. And hunger can be magnificent. I stare at the half-washed dishes. I fight to push the dread out. I pretend my time as Monstrilio is hazy. Muffled sounds and blurred colors. I say I remember warmth. But I don’t say I miss my fur. I don’t

“Isn’t this marvelous?” Peter said, gaping all around. One of the things I loved most about him was how he used words like marvelous earnestly, so committed to their meaning that any hint of affect dissipated and the words lingered full and sweet.

what they needed wasn’t acknowledgment or empathy or closure; it was escape.

In church, my mother was less afraid of me. She prayed for me with eyes tightly shut. There, she believed I could be saved, her family could be saved.

After Santiago, I expected to gnarl too. I wanted my grief, but instead I was left with a horrible nothingness, and I got really scared. But then I realized fear was a thing I could feel, and I clung to it. I was afraid of my loneliness. I was afraid I would never have anyone to love again. I blamed you for it. For leaving. I was angry. Furious.

Wouldn’t that have been a groundbreaking discovery, someone bringing a creature to life solely with their own grief and a prodigious unwillingness to let go?