Bodies (An experiment with metamorphosis)

I have that curious dream again… the one where the ground breaks away beneath me. Only this time it happens: grappling with the crumbling pavement, I try desperately not to, but I fall. I keep falling. It is not so much the dream that has me in a panic come morning; it’s the fact that as the sunlight hits my eyes to wake me, I am dead.

I reach for my lover who, beside me, still sleeps with that beating heart of his. He does not wake to greet me. Rather, as I touch my hand to his chest he is chilled, pulls the blanket up past his neck, and turns toward my window, as if to seek warmth from the early morning autumn glow.

Let me back up. I’ve been dying for quite some time. It’s something I have sought to evade for years. Only this morning it seems I cannot continue to worm away from fate; the truth stares me right in my face. I pull myself up from my bed—my casket—and I slink to the mirror. My skin sags like a disgusting mutation before me. A frantic awareness of my death-state has me locked in terror as I grab my utensils: a hairbrush, some rouge, mascara, anything to hide this condition of mine. My efforts yield nothing; I am beyond dead. I am decayed.

I am meticulous in my actions, for I have decided it best not to wake my love. I would enjoy throwing my utensils at the mirror in frustration as each one betrays me, but I do not. The hairbrush rips my hair from my skull, and I am left bald, with a giant fissure that will expose the veracity of my situation the moment I am seen. I smear in the rouge and my skin peels away. Panicked, I continue to rub until all that is left of my cheek is the bone, although I do not bleed; dead folks tend not to.

I hear my lover stir. This ghastly shell of mine is sure to frighten him so I try my best not to hover. I lower myself to his level and I sit at the foot of the bed. I brace myself for his reaction.

He blinks morning from his eyes, and stretches his feet. They poke out from the blanket. The stretch of his arms follows.

Delay. I can’t handle this. Should I just run?
He reaches for my lifeless limb. The arm. He hasn’t noticed yet. He looks at me with what seems like reverence and I am without words. We sit in silence for one minute… two… he reaches up to touch my hairless head.

“Gah!” I exclaim, quickly jerking it away.

“What’s wrong with you? Get back in bed.”

I pause at his mindless words, his lack of acknowledgement before I surrender.

He still hasn’t noticed. How could he not?

Silent, still, I allow him to pull me back under the blankets and he croaks softly in my ear.

“I don’t care,” he says, “go back to sleep.”