You’re dead, and this is unfortunate, but the world is full of unfortunate things, my dear. You’ll need to answer some questions now. Know that I only accept the truth.
Firstly—
Are you ready to be dead?
- Let me face whatever comes next, even if what comes next is nothing at all. I have no fear, no unfinished business. Let me go forth and see.
- Fuck no. Save me. Bring me back.
No fear? No unfinished business? You’d have me believe you value your own existence so little?
No. No, I’m sorry, my dear, but I just don’t believe you. Go back and try again.
Hm. Perhaps. These things can be arranged, you see, but always at a cost. Our second question, then—
What lonely, violent act of desperation are you ready to commit in order to return?
- I will sink back into my own bones. It doesn’t matter what it takes or how long I’ve been gone—I will come back as me and only me, and I will hurt no one in doing so.
- I will sink into the bones of another and take their life for my own, somebody who no one will miss. Somebody who doesn’t deserve the gift of their own skin.
- I will sink into the bones of my own home: the glass and the wood and the stone. I’ll have no blood, no flesh, no way to wander—but I will endure. I will persist.
Perhaps you’re thinking to yourself there are no good choices here, and very likely you’re right. But if I may offer some advice, little one: it absolutely does matter how long you’ve been gone, for reasons we’ll come back to shortly, and this naïve assertion that you’ll hurt no one—
Child. Child.
This is not a choice you can make.
Of course, you can always endeavor not to cause harm, or limit said harm when you can. These are admirable goals. But there is no fork in the road, no path you can take, that will not break branches beneath your step. No action or inaction comes without consequence. This is what living means.
So, yes. You do successfully sink back into your bones. Unfortunately, they’re far beneath the ground, but that doesn’t stop you from clawing through the dirt, up and up and out. Not all of your flesh has come with you. It’s begun to liquefy, collapse in on itself—but your bones hold together. They’re strong, at least. They’re strong enough for now.
And you are alive, gloriously alive. Yes, you’re actively rotting, but you’re here and sensate and full of possibility. To be dead and gone and then back again . . . it’s not just a second chance; it’s magic. Yes, you’re a walking reminder to the world of the decay that awaits, but also a miracle, a gift from . . . something.
Unfortunately, the world doesn’t want your grim reminder. People fear its truth, turn their face from it. So many loved ones who wish you had not returned, who shudder before you, vomit and weep. You hurt them whether you want to or not, simply by existing where they might see. And all these others, too, who don’t know you at all but fear what you’ve done and what else you might do. Perhaps you have strange appetites now. Perhaps you satisfy them. Perhaps you don’t.
What drips from your tongue is your own business. I won’t judge you for that—but you will.
Either way, it doesn’t much matter whether you become the monster or merely look the part. In the end, even your bones no longer want you. Your bones are ready to rest, even if you are not. You mold and crumble. You fall apart.
So much in this world ends in dust. You dissipate, diminish. You’re gone. Go back.
What a bold thing you are and what a bold claim, insisting you can find a person who no one will miss. That’s more difficult than it sounds, you know. People have such capacity to love, even when that love is met with only violence and scorn. Bolder, still, this self-righteous idea that you might wear someone else’s skin better. I must admit, I do wonder what your criteria is.
Perhaps a serial killer, then. Yes, this is practically a public service—and helpfully, here comes one now. You drift down, settle into their bones, and just like that—
Alive.
Extend your new arms. Flex your new fingers. All the wrong width, yes, and the wrong length—but you can adjust to this. You can touch things again, hold and cradle. You can feel sunlight on your skin and leave footprints in the dirt. You can dance on new, awkward feet, sing in this new, alien range. You can eat and eat and eat—but all the food tastes so different. Spices are fire on your tongue now. What a wasted life your serial killer was living.
Adjust. Experiment. Focus on your curiosity and not the loss. Focus on your responsibility: the woman outside. You see her through the window, your hand reaching for the knife—but focus. Let the blade go. Let the woman walk away, alive. You can save all the women this way, and you can be happy. You can start over: build yourself a new family, a new life. You’ll have to. The old one’s gone. No one recognizes you in this body. No one will believe a thing you say. Don’t focus on the loss—but you’ve lost so much.
You’re you, but you’re not you. You’ll never be fully you again. And you are not alone here.
The serial killer never left.
You dream their grotesque red fantasies. You think their most sickening thoughts. Intrusive thoughts—except that’s you; you are the thing which doesn’t belong. And you watch the women, can’t stop watching the women, can’t always let go of the knife. You know what blood tastes like on your tongue now, know the red, wet salt it’s always craved.
Do you go mad? Perhaps you go mad. Perhaps you don’t even notice when the police catch up, when the bullets tear straight through your chest; perhaps you don’t even know you’re choking up blood. Or maybe no one ever caught you. Maybe you spent decades fighting for control: dropping the knife, picking up the knife. Either way, this body still fails you. Disease is so patient, after all. Given enough time, it finds everyone.
So much in this world ends in blood. You choke and go still. You’re gone. Go back.
Well, you do persist, child. I will grant you that. Flesh is so temporary, but glass, wood, and stone . . . these things last centuries if properly tended. And you aim to last centuries. You aim for the future, even if you can only see it through drawn curtains and open doors.
So, yes, you melt into the walls. The paint is your skin and the floorboards, too. You are the inexplicable cold spots, the flickering light fixtures. You are the television that abruptly turns on. But also—you are the intangible thing that passes through the walls, the presence rarely seen but always sensed beyond reach. You are your home, and you are in your home, and you are not alone here. The living dwell here, too.
Loved ones at first, but they don’t stay long. Their grief perseveres despite your presence. Communication by lightbulb is so arduous, after all, and so they lie to themselves: you must be a figment; you must be a manifestation of their own loss. They need to move on, so they leave you behind.
Others come, though. Leave, eventually. Move in and out and in again. Some, you like. Some, you befriend—so much as a cold spot can befriend anything. The others are fascinating to watch over the decades: new fashion, new body mods, new languages, new genders. Whole new and beautiful family structures. You come to know them like their own dead grandmother, like their own little house god shielding them from harm. But they know little to nothing of you, if they acknowledge your presence at all. You aimed for the future, and here it is—but you want more, you want more, you want so much more.
Perhaps you grow angry. Perhaps you lash out. Perhaps the showers turn cold and the windows all shatter and the carpets are soaked with warm, wet blood. Perhaps, perhaps just a few people die.
Maybe you’re sorry. Maybe you’re not.
Of course, they acknowledge your presence, then. Whispered warnings, legends told—but the details are all wrong, and your rage only builds and builds. People seek you out for seances and parties. Fools quickly regret their practical jokes and reckless dares. Eventually, you’re too dangerous to trifle with anymore. Gasoline-drenched skin, then—or maybe it’s only an accident, bad luck and act of God. You made it to the future, and the future is full of fire. Perhaps the future, too, is entering its last act.
So much in this world ends in flame. You crumble into ash. You’re gone. Go forth.
You’re dead again, and this is unfortunate—although you might no longer agree. Maybe you’re tired of paths, and who could blame you? No matter how many roads it took to get here, you’ve come a dark and long and lonesome way. So much loss, so much inevitable horror. That’s the lesson, isn’t it, that you’ve finally learned: there’s no way out, no right decision, that will let you reclaim all that you have lost. Everyone gets the time they’re given, and when that’s gone, it’s gone. Never linger. Never look back.
There are no happy endings here. Perhaps, this time, you’re ready to move on.
But—
Consider the wonder, even amidst the horror. Even though the endings were all ugly and cruel—consider the joyful bits of curiosity and magic, those sublime moments of success and sensation. Consider the rare instances of tender affection and all other beautiful parts left unwritten, too. Did you return to your own bones and terrify loved ones? Perhaps, and if so, maybe one did stick around; maybe someone loved you as fiercely as you, yourself, loved. Maybe they marveled instead of shuddered. Maybe you had a second chance at goodbye.
Did you steal the bones of another? And if so, did you stand in awe of the color orange, so wonderfully different with different eyes? Did you happily re-catalog the known world? And your duty to save those who needed saving—yes, you failed them, and failed them often. Does that negate the good you accomplished? Should that erase the ones who survived?
And if you haunted the wood and the glass and the stone . . . what a fascinating transformation. What an experience to become something big, to exist simultaneously in every room. Consider the tenants you grew fond of, those families you sheltered in any way you could. Do you truly regret hearing their laughter? Their peculiar music? Their new prayers to new gods? How can you regret the future, even this tiny sliver of it?
There’s always so much to see, to feel, to learn, to love, to live for. Are you sure you’ve tried every path? Are you certain you can’t learn from your mistakes? Even if every ending is bleak, full of dust and flame and blood—does that really mean all those pages before were never worth the reading?
There is no wonder in oblivion. There is no love in oblivion. There is no future in oblivion. There is no you in oblivion.
And yet all the agony you went through . . . the sheer misery of existence . . .
It’s time, then, for your third question—
Child, are you ready this time? Are you ready to be dead for good?
- Let me face whatever comes next, even if what comes next is nothing at all. I’m afraid. Of course, I’m afraid, but I can’t, I won’t, go through this again. We’re not meant to live forever. Let me go forth and see.
- Fuck no. Save me. Bring me back.
I’m sorry, my dear. I’m so sorry, but I just don’t believe you.
I’ll ask again, and remember—I’ll only accept the truth.
Are you ready to be dead? Are you ready to be dead? Are you ready to finally and forever be dead?
- No. Never. Never. Never. Save me. Bring me back.
