We Love You, Bunny - 4

“I’ll bet he was a Prey of some kind,” said the Barman, eyeing me. “A Deer. Even a Rabbit maybe.”

I shuddered at this Word, Reader. Felt my Pelt grow hot.

‘I don’t know about that,” said Hunter’s Cap. “His Eyes have too much of the Killer in them, wouldn’t you say?”

At the word Killer , I remembered Axe in my Blazer, Razor in my Pocket. “Do you know where Allan might be?” I asked them. The Phrases tumbling out of my Mouth quite without Thought.

“ Allan ?” Hunter’s Cap repeated. He winked at the Barman. “And what might you be wanting with him?”

“To kill him,” I said. Out came my words again. Perhaps the Goldy Liquid had loosened my Tongue somewhat.

They laughed even more heartily. And this time I laughed with them, even though they were certainly laughing at me, Reader. Despite my gloomy Mood, I still enjoyed creating Delight Even if twas at my Expense

“And how will you kill this Allan?”

‘With Axe of course,” I said.

They fell silent then as they exchanged Glances. “Are you telling us that you’re this Axe Murderer?”

“I am actually. But sadly I have killed the Wrong Allan. I am now looking for the Right One.”

“Well look no further, Friend,” said the Man at the bar, shaking his Head, wiping the happy Tears from his E yes. “Though I do hope you won’t kill me.”

“Or me,” said the Barman.

“Are you Allan?” I asked.

Hunter’s Cap smiled at me over his rust-colored Drink. And the Barman smiled too, his Pockets full of my Grasses.

“We are both Allan,” they said, winking at one another.

“Both…Allan?” I repeated.

And they roared and roared again with Laughter.

Until I took out Axe, Reader. Which quite stopped it, their Laughter. Which quite stopped all the Sound in the World.

XI

A Black Night full of grim Stars I lay in a deep Ditch of cold Mud and Stones, quite unable to rise or even move my Feets I could only lie here, Reader, staring up at the sliver of Moon in her Kingdom of Darkness Trying to get her to speak with me in the other Language, to make of her a Friend for I sensed she had been a Friend once Who am I? I asked her. What am I? was perhaps a better question. Where do I even belong in the World? I know no longer. I only know I am afeared of my Self, of what I have become The Moon only shone down on me coolly. Perhaps she was angry with me for killing both Allans at the truck stop Her Light seemed to further expose their splattered Bloods on my Clothes The many Flecks of still quivering Flesh from their Bodies Perhaps she had born Witness, through the window, to my Violences. How first one Allan I had killed, the one sitting at the bar, while the Other watched in a kind of laughing Horror at the swing of my Axe. Then how I’d killed the Other, hopping over the bar in a Flash. Raising Axe over his Head, the Head of the Barman, my new Friend, who was my Friend no more, for he was Allan He, meanwhile, still looked at me enchanted as though I, though covered in much Blood already, was a Wonder he could not help but behold, a Rainbow or a Northern Light, and not at all a Murderer of Allans. A single swing of Axe was all it took to kill this second, laughing Allan and then he was down like his Double. And my Hands and Arms so frighteningly skilled in this Severing, knowing precisely where to strike on the Neck so that both Heads were cut quite cleanly from their Bodies. So that I became afeared of my own Arms and Hands, the sharp hot Magic they made with the Blade. So quickly did I strike that both Heads were still laughing in a kind of Horror-shock as they rolled away. I watched them roll from their bloody Bodies, Pony closing his Eyes in my Pocket. How I wished I could close my Eyes as Pony had, Reader But I could not For I must kill Allan, that was all too clear. Twas a Directive in my Body. Twas an Action before Thought. The severed Heads rolled away in their Sea of Blood, quite like the Wrong Allan’s had, quite with a Life of their own toward the back of the bar. Watching them take their leave in this Way, I started to feel quite lonely “Wait,” I felt compelled to call as they disappeared into the Dark. “Please!” I ran after them to the back, toward the empty booths and pool tables. There was a back door here, lightly swinging as though someone had just made their Exit. And Outside? There were no Heads, Reader Only a small Garden which perhaps Allan the Barman had tended in his other Life as a Witch. Some thin, cold-looking Trees. A couple of Rabbits staring at me in the Dark. Did you happen to see any Heads? I asked these Rabbits. But they just looked at each other, Reader, as if they did not understand me Then they hopped hurriedly away. Take me with you! I felt compelled to shout. But they did not heed my Cry at all. I attempted to give Chase but they were far too fast on their little hind Legs and I quickly lost them. As I watched them hop away into the Dark, an Ache consumed my Person Wherever they were going, my own Human Legs could not Follow

And so I was quite alone again, without Friends

Back inside the bar, I was met with an even greater Shock. Those bloody Allan Bodies were no longer on the floorboards, Reader. They were gone. Gone even though my Ears still rang with their laughing Screams. I looked all around the bar and could not find these Bodies. I checked the dusty underneaths of chairs and tables and pool tables and even behind the bar itself. They had disappeared quite like the Heads There was only a young Boy in black, sitting in a booth in the Corner of the bar. I had not noticed him until this Moment for he’d blended so perfectly with the Darkness. He wore Headphones and his Hands gripped a Book called Being and Nothingness . He stared at me over the top of this Book with wide Eyes, unmoving, like he was a Statue of himself. “Did you happen to see the Bodies that were here?” I asked.

The Boy Statue did not answer me. He continued to stare, frozen, as though something had awed or afeared him into Stillness and Silence

I looked back at the dusty floors, Axe still hot in my hand, her Blade bloody. Had I dreamed this Violence? Did I not kill Allan twice after all? I asked Pony but he had been traumatized and could speak no Words

I began to question Reality, Reader

The very Nature of Things

My Head began to spin and whether this was from the Goldy Liquid or my Violences I knew not. The sad Music still played in the bar, so prettily. Echo and the Bunnymen, the jukebox said. “The Killing Moon.” A favorite of one of the Allans presumably. The Dust swirled around me. Speak to your audience of Dust , said the Poets last Night. But I had Nothing to say I had finally killed Allan. Both of him. That Darkness that gripped my Heart should surely have lightened. I should have been Relieved. Happy. And yet something felt… wrong . Off.

I was not happy

I was in fact very sad

I felt a Veil falling between my Self and the World.

Now in the Ditch, I looked up at the Moon, Cruelle Mute. The Violences had allowed me, briefly, to forget my Sadness about Jonah but now this Pain came back full Force I envied the Allans, their Heads lost to the Darkness. Possibly still rolling out there somewhere in the Night. Perhaps they were making their way to the Lost Place. It suddenly seemed very far away.

I was lying there lost in these Musings when suddenly I saw four Shadows approaching me with heavy Footfalls. I could have run (indeed I should have run), but instead, I let these Shadows fall over me, Reader. Obscuring my view of Moon. Whispering, “Look, there he is.” My Keepers, I thought They’d found me at last. They were taller and lankier than I re called. They looked like giant Bats, swooping down on me I contemplated fighting them off with Axe but in this Moment I had no Will to Escape anymore, Reader I allowed my Self to be taken by them, my Body gathered up, my Arms slung around their surprisingly broad Shoulders, and dragged out of the Alley. Back to the Attic and the Ropes of Revision

Anyway, what had I to live for?

XII

When I awoke, I expected to find my Self back in my Attic Cell, a bouquet of Pixie Stix at my Feets. A heart shaped post-it beside my Head that said Good Morning I LOVE you

Instead I found myself on a futon. Was it Jonah’s futon?

No

This futon did not smell intoxicatingly of his Dandy Lion Hairs. It smelled distinctly musky, what I later learned was a Scent called Patchoulis There was a large window in this musky room. Through it, I saw a very sad Garden, its mangy Grasses bitten through with Frost. White Flecks falling slowly out of a white Sky. Snow , I knew instantly. I had felt it falling on my Pelt before (cold and bright and making me shiver in my Heart) back when I existed in that other Form, lived closer to the Earth, now white and bereft of Flowers. The World it seemed, had turned Cold overnight. As if it knew of my own Heart turning Cold In the many Fictions my Keepers attempted to read or feed to me, this often seemed to happen, the Weather Systems reflecting the Character’s emotional Interiors. Pathetic Fallacy, my Keepers called it. A Mirroring of the Atmosphere and the Heart . This window seemed so to reflect my Heart that I wondered for a Moment if I might be in a Fiction my Self. But I did not like to wonder on this long. I turned away from the glass and what I saw then, Reader, made my Heart colder still

Four young men in Trenchy Coats were sitting around me on beany bags.

“Good Morrow,” one of them whispered. Colby. The Carrot-haired one whose E arring I had stolen.

Oh no, Reader. Oh no, Oh no. Not—

“Ah, he recognizes us, clearly,” said another, smirking. The one with Tears falsely weeping from his right Eye. Matthias, I would later learn was his Name.

“He Pales,” observed a Third. He had Hairs the dark of Jet, quite slick. The Leader, I remember having intuited. “Bring him Hydration!” he barked at a fourth, the Blondy. Gunnar the Henchman. “You must be quite parched,” the Leader said gently turning to me.

I nodded dully. Gunnar looked at me. “What do you wish to drink?” he asked.

“Just pick something, Gunnar, do not force him to think!” the Leader snapped.

Oh god , whispered Pony. Rhyming. My Soul screamed inside my Self, yet I moved not. For I did not have the Heart to run this M orning, not even from Poets. Imbibing all that Goldy Liquid the Night before had made my Body quite sluggish. My Head felt like I had taken my own Axe to it. So I remained on the futon. I sipped a tea of Chrysanthemums Blondy gave me. Twas in a cup shaped like a leering Skull.

“Where am I?” I whispered, though I already knew.

“Oblivion,” smiled Blondy.

“Otherwise known as our Writing Space,” the Weeping one added.

“I hope you don’t mind us kidnapping you,” said Colby.

“I don’t care,” I said. “For I see no Point in Living.” This was so true, it nearly brought Tears to my Eyes. They smiled, seeming quite taken by my Nihilism. My suicidal morning Musings

“What were you doing out there in the Ditch?” they asked me, most dreamily.

Should I really tell these Poets about killing Allans? No, I decided. I would keep it to my Self for now. “Trying to speak to the Moon,” I said. “But she would not speak to me.”

They nodded knowingly. “She is very capricious.”

“She is a Cow,” the Leader hissed. “Sometimes she speaks, sometimes she refuses to speak.”

“One cannot trust Her at all,” they all murmured.

“And what were you doing out there?” I asked them.

“What else? Breathing in the wild Night. Looking for the Flame of Inspiration so to speak.” They smiled at me. “And then we found you.”

“And you’re quite lucky we did. There is supposedly an Axe Murderer on the loose.”

“Is there?” And I feigned Innocence, that Country of Mind from which I was forever severed

“He killed twice more last Night apparently. At the very bar where we found you,” Gunnar said.

“We don’t know if he actually killed , Gunnar. There were no Bodies. Only Hearsay from an Undergraduate. A Visual Artist, no less. High on Dexedrine.”

I recalled the young Boy Statue in the booth, hiding behind a book called Being and Nothingness , staring at me in afeared Silence.

“He claims the Killer looked like that actor, Jacob Chamalord,” Gunnar said, looking from me to the Others, who stared at my Face.

“Oh yes?” I said. Oh fuck , Pony whispered in my Pocket. And I wondered, Reader, if they noticed this alleged Resemblance between my Self and this Jacob. The Poets looked at me a very long time, indeed seemed to lose themselves in looking.

“You might have been beheaded by Jacob Chamalord, Friend,” the Leader said at last. “How lucky that we saved you.”

“Yes how lucky,” I mumbled. This does not feel like Luck , Pony whispered .

“Did you not fear for yourselves?” I asked them. “Encountering this… Murderer?”

They chuckled at this, Reader. “Oh we do not fear the Axe. We are Poets, after all. We live ever close to the Blade.”

“On the dull Edge of Oblivion.” T hey smiled darkly. “ By the by, we were quite impressed by your Reading the other Night.”

I thought of the bar burning. Their Claps and Cheers. How they happily added to the Fire with their many W hiskeys, while Jonah sat there appalled. “Thank you,” I murmured.

“We have even told the Immortal about you,” the Leader said.

“And who is the Immortal?” I asked like I was interested though I did not care, Reader

They all looked very alarmed that I did not know.

“Only the greatest Wordsmith of the twenty first Century!” spat the Leader.

“He comes to Campus a few weeks from hence as our Visiting Writer,” Blondy said. “He will give a Reading in the Grand Hall.”

“And he will read our Work too, don’t forget, Gunnar, he has promised,” Colby added.

I began to deeply pity this Immortal, Reader

“We are right now preparing our Manny Scripts for his Arrival,” Matthias said.

“Just prior to Thanksgiving Break.”

“Which we protest in any case. A stupid holiday.”

“A Thanks for what exactly?”

They all sneered happily. “You will meet him when he comes,” Blondy said.

“But I hate Poets,” I whispered.

“Yes, exactly. He will love this about you. That you hate Poets.”

Except me , right? I remember Jonah saying and smiling.

Once more, I felt my Eyes fill with Tears. I turned away from them toward the window. The white Flecks were now falling most heavily. Pathetically. A mirroring of the Atmosphere and the Heart . “Will Jonah be there?” I asked.

Silence. I glanced back at them. They were all exchanging Looks now.

“He might be or he might not,” the Leader offered at last. “One never knows with Jonah .”

“He is in love with one of the Fictions,” Blondy erupted. “It is disgusting !”

“Shhh, Gunnar,” the Leader whispered, most consolingly. He looked at me through his thick Lenses. “Forget Jonah for now. He is not Worthy of your… Affection .”

“We will help you forget if you stay with us,” Colby said.

“You will be our Muse,” said Matthias. “You’ve already given us some immortal Lines.”

“As well as some other stranger Sounds…” added the Leader with a sly Smile.

I had?

“Uttered as you slept. In the throes of your Heartbreak. Straight from the Soul, Muse.”

“Muse,” I repeated. And for the first time this Morning, I began to feel truly afeared What is a Muse? Twas then I noticed, Reader, that they were all writing. Blondy scribbled in a little black Notebook, clasping in his Hand a Feather, plucked no doubt from an unsuspecting Magpie. Matthias scratched at a pad of yellow Papers, his pierced Tongue lolling out of his Mouth with wicked Pleasure. Colby gleefully stabbed at his phone with his Fingers. And the Leader, he was clicking on his Lappy Top, his Face a sickly Blue from the screen’s Glare. All of them smiling as they scribbled and scratched and clicked. All looking at me, Reader, as though they were cold and Pony and I were a bright Fire. Twas then I had the oddest Sensation. That my Soul was somehow leaking out of my Body. That the Blood was being drained from my Heart. I felt I could not breathe, that I might be Sick

“He Pales again,” observed Colby, still stabbing at his phone.

“Gunnar,” the Leader said, still clicking too. “Bring him whatever he desires.”

Blondy sighed and set down his Feather. “What do you desire now, Muse?”

I thought of Jonah’s Hairs brushing my Shoulders. His Eyes the only Home I’d found in this World. “Tenderest spring Grasses,” I told him sadly. “Dandy Lions.”

He nodded uneasily. As if to say And where am I to find tenderest spring Grasses?

“And Pinkberry,” I added in a Whisper, almost in spite of my Self.

“ Pinkberry ?” Gunnar repeated. “But this is the preferred Food of the Fictions! Their many hideous Toppings and Sprinkles.” He shuddered.

“I would like extra Sprinkles,” I said without thinking. “Though I deserve them not.” Silence among them now. Their Leader looked at me, quite coolly through the Smoke of his Clove Cigarette. Then down at his Writings, which somehow, I knew, I had been feeding.

“Do as he desires,” he barked again.

“ What ? But—”

“ Go, Gunnar!”

Gunnar sighed and rose from his beany bag. “Extra Sprinkles ,” he mumbled under his Breath, quite reproachfully. Muttered about the Shame of being seen at Pinkberry, the happy Violence of the Decor. “ Tis like being raped by a thousand smiling cartoon Bananas,” he grunted as he stomped out the door.

“Is there anything else you desire?” the Leader asked me. Softly now.

I stared at the dusty floor quite forlornly, all their Feets in their untied combat Boots.

To go back in Time. To return to the Lost Self that knew not Love nor Killing Allan but only the tender Taste of the green Leaf. To leave this monstrous Human Form behind.

I opened my Mouth.

And then I vomited, Reader. Quite endlessly, while the Leader shouted for something called a Hair of the Dog.

XIII

So went my Season with the Poets, Reader. In which I was their Muse In which I was fed Pinkberry and Dandy Lions and Grasses which Gunnar allegedly had to forage from Fields quite frosted over, for twas November now. In which I drank of the Goldy Liquid (which they grudgingly procured for me) with a kind of reckless Abandon Twas a strange Interlude. A period of Oblivion. The Poets were either completely unaware of my Pain or perhaps sparked by it, forever writing beside me, recording my every Utterance eagerly, as though I were some kind of Oracle The Immortal is coming very soon , they said. And they must get their Manny Scripts ready, they said, for his Feedback. And I, as their Muse, played a most crucial Role in the Birthings of their Poet Trees When they said the word Muse a terrible softness came into their Eyes, Reader. A wild Wanting that afeared me It reminded me of my Keepers, of the Attic Times. Yet I was not technically a Prisoner here and could go any Time, I supposed. But I did not, could not leave their musty Rooms, Reader A kind of heavy Melancholy had over taken my Spirit, you see, paralyzing my Body I remained reclined on a beany bag, surrounded by their thin grey Volumes, drinking Goldy Liquid from my Skull cup, staring out at the Windows with Eyes quite glazed over, while they wrote around me in a little Ring Perhaps twas the fact of my broken Heart Or that I had killed three Allans (all erroneously as it turned out) and felt no Relief Or that my Keepers were surely still out there in the cold white World looking for me

No one ever comes here , the Poets often assured me. Tis the Den of Oblivion , they said and grinned darkly.

Jonah might come of course , they sometimes taunted. And my Heart would brighten briefly.

“He might? Has he spoken about me?” I asked. I watched them contemplate this, wondering if they were trying to increase my Heartbreak with their Answers.

“He fails to mention you,” they said at last. “He is so very busy writing , you see.”

“He remains indifferent. Up there with the Moon and the Clouds as is his wont.”

“So telegraph the Moon,” I whispered sadly.

Telegraph the Moon , they recorded.

I knew not how many weeks passed in this Manner, Reader In the Abyss, I lost all sense of Time and Space. Knew not the Day from the Night for twas all a kind of metered Darkness. Winter was falling thick upon the World, this I drunkenly observed from my beany bag by the window. Gone were its sweet Grasses and the Wind had a Sharpness to her now, I could feel it cutting through the glass like Axe. Increasingly, I felt as if something Vital were being taken from me by these scribbling Poets and I had no Power, in my weakened State, to resist. I looked out at this Cold and Darkening World and lost all Hope.

But this is turning into a most Dismal Story

In order to spare you and my Self further Painful Recollections, I shall skip ahead now to the Day before their Immortal arrived, for something of Import occurred on this Day that is related to my Violences I had been lying reclined in the living room, nursing my Skull cup, lost in my Utterances ( my Pelt shivers at each white Fleck , your Absence makes of every Hour an Attic Time ), feeling my Soul drain from my Body, when we heard a Knock at the door. The Poets looked up. They had been surrounding me as usual, scribbling feverishly, recording my every Sound with bright, hungry Eyes. Now they appeared panicked. A Knock? At the Den of Oblivion? They looked at Gunnar, who sighed and got up from his beany bag, muttering that he was not a Servant. At the Window, he peered through the torn Curtain.

“Well?” the Leader hissed. He was sitting at the Foot of my weakened Body, hunched over his Lappy Top

“Tis some sort of Mob,” murmured Gunnar.

Mob, Reader?

“Ignore them,” the Leader snapped, clicking away.

“Do not ignore us, please!” someone cried through the door. And they knocked again, more forcefully. The Poets turned to me, almost instinctively, then to each other.

“Hide him,” the Leader whispered.

I allowed Colby and Matthias to drag me upstairs (I truly had no Will anymore ). From my perch on the landing, I watched the Scene below unfold, my forehead pressed against the railing. The Knocking was now very forceful indeed. Was it my Keepers at last? Polices? Oh god , Pony whispered and, despite my Numbness, I had to smile. It had been so long since we’d had an Opportunity to converse privately.

Pony ! I exclaimed.

Shhh , Pony said, for this was no Time for Happy Reunions We held our Breaths and waited. When Gunnar finally opened the Door, twas a group of Strangers who filed in. All were wearing the same black T-shirt imprinted with giant bleeding red Letters And all appeared to be bleeding profusely themselves, for their Faces were very White, and their Throats appeared slashed Dear God , Pony whispered. Twas as if I had taken my Axe to each of their Necks and then had attempted to affix their Heads back on their Bodies as I’d tried to do with the Wrong Allan’s. Only in this case it seemed to have worked. For though they all appeared to have recently been killed, they were very much Alive. Staring down the Poets in their Den of Oblivion.

“What is this?” I whispered to Pony.

I have a bad Feeling , Pony whispered back. Which made me Afeared, Reader. Pony’s Intuition, you see, was almost always Correct

Three young Persons stood at the Helm of this Mob. One of them I recognized as the Couch Monster from the Greek house where I had killed the Wrong Allan I had a Flash of him reaching for a Gun on the wall, screamingly accusing me of Murder Another was the Boy Statue from the truck stop, who had no doubt witnessed me killing the other two Allans, the ones who had likely only been joking about being Allan Between them was a tall dark-haired Girl in an Army Jacket. She alone was a Stranger to me. Her Blood-splattered Face looked very pinched and serious. Her dark Hairs tied in a most somber Ponytail, but twas nothing like Pony’s Tail, for I sensed it had never once swished

“May we help you?” the Poets said, bowing slightly to this bleeding Mob.

The Girl pulled an Axe from her Jacket. Reader, the Resemblance to my own Axe was so striking that if the Blade weren’t just now hidden in my Blazer, pressed against my Heart (as it always was), I would have thought twas mine. The Girl turned this Axe round in her pale Hands. “We are from the School of Visual and Performing Arts,” she said gravely.

Oh god no , Pony whispered.

“And we are raising Awareness,” said one of her bloody Ilk.

“About the recent Violences!” cried yet Another.

“On this accursed Campus!” finished Another.

Twas astonishing that they could speak with their serious Neck Injuries, Reader. I was about to remark on this to Pony, but he cut me off.

Tis Makeups , he explained quietly. Theater can be very Cruelle in its Deceptions.

The Girl smiled nastily, covered in her false Bleedings. “No doubt you’ve heard about the Violences of course?”

“Violences?” The Poets looked back longingly at their Writings. They did not like this Interruption, I knew. “Oh yes, the Violences,” the Leader said irritably. “Terrible.”

“Dreadful, dreadful,” the other Poets murmured, lighting Cigarettes.

“What’s even more dreadful ,” the Girl said, her Voice rising, “is that the Police aren’t doing anything to find the Perpetrator, can you believe this?”

The Poets shook their Heads, pretending to be horrified. Pony and I, however, were delighted Not doing anything, Reader? Twas the first good News we’d heard in Sometime

“Injustice!” the bloody Mob cried behind her .

“Systemic Apathy is a DISEASE!” cried one in the back, but the Girl raised her Axe silencing them all. She had a mind witchy Energy to her, quite like the Leader.

“And what exactly is… AAARV ?” Matthias said, attempting to read the bleeding Letters on their T-shirts. Dragging out the As with his Poet’s Cadence.

“ARTISTS AGAINST AXE-RELATED VIOLENCE,” they shouted.

“An ancient Warren organization!” cried one.

“Which we have resurrected!” cried another.

“In the Face of these most Violent Times!”

And now they all raised Axes in the Air

Such a fucking Production , Pony whispered. Leave it to Performing Arts.

“After all, one of our fellow Students has been killed!” the Girl cried. I thought of the Wrong Allan then, my awful Oops, and felt an Ache “Our very own dear Taylor Fields.”

“ Tyler ,” corrected the Couch Monster quietly beside her.

The Girl frowned. “As you see,” she told the Poets, “we have enlisted the Witness to his Murder.” She nudged the Couch Monster, who flushed beneath his bloody Makeups. “He told the Police , but of course they didn’t believe him. Instead, they’re saying it’s all a PRANK, can you believe that?”

Thank Christ , Pony mused.

“I thought it was a Prank too at first,” the Couch Monster mumbled. “But I saw what I saw. At least,” he shook his Head, “I think I did.”

“Of course you did !” the Girl shrieked. “No one in this town seems to CARE that people’s HEADS are being CHOPPED OFF.”

And she swung her Axe, slightly bigger than the others, most wildly. Tis a Toy , Pony told me now. Performing Arts must have a formidable Props Budget.

“If the Police aren’t going to investigate until they have a Body ,” she said. “If they’re not going to believe us until they have Evidence , then we have no choice but to take Justice into our Hands, do we not?”

Oh fuck , Pony whispered.

“Absolutely,” the Poets agreed.

The Girl beamed now through her Bleedings. “So you will join our Cause then, Poets? As fellow Artists?”

Now the Poets looked at one another, panicked. “Well, we would love to, you see. Very much indeed. Only we are very busy at the Moment. Just in the Midst of finishing our—”

The Mob immediately booed. “Inaction is Murder!” “Silence is Complicity!”

The Girl meanwhile, just stared at the Poets, her Expression full of quiet Fires.

“You know Narrative Arts has a very long History of looking the Other Way when it comes to Campus Violence,” she said at last. “Axe-Related Violence in particular .” She looked at them most accusingly.

“Is that so?” they murmured.

“So the Rumors go.”

“Well, we know Nothing about that,” the Leader snapped.

“Of course not!” she snapped back. “Too busy writing your Poems in the Dark. Well there will be No One left to read them if we are all MURDERED!”

There is No One reading them now , Pony whispered.

The Poets nodded gravely. Thankfully, I knew they did not really care at all. They wanted to sink back to their Oblivions, climb their Poet Trees. “We promise to keep an eye out,” they mumbled. They were about to usher the Mob out the door, but the Girl stopped them.

“Wait! If Nothing else, at least take a look at these Pictures of the Suspect.”

Oh god. Pictures , Reader?

“Despite his recent Trauma, Trent was able to sketch the whole thing, just as he himself witnessed it at the bar. Show them.” Trent opened his black Book. The Poets stared silently at the open page, at this alleged sketch of my Self, their Cigarettes smoking in their Fingers. I held my Breath, my Heart knocking against the blade of Axe. Waiting for them to say, Yes indeed that is our Muse. He is upstairs right now.

“Is this some kind of Joke ?” Colby asked at last.

“It is not a joke and maybe you won’t think so either when you’re MURDERED!”

“But it looks like a Violin with three Noses,” Gunnar said.

“It’s an Artist’s Sketch ,” the Girl said. “Trent is a Cubist.”

“I included this too, if it’s more helpful,” the Boy called Trent said, holding out a glossy Photo that looked ripped from a Magazine.

“This is just a Picture of Jacob Chamalord with Rabbit’s Ears drawn on his Head,” Matthias said.

“It is a Found Object and, according to both Trent and Cody (and here she nudged the Couch Monster), a Perfect Likeness !” the Girl roared.

Jacob Chamalord Oh Reader

“Well? Have you seen him or haven’t you?”

The Poets stared at this Photo. They recognized my Likeness, I know they did. I could feel it in their Silences, the crackle and hiss of their Cigarettes turning to Ash in their Hands. I held my Breath as they looked at each other then back at their Writings.

“No,” the Leader piped up at last. “We have never seen this Person before.”

Ah , sighed Pony.

And I too sighed with something like Relief, Reader.

Later that Evening, after the bleeding Mob had taken their leave, I lay reclined in the living room. High on the Goldy Liquid and its forgetting Magic, yet still very much unsettled by the Day’s Happenings Normally at this Time of Night the Poets would surround my Body in an effort to record my Drunken Utterances. Instead, Reader, they were having a great Argument in the kitchen. About me and my Murders

“I really think he might be this Killer they are looking for,” Gunnar was shouting.

“Absolutely not,” the other three countered.

“But he has an Axe in his Blazer!” Gunnar persisted.

“Yes,” murmured Colby, dreamily. “For the frozen Sea within us.”

Gunnar shook his Blondy Head. “I think it is Real.”

“ Real ?” sneered the Leader, his Hairs of Jet glistening under the grim kitchen Lights. “Come now, Gunnar. Are we seriously going to have a Discussion about what’s Real ? What are we, Fictions?”

“But three P eople have been killed!” Gunnar persisted.

“Tis Tragic,” the Leader agreed. “But tis also a very dangerous Town. We knew that when we applied. The more prestigie-yes the Program, the more violent and bleak the Town.”

“Tis the Risk we took for Art.”

“But we found him near the very truck stop where those Men were murdered!”

“ Missing ! Missing not murdered.”

“They could be missing and murdered,” Gunnar said. “Do you not think it’s a remarkable Coincidence that—”

“ Enough, Gunnar,” the Leader hissed. “He is a Muse. And not just any Muse. When I am near Aerius, I feel things I’ve never felt before. I have a new kind of…Access.”

I shivered at this word Access. The Others did not know that the Leader would often wake early to be with me alone. I’d open an Eye to find him hovering over me with his Lappy Top, clicking with a Fury that afeared me so much, I closed back my Eyes and wished to Run Yet I could not Run, had no energy to Run. Could only dream of the Lost Place, of Jonah waiting for me there.

“When he Dreams,” the Leader sighed, “his Utterances become something else entirely.”

“Oh yes? Like what?”

Like what? I wondered.

The Leader shook his Head, his Gaze suddenly misty. “I only know they are a Language. More Primal, more Transcendent than our Human Tongues could ever muster. And I am very close to cracking them,” he whispered.

I felt my Heart lift a little then. Could it be the Language of the Lost Self? Was it still Somewhere Inside of me, though I could access it not?

Gunnar merely scoffed. But I felt him looking at me curiously now from the kitchen. “And what if he’s dangerous?”

“A dance with the Muse is always dangerous,” the Leader said darkly. “Tis a most violent and ecstatic Tango.” He ran his Fingers through his Hairs, which I’d drunkenly twisted just the other Night into a Fishtail. Very surprised to find that my Hands had this particular Goldy Cut Skill. On a Lark, I’d told them that such Hair Braidings might help their Writings. Though really I’d only suggested it so that they might stop their Writings, Reader Give my Soul, even if briefly, a much needed break. I had also braided Matthias’s and Colby’s Hairs. Even Gunnar, perhaps not wanting to be left out, had allowed me to weave a small twisty lace Braid in his long goldy Locks. He’d come to me solemnly, Brush in hand, and whispered if you must .

“A Journey to the Underworld,” Colby said, stroking his own Dutch Halo.

“Perhaps you’re not equipped for such Journeying,” Matthias said, fingering his French Knots.

“I’m equipped . I’m just concerned he might murder us all in our Sleeps one Night.”

“Silence, Gunnar!” the Leader shouted. “The Immortal comes Tomorrow and I will not have you ruin this for me! Not when I am so close.” He looked at me lying there in the living room. I immediately closed my Eyes to feign Sleeps. Felt him smile at this. The coyness of the Muse. He began to walk toward me.

“Can we really trust a Muse who loves Jonah ?” Gunnar called after him in disgust.

“Love makes Fools of us all,” the Leader muttered bitterly as he approached me. “Including the Muses. Including even the Gods.”

And then One by One they all followed suit, resuming their usual Positions around my Person Waiting for me to speak Utterances that would spark their creative Journeyings, grow their Poet Trees At first I refused them, I was Silent. But my Pain was such that the Utterances gushed from my Lips quite in spite of my Self, and I knew not what I said. I only thought of the Lost Place where I was never lonely for I was Friends with the Mud. There my Heart did not ache for Jonah. I had killed no Allans nor wished to kill Allans. There was only the Wind in my Ears and the Cowslip on my Tongue and the soft sweet Grasses at my Feets. Then I thought of Jonah himself. Who the Poets kept hinting might come but who never came. And so, surrounded by Poets and quite without Hope, I imagined him there with me.

I had grown quite good at imagining , Reader , in this Time of gray Skies and Snow.

XIV

This, Reader, was the last Night before the Violences which I must now return to in my Tellings It started on the Eve of the Arrival of their Immortal. The Poets had stayed up quite late scribbling and clicking madly, putting what they called the Last Touches on their Manny Scripts, while I sat, Muse-like, drinking myself into a pretty Oblivion in their Center. (They never ceased plying me with the Goldy Liquid for which I was grateful.)

When I woke very late on this Day, I found them surrounding me in their Evening Wear Black silk shirts and Ascots gleaming ominously. Eyes freshly lined and glittered. Talons painted a sparkly Black. “Tis time for the Immortal’s Reading,” they intoned. “You will be our Guest.”

“At the Dinner too,” Matthias added.

Reader, I did not want to go to this Reading I was not only very afeared of encountering my Keepers or this Mob but I truly hated Poet Trees more than ever before Also I was very Depressed I told them this. But they said, “That is a perfect State of Mind for Poet Tree.” “You are our Muse,” they said. “We wish to introduce you to our God,” they said. “Tis time for Muse and God to meet.”

“You can ask him about this Lost Place you often mention in your Utterances,” Gunnar grunted .

How can a Poet possibly know about the Lost Place ? I thought. I shrugged and flushed, hating that these Poets knew my Interiors.

“Also Jonah will be there,” Colby taunted.

“Jonah?” And a small, shameful Fire in me awakened. Hope broke terribly inside my Heart.

The Poets smiled. “Come along and you’ll see.”

Given how these Poets had spoken of the Grand Hall , I’d expected it to be grand, Reader. But it turned out to be a very small Bookstore quite like the one I’d burned down A dusty Hole full of shelves and wobbly tables covered in Volumes A few fold out chairs had been arranged around a wooden Podium. No sign of Jonah anywhere As the Poets rushed to claim their Seats, I went looking for him, but the Place was truly empty. Even the Woman with Allergies was not there (perhaps she’d taken my advice and given up on Poet Trees). Just a pale Clerk glowering near the ancient cash register and an old Homeless hovering in a Corner. He was partaking from a plate of free Cookies on a table, stuffing them into his coat Pockets. Lots of Homeless in this town so sad, I remember my Keepers telling me, so long ago. What we thought you were at first, isn’t that funny?

I went over to him, mainly to partake of the Floral Arrangement behind the Cookies. The Homeless watched me stuff limp Daisies into my Pockets just as he was stuffing Cookies in his.

“Are you here for the Immortal’s Reading?” I asked him.

“The Immortal ,” he said, and laughed uproariously. “Absolutely not. Are you?”

“I’m here because I have no choice,” I told him.

But we are also hoping to see our Love , Pony whispered.

He smiled. “Me too.” He took a Daisy from my Hand, put it in his Mouth and winked at me. I watched him disappear into the dusty Labyrinth of Shelves.

“Aerius come here ! Tis about to start .”

“Jonah isn’t here,” I whispered to the Poets as I took my seat.

“ Hush .” They told me to direct my Eyes to the Podium where the Immortal would soon manifest like a Sun. Colby walked up first, going quite pink in the Face as he unfolded his crumpled Introduction and read from it, his Words running together so that I caught very few of them. Esteemed. Genie-yes. I con.

The Homeless walked up to the Podium then, the very one I’d just encountered stuffing the Cookies into his Pockets. I knew it , Pony whispered. A little Man he was, quite like an Elf. He wore a Trenchy Coat like the Poets, though his was quite battered-looking, like it had weathered many Storms. He had a Scally Cap tilted on his Head. A scruffy Face covered in grey and black Bristles, and glittering Eyes that reminded me of a Hawk’s Could this Homeless really be their Immortal? The way the Poets murmured and grunted appreciatively at the Sight of him, he must have been, Reader. Twas then I saw that tucked under his Arm were many Volumes I wanted to escape, but my Head was cottony from all the Goldy Liquid I had been imbibing and anyway these Poets were sitting on either side of me, Reader, pinning me in Place What remained of my Soul screamed inside my Body as this Immortal began flipping through his Volumes, each one spiky with little Bits of Paper, marking where he would read Selections (there were many of these Bits of Paper, Reader) As he flipped, thanking Colby for his most generous Introduction , thanking all of us for being in Attendance , sneering at the humming Emptiness of the room, the Poets lowered their Heads as if about to hear a Prayer.

He read many Poems from many a Volume, while they hissed their approval after each one. Pony went into a Coma. I, for my part, became quite sleepy, Reader. Twas something in the trance-y way the Immortal was reading. Almost as if he were trying to Hypnotize with his Voice. Despite my Self, I fell into a kind of Dreaming, a Vision. Suddenly I was in the tall grassy Blades, a sun-warmed Dandy Lion on my Tongue, a vast blue Sky over me, hearing the jumping Song of the Wind.

“Aerius.”

Then a giant Hawk swooped down, eclipsing the Sun and swallowing me in Darkness He was about to take me in his Talons and I screamed and screamed and—

“AERIUS!”

I opened my Eyes. Poets all around me. Looking disgusted and embarrassed by my Dreamings “I told you,” Gunnar hissed to the Others. “Didn’t I tell you we should not have brought him?” The Immortal stared at me from his Podium, smiling most strangely. A curious Twinkle in his Eye now.

He continued to smile at me at the Dinner, a most horrid Affair at something called a Bistro It gave Pony and my Self a Shiver to enter the Place, Reader, though twas nice enough with Candle Lights and Flower arrangements and tinkling piano Musics. There was a giant Rabbit’s Head on the wall emanating red Light like Fire, which Pony took to be an Omen of ill Portent I feel I have been here before , he whispered from my Pocket . In another Time, in another Pocket . We should go .

But what about Jonah? I whispered.

“Aerius, do not dawdle at the Threshold, please ,” the Poets scolded.

So I joined them at their round table appointed with Tealights and dying Orchids, their Immortal already sitting at the Helm like a sad drunk King. The Poets surrounded him, each of them clutching their Manny Scripts which they were so very eager to share. The Immortal eyed these Pages warily, mostly keeping his strange Gaze on me as I partook of the Orchids. I was keeping my Eye out for Jonah, of whom there was still no Sign We should go we should go , Pony whispered. Making me nervous and I was already quite nervous, Reader, to be in such a public Place where I might be recognized. Beneath the table, Pony continued to murmur about his Intuition and how I never heeded it these Days. The Poets meanwhile raided the bread baskets and attempted to engage the Immortal in C onversations. “And how is your hotel?” Colby offered.

“I am not staying at a hotel,” the Immortal said wearily. “I am staying with your Poet Tree Teacher and his Wife, the Fiction. In their guest room.”

That sounds horrible, doesn’t it, Pony?

I don’t care , Pony intoned. Let’s please go before it’s too—

“I imagine that must be much cozier than a hotel,” Matthias said, most genially.

“I’d prefer a hotel, honestly,” the Immortal sighed. “But it’s not terrible. I’m left alone mostly. David is busy teaching and the Fiction is locked in her Writing Shed. I’m treating it as a little Writing Retreat my Self.” He smiled sadly.

“How wonderful, Great One,” the Poets murmured, nodding. They were behaving so strangely, Reader. Not at all seething as usual. In fact, they were being most polite, which unsettled me Their Voices full of Light and Softness like they had swept them of all Shadows. Now and then they gazed at their Manny Scripts, which were resting on the table before them. Pages they had written furiously at my Side, woven through with my Utterances, now typed and ready to hand over to their God for Feedback. He ignored these Pages, drinking his Scotch with Ice. Continued to stare at me as I ate the Orchids. “Fascinating,” he mumbled.

“Where is Jonah?” I asked Gunnar at last. I was trying to avoid the Immortal’s Gaze, for it only increased my Dread

“He’ll be along soon. He won’t miss the Chance to have his Manny Script read, trust.”

“At the very least, he will not miss the free Meal,” Colby added.

“No Poet would miss the chance for a free Steak,” the Immortal said to me, smiling.

“Unless one sees Steak as Murder,” Gunnar grunted quietly from behind his Menu. “In which case, he would not miss the Chance for a free Risotto.”

I could order whatever I wanted, Gunnar said to me. The school had deep Pockets, apparently, like the one in which I housed Axe.

“Do you have any more of these?” I asked the Waitress, pointing to Centerpiece I’d ravaged. She looked at me and smiled quite dreamily. Gazed at the Pearl Earring brushing my Neck like a frozen Tear. “I’m sure we can figure something out,” she said. “Anything else I can bring you?”

“A bottle of Goldy Liquid, please.”

“Goldy Liquid?” the Waitress said, looking puzzled but delightedly so.

“Goldschlager,” Gunnar explained to her. “Will you not have Wine for a change?” he hissed at me. “Or Ale? Anything other than this Frat Boy drink ?”

“I will join the Boy,” the Immortal said from across the table. “ Goldy Liquid ,” he smiled borrowing my Parlance. “Please bring another shot glass for me.” Reader, I did not really want to share my Goldy Liquid with this Immortal He had already gone through two double Scotches since we’d arrived at the Bistro. But it seemed there was no Choice, there was never any Choice among these Writers

“Your Reading was so wonderful, Great One,” the Poets told him. Many such Words of Praise they heaped on his Person, while he grunted his Thanks, seeming quite bored. His Eye had a faraway glittery Look. His Scally Cap drooped. He turned to me, still forlornly partaking of my dead Petals.

“And you,” he said. “What did you think of it, may I ask?”

“Me?”

The Poets all turned to me now, waiting for my W ords. “What did I think?”

“Of the Reading ,” Gunnar hissed.

“Well I hate Poet Tree. And all Poets. So I am not the One to ask,” I mumbled.

He laughed with Delight . “You are exactly the One to ask,” he said, Eyes still on me. “I noticed the Work made quite a…visceral Impression on you.”

It came back to me, the Impression. My Self huddled close to the Earth, its sumptuous Dirt, its blades of Grass a prickly Velvet, the Shivers through my Body.

“Twas a strange Experience for me,” I murmured.

“Strange?” A Hunger overtook his Face now. I thought of my Keepers then, ever hungry for more Adjectives about their Writings. “How so?”

“It took me Somewhere,” I said at last, evasively, picking at a Petal. “Some Place or Self I thought I had been before. To which I long to return. Except that I cannot find my Way Back now.”

“Where?” He whispered. “Tell me.” He seemed very excited suddenly.

Oh god , Pony whispered. They’re here.

“Where?” I said.

“Yes, where?” the Immortal pleaded.

There! Pony cried.

“There?” I repeated.

“Where’s there?” the Immortal cried. “Where did you go, tell me!”

But I never answered his Question, Reader. Because that’s when I saw them outside the restaurant, through the glass Windows. The Windows! The Windows! Pony shouted. Making their way to the door, all four Their terribly shining Hairs, their shimmering Dresses swishing in the Night Those wildly desirous Eyes And that sinister Scent, Reader, I felt I could smell it even through the glass. Of Flowers not in Nature. Of False Grass

“Aerius,” the Poets said. “What is it?”

But I could not speak, could only watch them approach Goldy Cut, her Hairs freshly golded and cut, her stained white Gloves, her Dress the Color of Wrong Skies. Then Murder Fairy, brooding in her red Cloak and little clicking Shoes, ever casting watchful Glances all around her Person. Insatiable in a Victorian-looking Frock, clomping along in her army Boots, her brazen Mouth open as if trying to make out with the very Air. And of course, the Mind Witch with her silvery Locks, her long white Tunic which so resembled my own from long ago. And her Third Eye, that Huntress, wide open

What Horror I felt then, Reader. A Memory of Ropes. A Triangle of Glass

“Well look who’s just arrived,” the Leader intoned, noticing them.

“Why would they be here?” Gunnar seethed. “The Fictions don’t have a Visiting Writer.”

“Probably just here for Dinner,” Matthias said. “They can go anywhere anytime, remember? They’re rich .”

“Looks like they have some Companions with them Tonight,” Colby chimed in.

Twas then I noticed that they were not alone, my Keepers. Four Men were walking behind them. Each Man was quite tall, like I was, and wore a dark blue Suit.

“Prelaw by the looks of it. Or Finance,” Gunnar sniffed. “Some lovely American Psychos. In Brooks Brothers no less. How fittingly vile.”

One of the Men looked at me through the glass and seemed to smile. He had the whitest Teeth, Reader. His blue Eyes shone in the Dark. A wave of Dread entered my Heart. “I must go now,” I whispered.

“ Now ?” the Immortal said.

“We haven’t even received our Food!” the Poets cried.

But I was already running from the table, Reader, toward the back of the restaurant, the Poets crying for me to come back, come back.

In a dark Alley reeking of Garbages, I leaned against the rank Wall, catching my Breaths. Stared up at the cold Night. A close One , Pony whispered, over my racing Heart. Too close too close.

Had they seen me as I had seen Them?

Don’t know, think not. Shouldn’t linger here in case.

Quickly, I wandered away from the Bistro toward a small Park across the street. I had not been outside in a long Time, Reader, and the World had grown terribly cold. But twas lovely in its coldness. Trees tall and glowing white with Snow beneath the Moon. Grasses sparkling with Frost as though Nature had spread her Glitter there. I drifted toward the Glitter, my Breath coming out like cold Smoke. As I did so, that Melancholy possessed me again, making my Steps heavy, hanging my Head low. Perhaps because I felt once more alone in the World That I had no Place here That I would forever be on the run I watched from between two prickly Evergreens as my Keepers were seated in the Bistro, a pretty table right by the front Window Their Companions, these tall young Men, helped them into their chairs. Something about these Companions, Reader. Their glazed Expressions and chiseled Faces Their Eyes, so blue and bright They felt infinitely familiar for Reasons I could not articulate. Twas a Feeling. An Intuition as the Mind Witch or Pony or even Mother might say. One of the four Men looked especially familiar. He had a black Patch over one Eye like the Wrong Allan. He looked quite like the Wrong Allan too. So much so that I almost wondered if he was the Wrong Allan, Reader, if I had not really killed him after all. Suddenly his Eye locked with mine through the Window, as if he’d heard my Wonderings through the glass, and now saw me hiding between the Firs. Looking at him, I had a Flash of that Rabbit I’d encountered in the Rose Garden so long ago. Twas his Eye Patch perhaps, which reminded me of the Rabbit’s black Patch. Twas a Sense of Knowing as I held his Gaze, all my Pelt Hairs suddenly standing on End. Quickly I hid back behind the cold Shrubs, my Heart pounding.

“Aerius,” said a soft Voice then. I screamed.

I turned to find the Immortal standing behind me in his battered Coat. Smiling at me most sadly, gripping the bottle of Goldy in his Fist. “You ran away.”

I looked at him, my H eart still pounding. “I…needed Air,” I said.

The Immortal smiled. “You don’t need to explain yourself to me, Boy. Who wouldn’t want to be out here among the Stars? Rather than sit in that Den of Lies.” He nodded toward the Bistro then took a long Swig from his Bottle. “Follow your own inner Moonlight,” he murmured. “Don’t hide the Madness.”

I had no Idea what he was talking about Reader. But I said, “This is excellent Advice. Thank you, Great One.”

“Great One,” he muttered, shaking his Head. “I am no Great One. Poets are Damned but see with the Eyes of Angels. That is our Affliction.” He took another Swig then stared balefully at the Snow. Let’s get out of here, Pony whispered in my Pocket. Please.

“I really should—”

“I know what you are,” he suddenly said, looking right at me, Reader. “And I know this Place you are trying to return to.”

I gazed at the Immortal swaying drunkenly before me.

“You know?” I whispered.

He smiled darkly . “All Poets know. Well, any Poet worth his Salt knows. Many a Time I have tried to go back there my Self,” he said. “To the Primal Self. The Animal Past.” He took another long Drink.

“The Primal Self,” I repeated softly and felt a Shiver. “Where you know the Language of the Moon and the Wind and the Grasses?”

“Where you know the Language of Everything.” He looked dreamily at the Sky.

“And do you ever see yourself small and furry?” I asked him. “Sitting under Shrubs?”

“I do,” he whispered, Eyes shining with Tears. “I do.”

“Me too,” I confessed. Tears in my own Eyes now. “How can we go?” I asked him.

For what did I have in this Place but Poets and Keepers? And Jonah nowhere in sight. And I did not love being a Muse “Will you show me the Way, Great One?”

He does not look he knows his way Anywhere , Pony observed.

The Immortal pulled a grey Volume from his Pocket.

Oh god no , Pony said.

“This,” the Immortal said, waving the Volume. “I will read you a Poem I didn’t read earlier, before my Audience of Dust. The dry, Academic Setting was no Place for it. To have great Poets, there must be great Audiences. Here,” and he waved at the Shrubs, “is where one must read Poems. Out in the open Air among our Friends the Trees and our Lover the Mud.”

And he sank down to his Knees on the snowy Grass. He pulled me down with him, he was surprisingly strong. I watched as he peeled back the Grass, ripping out the Roots, and began digging in the cold Dirt with his bare Hands. He encouraged me to dig with him. I did though twas very cold Work at first. But the Warmth from our Hands seemed to soften the Earth. I laughed with Excitement and the Immortal did too, even as Pony whispered, I do not know about this.

“There,” said the Immortal at last, pointing to the Fruit of our Labors. I looked down at this small dark Hole we had dug.

“This is the Way Back?” I said.

He nodded, bleary-eyed, his Scally Cap quite askew now. He stroked the Soil with his frail Hands. Quite drunk he looked at this point. I stared at the Hole. It did not look like the Way Back to me, Reader It did not look like the Way to Anywhere at all

I told you , Pony whispered.

“We also have this, remember,” he said. And he shook his grey Volume at me again, its Pages flapping like a flightless Bird.

“And is this a Map?” I asked him.

“This is a Poem ,” he said, getting impatient with me. “There is a Poem in here that we will read together. You know they have said I am the reincarnation of Ginsberg.”

“They have said this?”

“Oh yes.”

“Wow.” I did not know who this Ginsberg was, Reader. But I attempted to look impressed. If there is one thing I have learned from the Poets and Keepers both, is that tis very important to pretend one has read certain Volumes and to look impressed by a Name. “Ginsberg,” I repeated with Feeling.

He nodded. “And this Poem is my Tribute. It is a Howl,” he said.

“A Howl?”

“MY Howl. In the manner of Ginsberg, I have written it. Totally revolutionizing his Confessional Mode. I like to think too that I have sharpened its Symbology.”

“Oh?” I said.

“We must be like Midas,” cried the Immortal. “We must Howl our Howl into the Mud. The Mud is our very best Audience. She will hear us and open herself, the Earth will open, she will take us into her mineral Embrace. And this is how we will go back.”

I nodded, Reader, though I no longer knew if this Poet and I were talking about the same Place. And if we were, did I really want to go back there with this Poet?

I hate all Poets, remember? I told Jonah.

Except me, right? Jonah smiled.

Except you , I’d said, my Heart already breaking. Jonah nowhere in this Night. I looked at the Immortal, extending his frail Hand to me.

“Take it,” he said. “While I speak the Words aloud. Here.” He gave me his Volume. “You may hold the Poem and read along with me. Though listen first please so that you may catch my Cadences.”

So I held the Volume in one Hand and the Poet’s Hand in the Other. I watched him bend his Head toward the cold, muddy Cavity. Putting his whole Face into it, Reader. He then began to shout his Poet Trees deep into the Hole. And I read along with him from his Volume. Twas the usual Poet stuff about melodious Springtimes and curious Clouds and cosmic Fellatio and the Monster of Capitalism and the Wonder of certain hallucinogenic Drugs and the Reincarnation of the shiniest Souls And then:

“I am Allan G,” he whispered into the Hole.

“What?” Suddenly a Cold swept through me. The night Sky seemed to fill with a red Fog.

“I am Allan G,” he repeated.

“You are—”

“I AM ALLAN G,” The Immortal cried into the dark Hole, my Grip tightening over his Hand.

“I AM ALLAN G,” he howled. No longer hearing that I was not joining him in his Reading. That I was instead staring at the Page, at the word Allen (a variation?) beside the words I am . That this word Allen was flashing redly in the back of my Brain Chambers.

Along with the word Kill .

XV

Quickly, I buried the severed Head in the Hole, letting go the cold Hand of Allan, while his Blood pooled hotly around me Allan whom I had killed again Killed almost as quickly as I’d thought the word kill Whom I had killed thrice before, though erroneously Watched as Allan’s severed Head tumble into the Hole we had dug together. Watched his headless Body gush its dark hot Blood.

“I thought I had killed you already,” I told Allan’s head softly. “Thrice.” I covered the Hole with clumps of frosty Grasses so he would not look at me His Blood-splattered Face appeared to be smiling serenely He was smiling more in Death than he’d ever smiled in Life, sitting among the Poets and their Manny Scripts which he must review, drinking his Scotches and stealing dusty bookstore Cookies and reading from his Volumes under the gray Light. How many more times must I kill you, Allan ? I thought.

In the Distance now, I heard the voice of Gunnar.

“Lenny,” he called. “Lenny, where are you? Your plate of Murder sits cold on the table!” (Murder, Reader, was how Gunnar referred to all Meats.) “Your Murder grows cold, Lenny!” he cried. “As do our Manny Scripts,” he muttered under his B reath.

I looked down at the headless Body lying in the Dirt, dark Blood still gushing all around us. The cold Hole in which I’d buried the Head.

Lenny?

“But you said you were Allan,” I whispered to the Body. Which could not respond, Reader, for it had no Mouth.

Oh god, I thought

I could feel Pony’s stony Silence in my Pocket. No, I shook my Head.

No, no, NO twas impossible that I had once more killed a Wrong Allan, Reader. I shook and shook my Head as if to make it not so, not this Time. He was Allan, he must be Allan, mustn’t he? Hadn’t he screamed I am Allan nearly a thousand Times into the Hole? And the words I am Allen were printed in his Volume, were they not? Twas Allen with an e , but surely no less Allan for that. My vision had grown swimmy, Reader, and the Pages were now sprayed with Allan’s Blood, obscuring all Words. I closed the Volume. A Lamentation by Leonard Coel it read on the Cover. I felt sick then. I turned the Book round. On its back was the Photograph of the Man I had just killed. Leonard Coel. Looking sad and scruffy in his weathered Coat. His Eyes twinkling sadly, filled with a Longing that I knew now was for the Lost Place.

“Lenny,” shouted Gunnar once more. “Oh forget it,” he hissed. Through the Shrubbery now, I watched Gunnar trudge back into the Bistro, not wanting his own vegetal Risotto to grow cold. I turned back to the headless Body of Allan. Who was a man named Leonard Coel. Leonard. Leonard, I’m so sorry I have killed you. Please forgive—

But the Body was gone.

Nothing at my Feets now but cold Grass, sparkling with Frost.

“Leonard?” I whispered, reaching out. But there was only Air and cold Earth. Allan or Leonard was gone, Reader. As if he had never been here, hunched beside me on the Grass, screaming his Poet Trees into the Mud. As if I’d never taken the hot Magic of Axe to his bristly Neck. No Sign of him though his Blood had freshly splattered the Blade.

“Leonard, where did you go?”

I dug my Hands back into the Earth, looking for his Head, for something to tell me what was Reality, Evidence of what I had done. I was attempting, as my Keepers often said, to ground my Self . And I did feel something in there, Reader. But twas not the wispy haired Skull of Leonard. Instead, my Fingers grazed something warm and fuzzy and soft.

And Alive, Reader.

I jumped up from the Shock of it, this Presence of warm Life in the cold Hole

Then out of this dark Cavity there emerged a Creature white as the Snow. Furry, twas. Long-eared and bushy-tailed. Sitting at my Feets. A Rabbit. Wearing Leonard’s Scally Cap on its Head. He shook it off, his Eyes looking up at me, blue and twinkling, quite like Leonard’s Eyes had twinkled. Twitching its small pink Nose as if to say: Hello.

“Hello,” I whispered. And I felt as if I were falling, Reader. The cold Ground seemed to sink beneath me . “What have you done with Leonard’s Head?”

The R abbit stared at me. Tis funny, but I felt twas about to speak, that it knew of Leonard’s Whereabouts. I recalled my earlier Encounter with that Rabbit in the Bush, how I’d heard its Language reverberating in my Blood. Now I looked at this white Rabbit sitting by the cold Hole, looking up at me. I waited to hear him speak through my Pelt. I even closed my Eyes. Tell me. Tell me the meaning of all of this, small One.

“Aerius,” said a V oice.

I opened my Eyes. There he was at last. Standing in the Snow before me, his Face licked silver by the Moon. Cigarette burning between his fingers. Smiling like I did not have an Axe in my Hand, a Rabbit at my Feets, like I had not just accidentally killed his God.

“Jonah,” I whispered.

“What are you doing here?” he said, Eyes on mine.

“Waiting for you,” I said. And I knew twas true. I could feel the Rabbit nodding at my Feets.

Jonah’s Smile brightened. “It’s good to see you.”

You too. But all my Words were gone from me again. Hiding under Shrubs. It seemed Jonah’s Words were gone too. He took a long drag of his Cigarette.

“I wondered where you were,” he said at last. “If maybe you’d even gone back Home.”

“Home?” I shook my Head at the dark Hole, the Rabbit was now rubbing its Face with its Forepaws. “No, I actually can’t go back it seems. Ever.” Tears threatened to fill my Eyes.

“Oh,” Jonah said. “Well…I’m glad.”

I looked back at him. Still smiling at me in the Dark. “You are?”

“Of course. I’d miss you. I have missed you. A lot.”

I’ve missed you too! So much. But I stayed silent, Reader, under the Moon and the starless Sky. Even as he moved in closer to me, having just said the Words I’d so long dreamed he would say. Perhaps I still feared that his Missing and my Missing were not the Same. Perhaps I feared this was not Reality. I merely nodded coolly.

“I didn’t have your number or email so I couldn’t reach you,” he said, moving in closer still. “I just kept hoping…” And he shook his Dandy Lion Head. I reached out and stroked his Hairs, so soft they made me ache. I was so relieved that I did not touch Air.

“Hoping what?” I said.

He smiled again. “That you’d show up Somewhere again, I guess. And here you are.” A Warmth suddenly coursed through me in the cold Night. I wanted to kiss his smiling Mouth. And he wanted to kiss me, I felt. Our Breaths, a dancing Smoke in the cold Air, were already entwining. And then he said, “What are you doing with that Axe?”

I realized I was still holding its Handle limply. It looked suddenly like a foreign Object. Nothing that could or should ever belong to me. An awful Prop someone had placed in my Hands. I felt Pony shaking his head sadly.

“I don’t know.” Those threatening Tears fell from my Eyes at last. I looked at Jonah through these Tears.

“Aerius,” he said, with such Kindness it nearly broke me.

I almost told him Everything then, Reader. About Allan, how I must kill him. How I would very much like to stop but it seems I could not stop, my Hand on Axe faster than I could think or blink. When I only wanted the Cowslip, I only wanted the Moon to speak to me, I only wanted to hear the Song of the Wind. I only wanted Jonah’s Mouth, his Pelt, his Cock, his Love. “I do not even know what is Real anymore,” I said at last. “I only know that I’ve done some terrible Things. That I seem to be wired for Destruction. And that I don’t belong here.”

And that I love you.

I waited for Jonah to run from me. But he just stood there in the Snow, staring along with the Rabbit.

“Wow,” he said at last. “These Performance Pieces of yours are really intense.”

“What?” When at last I gathered the Courage to meet his Eye, I saw he was gazing at me with a kind of Wonder. Like I was a Poem or a Cloud.

“I dig them,” he said dreamily.

“You do?”

He nodded. “Just please don’t kill that Bunny,” he said. He smiled at the Creature still sitting by my Feets. Looking up at us with shining Eyes.

“Bunny,” I repeated. The Word caused a Fire to light up inside me. The Word was like a Tunnel opening in my Mindscape and once more, I felt I was falling.

“Aerius, are you okay? I’m sorry, I was kidding. I don’t think you’d ever kill a Bunny.”

He brushed my Hairs away from my Eyes. Stroked my sorrowed Cheek and I was melting, melting under his Perfect Touch. That wanted Nothing from me. That made me want to give him Everything.

“Sometimes I feel very wrong,” I whispered. “Or like the World is wrong. One of Us is very, very wrong. And I want to leave, I want to go Home. But I don’t even know how or where I… .” I looked at the dark Hole. The Rabbit watched me sorrowfully now.

Then Jonah kissed me, Reader. His lovely Mouth suddenly crushed against mine, making me forget the cold Night. Hands gently caressing my Neck, my Face, as I caressed his. His impossibly beautiful Pelt pressing into me, warming me so deeply, I felt I should never be cold again. I felt the Rabbit sigh. And Everything became clear in that Moment. I love you , I thought. This is who I am , I thought. This is Home , Pony whispered. Axe nearly dropped from my Hand…

Church Bells chimed in the Night. Jonah pulled away gently, no longer smiling.

“Oh god, I really should head to the Dinner now. I’m pretty late.”

“Okay,” I breathed.

I looked down at the Rabbit still at my Side. And he looked at me. I guessed we were alone again in the World. What about me? Pony sighed from my Pocket. You forget me so much lately.

“Should we go?” Jonah said then.

We? And he held out his Hand to me.

Reader, may I express to you the Happiness I felt for this short Space with Jonah’s Hand in mine as we made our way out of the Park? Winter was banished at last from my Heart I kissed him once more and he kissed me, Reader His Mouth so soft and yielding, its cigarette Smoke filling my own Twas a beauteous Moment, the Moon shining down, making the frosted Grass sparkle. The Bunny still following us. As if to say yes, this, exactly . And the World no longer felt Wrong like Allan. And I no longer felt Wrong in it.

“I love you,” I told him, the Words coming out of me like Smoke. Snow began to fall lightly all around us. For a brief Moment, everything felt exactly right.

He smiled at me, his Dandy Lion Hairs glittering with Snowflakes.

“Let’s get Inside,” he said, squeezing my Hand. “It’s freezing out here, don’t you think?”

No , I didn’t say. I do not find it cold at all . May I just be out here with you, the Snow falling around us forever? But I let him draw me back toward the Bistro and its lighted glass windows.

And then there, through the windows, I saw them again. They who had made me go running in the first Place, Reader. They whom I wished to forget forever Drinking their Champagnes at a round table with their strange Companions.

“Aerius, what is it? Why are we hiding here?”

For I’d stopped us, pulled us both behind the Evergreens that flanked the Park’s Entrance.

I stared at them, their small shining Heads glowing like awful Suns. Their Companions were seated beside them, each one chewing from his own plate of Flowers. Lovely American Psychos, the Poets had called them. Who were these new blue-eyed Mates? These tall, Petal-eating men in their blue Suits and black Gloves. Why did their striking Faces feel so very familiar to me? As if to look at them was to see something of my S elf? The one with the Patch over his Eye, who’d been staring at me earlier, was now looking dully through the glass.

“Aerius?”

Suddenly, he noticed me, Reader, through the Trees.

“Aerius, what’s wrong? Shouldn’t we go in?”

“I can’t,” I said, locking Eyes with Patch through the window.

“Why?”

Because through that door is Death. Because I cannot be a Muse anymore and I cannot be Revised anymore And I do not like the look of this American Psycho staring at me through the window Through that door are only Poets and Keepers, only Prisons “Let’s just go somewhere else. Please. I hate Poets, remember?” I tried to smile. But Jonah wasn’t smiling anymore.

“I have to go. I already missed the Reading because I had to finish my Poem.” I saw then, Reader, that there was a Manny Script tucked in the inner Pocket of his Trench. How my Heart sank at the Sight of those Pages, Reader, folded against his Chest so they wouldn’t get wet in the Snow. “If I miss this Dinner, I won’t forgive myself. Why can’t you just come in with me?”

I shook my Head, staring at my Keepers and their strange Dates through the window. Patch’s Eye was still on me.

“I have to go,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

“Well, I’m sorry too. Because I really have to stay. This is my Chance to get Feedback,” he was muttering.

“You won’t be getting Feedback tonight,” I whispered.

“How do you know?”

Because I killed your God . “I have a Feeling.”

“Well, either Way, I have to make an Appearance. It’s good…for Connections and stuff.” I saw now that he was also wearing a Suit and Tie under his Coat. The Tie had a brightly colored Painting of a bald Man screaming on a Bridge. I felt a bit sick then, Reader.

“I’m a Poet, Aerius,” he mumbled.

“I know,” I said sadly. Yet I still love you.

“It’s a rough Path,” he said, the Snow sparkling in his Dandy Lion Hairs. His lovely Face turned away from me, away from the Night that waited for us, toward the lighted windows of the Bistro, all those Idiots inside.

“You should come with me now,” I said.

“Please don’t ask me to choose between you and Poet Tree,” he said. The cold Night Wind swirled all around us whispering her Promises, I heard them. But Jonah, I knew, heard them not.

“Come with me,” he begged.

We can’t , whispered Pony. The Rabbit was still at my Feets watching this sadly. I shook my Head. “Please don’t ask me to choose either.”

And then the Warmth in Jonah’s Face was gone. Twas like the grassy Earth in his Eyes had suddenly frozen over. Twas like the Dandy Lions had died.

He let go of my Hand. To recall this now, his letting go, the sudden coldness of it. How he turned and walked away from me, through the door where I could never follow. How I stood there watching him go, Snow falling around me. Falling Somewhere I nside me still.

“Jonah wait!” I said.

But the Psycho in the window, Patch, he stood up from the table now, his Mouth full of pink Petal, his Eye wide with Recognition. He pointed at me, where I stood behind the Trees.

Panic thrummed in my Body.

Run, run, I thought. But I was frozen, Reader. Frozen by Fear or by my own broken Heart, I knew not. I could only stare at my Keepers through the glass—they’d looked up but didn’t seem to espy me behind the Trees. Now Patch opened his Mouth and made a screaming Sound I heard through the glass. Oh god, oh god , Pony whispered. A scratching at my Feets. The Rabbit, still at my Side, looking up at me with his bright Eyes.

Come with me , I felt him whisper through my Pelt.

And then he leapt off into the Dark.

XVI

How long did I run after Bunny leaping through those dark snowy Streets? Forever, it felt like, his Tail flashing ahead of me in the Night. As I followed, I thought I heard Noises behind me Oh god, Reader, were they coming for me? I dared not look back lest I spy my Keepers and their Psychos hot on my tail Instead, I kept running, my Gaze fixed on Bunny. I felt his Words along my Pelt. As if to say, Hurry . As if to say, This Way . Okay, Bunny, I thought. But you are moving so quickly through these winding streets, and I can’t keep up for I can’t jump like you, Bunny, though my Body wants to so much! Legs tingling, Feets singing with Jump. Bones and Muscles and Blood electric with Jump. The Longing to Jump ringing through my Being, and not just the Longing, but the Memory. Did I jump like you once, Bunny? Because racing through this Night together, my Body wildly straining to reach you, my Soul exhilarated though I am so heartbroken and afeared, my Feets nearly flying off the Sidewalk, I feel perhaps I did. But if I did I can no more And now I am afraid I’ll lose you in this endless Dark. And if I lose you, what will become of me? Behind me, the Noises seemed to grow louder

“Wait for me, Bunny,” I whispered as I ran. Each time I said Bunny , twas like a thrum through my Blood. But Bunny would not wait. Wherever he was going, he was very excited to get there. I felt him smile up ahead. Perhaps he was leading me back to the Place that Leonard and I had wished to go. Perhaps he’d found the Way.

“Have you found the Way, Bunny?”

And then? He disappeared I could see him no more in this dark wrong World Just a street of sleepy houses, Reader. My Self alone on the snowy sidewalk in the cold Night. Nobody pursuing me after all. Which should have been a great Relief. In my Afeared State, I had perhaps imagined these Noises. Yet I did not feel Relief. Oh, Bunny , I thought, looking at this lonely street. Oh god, where did you go? Did you leave me? Am I finally completely alone in this Darkness?

There is always me , Pony whispered suddenly from my Pocket. Please don’t forget. Please know I love you. Please know I am here. And I worried, not for the first Time, that I was imagining Pony said this to me, just as I’d imagined being chased. Because I so desperately needed to hear these Words in this Moment, Reader. Because I so desperately needed a Friend.

Twas then I saw him.

Bunny.

Perched regally before the front steps of a dark house up ahead.

A tall house, twas. Glowing a pale Purple, or so it seemed beneath this Sky, beneath this Moon that now appeared between the Clouds. Bunny, I whispered. And he turned to me, his Eyes still very bright, a Blue I could see glowing even in the Dark.

Here , said Bunny’s Body to my Body, making my Pelt tingle, making the Hairs there rise. Then he hopped to the gate beside the house and disappeared through the slats.

No Trespassers said a little Sign with cozy lettering on this Gate Beware of Dog said another Yet what could I do but follow?

A Garden, Reader. A Garden is where I found my Self when I followed Bunny through the gate. So pretty even in the Snow I could smell its Life pulsing far beneath the Frost. Everywhere you looked were climbing Vines and the spiky Stems of what were once Roses. All along its Fence, Strawberry and Raspberry and Blackberry Bushes, barren now. And a very small white house in the Corner of the Garden. Like a Cottage or a Shed, I thought. It gave me a funny Feeling to look at, this Shed. A quickening of my Pulse. A Cold in my Blood And yet twas pretty shining under the Moonlight

Bunny , I whispered, why have you come here?

But alas, there was no sign of Bunny anymore. He had disappeared Only Feetprints, Reader. The tiny Feetprints of Bunny turning Circles in the shining Snow quite like a Fairy Tale. Murder Fairy used to love to read me such Stories, they were her Favorites. Because they were about Witches and Fairies just like her, she said. And there was Magic too. Just like you , she said. Me? I said. Oh yes , she said, you are very much of that Other World . And she pointed to an Illustration of a Forest full of sly-eyed Creatures. Perhaps this was why I felt the Cold in my Blood. Because the wintry Garden, the little Shed, the Bunny Prints, all felt like a Fairy Tale to me. And though Fairy Tales have Wondrous Happenings , they also have Violent Happenings too Feetprints often led to Danger, I knew. To Witches and Ogres and such Yet they were so pretty that I was dazzled to follow Enchanted, as is often in the case in Fairy Tales I followed them until they suddenly stopped and were replaced by some bigger Feetprints. Human-looking. As though Bunny, in mid Hop, had suddenly become another kind of Being. Hurriedly, I followed the larger Prints, quite forgetting my Fear. They led me to the dark Shed in the Corner of the Garden. Right to its red front door where they stopped abruptly, as though Bunny had gone through the door, how curious. I noticed the windows of the Shed were lit up dimly as though someone inside were making a Fire. Perhaps Bunny himself. Perhaps this was the Way Back of which Leonard spoke. The Cold grew in my Body. Why did this inner Cold grow when the lighted windows and the shining Feetprints drew me in so? I could not say then. Twas another Feeling . Which I ignored. Bunny was my Compass, my North Star, and I must follow him to the very End of his Journeyings. I could not return to the Poets for I had murdered their God Also I did not care to be their Muse anymore Certainly, I could never return to my Keepers, to their Revision Just seeing their shining Hairs and hungry Eyes made me want to run and never cease running. Of course I wanted to return to Jonah. But Jonah favored another World, a World where I increasingly sensed I didn’t belong Had never belonged. A Human World full of Pain and Sorrow and endless Pining and Ambition and trying to take down the Moon in a Manny Script. I did not want to be in this World any longer Could not breathe there, twas not my Air. But in what World did I belong, Reader?

Perhaps this door would lead me there.

Twas darker Within than it had looked Outside. As my Eyes adjusted, I discerned a dank room lit by a ring of small Fires. A scent of burning Flowers and Leaf permeated the Air. I heard a Music composed mostly of Strings, which the Mind Witch favored, and which should have been a Warning, Reader. Which should have made me run Miles away. But I dismissed it. I was so desperate. So broken in my own Soul. And curious. Very curious too. In the center of the room, I saw now, there sat an old Woman. Cross-legged on the floor. Eyes quite closed. Long Goldy Hairs streaked with Silver. She wore a glittery Tunic like the Mind Witch. Her Eyelids were fluttering as though she were lost in Dreamings both blissful and painful. I have known such Dreamings And in her lap sat Bunny. Bunny , I whispered. But Bunny only blinked at me now. He seemed in a Trance. Quite happy, though she was holding him there. Stroking his long Ears. Whispering Words I could not discern, what was she whispering to him? It was putting him in this Trance State where he could no longer communicate with me. Where he no longer appeared to even recognize me, Reader, I was a Stranger to him. Bunny, what is she whispering to you? I saw that at her Feets were a bundle of fresh Rose Petals and Freesia. My mouth watered at the mound of Petals, Reader. Perhaps while she and Bunny were dreaming, I could have myself a Meal

Quietly I made my way into her Ring of Fires. Quietly I sat before the Woman, whose Eyes remained closed. A small room, twas. With only a table and chair in the Corner. On the table, a pad of Paper and some Pencils. A Lappy Top, the sight of which made me slightly afeared Still, I reached for some Petals Delicious So fresh and sweet and peppery, I gorged myself a little on her Bounty, Reader, and choked

Twas then she opened one Eye.

The look on her Face, Reader, when she saw me, sitting crossed-legged as she was, choking on her Flowers. Tears fell from her Eyes almost instantly.

Strangely, they fell from my Eyes too.

She looked at me through this Veil of Tears. “It is Alive,” she murmured.

Alive? I looked at Bunny in her Arms, his Eyes were very bright now, practically glowing in the Dark. The Woman stared at me like I was the most incredible Dreaming.

“It returns to me at last,” she whispered. “It manifests.” She stared up at her Ceiling as though speaking to S omeone there. I looked too but there was No One on her Ceiling, Reader When I looked back at her, she was shaking her Head in Wonderment at me.

What returns to you? I wondered. What manifests? But I found I could not speak. Something had happened to my Tongue, Reader. Almost as if the Petals had made it numb or was it the Woman herself, her violet Eyes now fixed on me.

Now she turned to the Bunny, still sitting in her Arms. “But what of the Violence?” she asked him. “Surely there is no Creation without Destruction, is there?” She was asking Bunny as though he might answer her. She looked back at me, Reader, that Hunger in her Eye.

“Tell me your Name.”

“Aerius,” I whispered. When she asked for Words, I could give them, it seemed.

“He speaks, he speaks. The Reality insists upon itself.” She smiled. “Aerius,” she nodded. “Of course. Both of the World and not of the World. And he is full of Sorrow. His Heart breaks. He is wounded, is he not?”

I nodded. For I was wounded, Reader For my Heart did break Though I did not feel it right to share with this Woman, I could not help my Self. She had a Power greater than the Poets, greater than my Keepers, greater than even the Mind Witch herself. A Way of directly drawing secret Truths from me that I did not wish to give away.

“Of course he is,” the Woman nodded with me. “He is a most beautiful Wound. Aching for the Tap.” She smiled.

Who are you? I wanted to ask her, but felt I could not move my Mouth now. Are you another Witch of the Mind?

“I am Mother,” she said, as though hearing the Question in my Head. Definitely a Mind Witch. “Mother is what you may call me.”

“Mother,” I repeated. Though I wanted to run, I was frozen, Reader. Her violet Eye had a kind of paralyzing Effect. A cold Fire spread through my Body, pinning me there on the floor as she drew closer, marveling at my Face. What she called the Beautiful Wound of me. How marvelous I would be to Tap. She had not Tapped in some time, she said. She’d felt so dried up, barren. The Marrow of her Soul had been sucked dry by her Students, those little unrelenting Vampires. Though I did not know what Mother was talking about, I nodded along. “But here you are,” she said hopefully, crawling toward me on her Knees.

I nodded, very afeared now

“I am so humbled,” she whispered. Though she did not look humbled, Reader. She looked in fact, quite emboldened. Crawling ever closer to me in this Ring of Fires. “I will never again question,” she said, crouching down before me. “And he bears the Mark of the Crystal Thief,” she gasped, looking down at my Forearm, the horned Rabbit drawn in ink. “A sign, a sign.” She wanted to touch my Face, I knew, but she was afeared to. Lest I might disappear, vanish under her Hands. I knew this Feeling. She did not yet know if I was Real or if she was imagining Things. At last, she reached out her Hand, so tremulously, to touch my Shoulder—

Twas then we heard the Sound of Boot Crunches in the Snow outside. The Swishing of Trenchy Coats. The Poets. Their deep Voices calling distantly. “Lenny, Lenny!”

“Fuck,” she hissed. “Interruptions!”

“Lenny, are you there?” But they did not call my Name, Reader. I wanted to scream, I am here! In the Shed with Bunny!

“Silence,” Mother told me, putting her finger to her Lips. And twas like my own Lips were suddenly sealed, like she had cut out my Tongue. Gathering Bunny into her Arms once more, she rose and left the Shed, closing the red door behind her with a click that said stay. The Moment she was gone, I could move again. I ran to the single window, open to let in the Night Air, concealing my Self in the dark Shadows lest Mother or anyone Outside see me. Peering through the glass, I saw the Poets standing in her snowy Garden like wilted Bats. Jonah was not with them

“Gentlemen,” Mother said, holding Bunny close to her Chest. “This is an unexpected Surprise. What brings you here so late?”

‘We’re sorry to bother you. It’s just that…” They broke off, looking at each other.

“ What ?”

“Leonard Coel has gone missing,” Gunnar said at last.

Mother did not reply. I could not see her Face, shrouded as it was in the Shadows of the Winter’s Night. She only continued to stroke Bunny by the Ears, which he appeared to quite enjoy from my vantage point. Her Silence seemed to say, Continue .

“We were having dinner with him at the Bistro, you see,” the Leader began, stammering. I had never seen him look so flustered. “And all was going just fine, just fine. He ordered the Steak, was drinking Scotch. We were complimenting him on his most brilliant Reading. Then he went outside for a Cigarette and…did not come back.”

“We waited until the Bistro closed,” Matthias said. “We had no choice but to eat his Steak lest it grow cold. And to order more Food and Drink otherwise they would not have let us stay as long as we did.”

“Meanwhile, one of us looked all around for him,” Gunnar said pointedly.

“But we could find no Trace,” the Leader said sadly. “Except this.” And he held up the Immortal’s Scally Cap. “We found this in the Park.”

“Twas like he just vanished into the Dark,” Colby said nervously. When the Poets got nervous, I recalled, they rhymed.

“And he was supposed to offer us Feedback.” They held up their Manny Scripts. Mother glanced at these crumpled Bundles gripped in the Hand of each Poet. I felt her Soul shudder. “I see,” she whispered.

“He said he was looking quite forward to reading them.”

“Did he?” Mother smiled at Bunny as though they were enjoying a private Joke. She scratched his Ear.

“We can’t imagine that he just disappeared when he still had to give us Feedback.”

“Of course not,” she said. “How could you ever imagine that?”

“We wondered if perhaps something had happened to him.”

“In fact, we think he may have wandered off with a Friend of ours,” Gunnar said, though the Others attempted to shh him.

“A Friend?”

“He has also disappeared, you see. And he may be dangerous.”

“Really? And who is this dangerous Friend?” Mother sounded amused, but her Interest was piqued.

“Our Muse,” they whispered in one Voice.

And Mother laughed. “Yes, that’s exactly right. He has run away with your Muse.”

They looked at her as if they did not understand.

“Boys,” Mother said. “You needn’t worry. Leonard Coel is here among us.” And she stroked Bunny’s Ears, which twitched and twitched.

“He is?”

“Yes, yes, he came home a little while ago. But he doesn’t wish to be disturbed at the Moment, I’m afraid. He’s busy manifesting, you see. Exploring his Animal Past and such. Being with you all was just so inspirational to him that he is currently in another State of Consciousness entirely.”

The Poets looked at each other. They did not appear relieved. “But what about our Manny Scripts?”

“We have polished them up.”

“We have been getting them ready for weeks ,” the Leader murmured.

“One cannot ignore the dictates of Inspiration, Joaquin,” Mother said to him. “The Call of the Wild must be heeded, as you all know from your own Dalliances with your…dangerous Friend, the Muse . Now if you will excuse me, it is quite late. And I am actually working on something new my Self.”

Their Eyes glazed over at the Thought of yet more Fiction in the World. “Cool,” they lied. “May the Muse be with thee.” They bowed and turned away with a Swish of their Trenches, a rustle of Pages. Trudged off morosely into the Night.

“I hope you’ll come to my Showcase this Spring,” Mother shouted after them. “I didn’t think I’d have anything to show, but Inspiration has struck this Night for me as well as Leonard. Landed in my Lap so to speak.” And she smiled at the Shed. “Must be something in the Air.”

The Poets stopped then. Frowned. Gunnar turned to look back at the Shed. For a moment, I wondered if he saw me in the window. But he did not.

“In the Air,” they echoed wistfully.

And with that, they left the Garden. Mother watched them go, still stroking Bunny’s Ears. And then she whispered to him, I heard the Whisper. All down my Pelt, Reader. “A close One. A very close One, Lenny. But I covered for you,” she said. “Me, the Fiction . You’re welcome.”

Lenny?

The Rabbit’s Ears twitched more nervously.

“And just think,” she said, “at least you don’t have to read their Poet Tree now. There is a bright Side, isn’t there, to the Rabbit Life? The Animal Past , as you so often said.” She laughed and turned back to the Shed, her violet Eye catching mine through the window. Twas an Eye far more hungry than all the Eyes of my Keepers and the Poets combined, Reader All’s Child’s Play compared to the Hunger I saw there. To what was bent toward me now, still stroking the trembling Rabbit in her Arms.

P A R T T H R E E

W E

Bunny, we’d like to pause just for a sec here, k?

First of all, Hi.

How are you?

Still sitting comfortably in your chair? Enjoying the ropes (we jest)? Still following our poor monstrous boy into his darkest night of the soul? Oh we hope so. And we actually think you have been, Bunny, by your face! You look riveted (and not just by ropes!), gagged (and not just by a literal gag!). And also like you’ve been, you know, crying a lot. Your one eye that we can see (will you ever stop hiding behind your hair, Bunny?) looks wild with emotion. Are you connecting with his journey? Is it touching your dark twisted heart? Well, let’s just set the book down for a minute, k? We’ll keep the axe where it is, of course, the blade right at your throat where it belongs. We’re deep in the wee hours of our story now, by the way. We’re deep, too, in the wee hours of this night. Sometimes it feels like the dawn will never break, doesn’t it?

We bet it feels like that for you right now.

Now we should say we’re aware that we’re not always coming off so great in these pages we’re reading to you, Bunny. Still, we wanted to show you the Source material. Wanted you to hear it all from the horse’s mouth (the rabbit’s mouth?), so committed we are to authenticity, to giving voice. And it really does look, by your tear-stained face and trembly body, like it’s striking a chord. We have to admit that pleases us. We’re enjoying these tears of yours as artists , you know? What we live for really, we do. We’ve shed one or two of our own tonight, trust.

But at this point? We feel we should interject with a little interlude of our own, k, Bunny? Lest you think we’re the fucking monsters he paints us to be. Our boy exaggerates, of course he does. He’s a Fiction after all, isn’t he? Our most beloved Fiction, but a Fiction nonetheless. And though we forgive him for his many lies (just like we’d forgive our own future child for spitting in our face one day), we do need to supplement his narrative here. Say some words on our behalf about where we were at this particular juncture. Both in our minds but also in our hearts, Bunny.

Which by then were really one mind, one heart.

And so we’ll tell this next part as one voice. For verisimilitude. For effect as it were. One voice from four mouths ever shifting, just like the old days. Remember those old days, Bunny? Maybe it’s the magic of this attic or perhaps the transformative power of story (ha!) but we feel we’ve sort of become One now again in the telling, isn’t that lovely? We’ll pass the axe around as we tell, how’s that? Just to, you know, make it more fun for you, our captive audience. Put our masks back on and turn out the lights. For vibes, Bunny. So you’ll never know who’s telling, where the axe is going next.

Oh but you’ll feel it.

That’s a promise.

1

Now where were we?

Oh yes.

Let’s go back a stitch in time, shall we? Back to that Hallow’s Eve, Aerius’s escape from our triangle window. If we can even call it an “escape,” Bunny. (We still call it the result of a certain person’s negligence, don’t we, Vik?) Of course, we were pissed that he left us. Hurt too, Bunny. We felt empty and lost and so terribly unmoored in the world, we really did. And also just, like really sad. That night we searched every last fucking garden and field and stretch of grass in this hellscape town, didn’t we? Screamed his name (most lovingly) into the dark until we basically had no throats left.

Because he must surely be so lost and afraid out there.

Because how would he even survive in the cold wide world without our loving care?

There was also, of course, the matter of Allan (Aerius wanting to kill him and such) which weighed on us too, sure. Though not as heavily, we confess, as other concerns. Like who would feed him his dandelion-pixy stix diet now? How might he procure his daily Woolf? Or just how mundane the world suddenly seemed to our eyes without him, Bunny. Kyra’s attic lost its glittery look, the dust became just fucking dust. The sun was just the sun and the moon was just the moon and everything seemed to wittle back down to itself so that we were living in the actual world, in fucking Reality as Coraline called it, and it was horrible. A most unmagical, terrible twenty-four hours.

But then?

Vik found that other ugly bunny in the rose garden the next day, didn’t you, Bunny?

Trying to atone, we guess, for losing Aerius. (But you can’t atone for the unforgiveable, Bunny, as you well know). “Time to move on,” she said, hopefully. “Try another.”

We looked at this ugly Bunny with his eye patch, munching his pink petals.

We had our doubts, of course, that we could ever find Love again. Took him back to the attic with the heaviest of hearts. Because some of us weren’t fucking ready to move on, k?

And we did wonder, we worried , could we even do it again?

Back in Kyra’s attic, it was with little faith (and in Coraline’s case, several French 75s) that we lit the candles and incense and such. Stood in a circle and such, surrounding the ugly bunny. Watching him munch those never-ending petals so very shamelessly. He was making serious eye contact with us the whole time. Our thighs quivered a little, we’ll admit. We felt our hearts open slightly, like the legs of a whore. A violent trembling overtook our bodies, Bunny, and Bunny, we knew, was responsible. We closed our eyes.

A sound like the end of the fucking world.

When we opened them, we were blood-spattered, covered in animal gristle, and Kyra’s curtains were on fire, weren’t they? We were screaming most dreamily and there was a gentle knock knock at the door. And? And a beautiful man in a dark blue suit waiting on the other side. He had an eye patch quite like the one he’d had in bunny form.

“Hello,” he said, “is this uh, intro to philosophy?”

“Fuck yes,” we think we whispered.

And after that?

Well, we were sort of on a roll.

How many rabbits did we fulminate that November with the power of our collective mind? Don’t really know, Bunny. Kyra was our counter but she sort of lost track once we started doing four at a time, k? The trauma of loss had brought us even closer together, you see, and this resulted in many a lovely Manifestation. Or, as Vik liked to jokingly call it, a Man Fest (being the crudest among us, she enjoyed such reductive word play).

We called it fucking Literature.

Were the explosions upsetting at first? Of course they were, Bunny, innards are ick. Hence the aprons and bunny masks Coraline bought us online, which were really protective wear. Hence our painting a bright blue sky on the attic walls complete with cumulus cloud. Because there is no creation without destruction, no heaven without blood, Else always reminded us of this as we waited, splattered with rabbit, for that knock on the door. How the sound of this knock thrilled us, Bunny! How we wish to exist forever in the holy space between the gristly explosion and the wondrous knock! That moment when, bloody and grinning so hard our faces hurt, we’d skip to the door and there he was waiting on the other side. Beautiful as Brando maybe (in his heyday, obvi). Smiling at us—a little vacantly, perhaps, but still. Always dressed in that dark blue suit and pale blue shirt that matched his eyes, so lovely-strange. (We did not know whose soul was responsible for this eye-clothing combination for no one has fessed up to this day.) Their black leather gloves freaked some of us out a little at first, sure. But Else convinced us to see such recurring features as our haunting artistic stamp, quite like Munch’s I. Vik was more freaked out by how polite they were, weren’t you, Bunny? They were always saying such nice words to us, it’s true. Hello. How are thee? All my heart is yours. You burn too bright for this world. How amazing that you are so super talented and single . Staring at us so worshipfully with those pool water eyes. “Hot,” she admitted, “but creepy, Bunny.”

“ Not creepy,” Coraline snapped. “ Better .”

Way fucking better, she insisted, than the aloofness of Aerius. It made us more civilized certainly. We did not need to tie them to a chair, for instance, no, no, for they were quite willing to perch beside us on the fainting couch and discuss, at length, which Bronte sister or Austen heroine they believed we most resembled. You are Emily sometimes, they mused, Charlotte other times. Sexy all the time. Not at all like Aerius. Not literally fucking running from us, Bunny, and screaming. Instead, so well-bred. So appreciating what we had to offer. Tell me everything , they would entreat. Fascinating, they would marvel, even if we said nothing at all. Thou art wise as thou art totally beautiful. They actually wanted to hear our playlists, Bunny, k? Begged for us to play Taylor again, to play Lana again, to play Stevie and Charli and Chappell not to mention the whole of Bush and Heart. This is my very favorite , one of us might say of “These Dreams,” and they said Oh, my very favorite too. May we have this slow dancing ? And they rocked with us in the attic to the watery music until we were quite seasick. They said, Love is a smoke and is made with the fume of sighs . They said, You are so fucking beautiful it actually hurts me physically to look at you. Ouch , they said, looking at us still. Ouch, ouch. They said, You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you , k? And we said Really? And they said Omg, totally . May we fuck you ? Yes, that’s right, Bunny, they asked to fuck. You got this part so wrong (you got SO MANY things so wrong) in your little novel, by the way. They weren’t afraid of sex with us, not at all, k? In fact, make no mistake: they begged for it just as fervently as they begged for more Bush on the Bose. And naturally, o ur answers varied, Bunny.

Yes, please fucking fuck me and let me also fuck you?

You may fellate my Aura until it turns the color of Primroses.

How comfortable are you with an entity orgy?

You may spoon me and should this result in a kind of dry fucking at some point in the wee hours, I am not averse to this. I am in fact wildly consensual.

But there was of course, an issue with that in the end. The fucking, Bunny, dry and otherwise. For as it turned out, as we quickly discovered, one by one by one, none of our Manifestations were quite equipped for that. Anatomically speaking. Where there should have been a dick there was only a small smooth bump, quite like a Ken doll’s. As you well know.

Was that disappointing to us?

Yes.

Yes it was fucking disappointing, Bunny.

And therein lies the rub so to speak.

Aerius, you see, was quite well equipped that way. Aerius also did not have small paws for hands. Aerius, our Happy Accident, came into the world ungloved and beautifully fucking five fingered. And?

And quite significantly dicked , as one of us loves to mention.

(Never lets us forget in fact.)

No, Bunny, she never had sex with him as we said, despite her vulgar boasting. None of us did, we’re not rapists , k? We only know because we peeked once or twice. Maybe a dozen or so times. But what we glimpsed in that peeking. Twas enough to launch a thousand ships in our hearts. Fuck Helen of Troy and her alleged face, Bunny. Aerius’s cock, that was a true masterpiece.

The most genius thing we’ve ever made. Fact.

But speaking of facts , we had to remind ourselves of others. He ran away from us. Did not wish to slow dance with us. Did not enjoy Touching Tuesdays or Prom Thursdays. Did not fuck us or even want to make out with us. Whimpered at the mere thought of it, Bunny. Screamed as we recall (fondly now). And yet: he could fuck us. That could was always hanging in the air, Bunny, like so much untouchable glitter. The anatomical possibility so to speak. His hands, though they never willfully touched us, when they did, by accident perhaps, well, we still shiver to recall it.

It was like being physically grazed by God.

Like our whole body became a kind of glitter, sparkling and weightless.

A few weeks later, we found ourselves with a basement filled with what we liked to call our Darlings . Or Hybrids, Else much preferred this term that captured the experimental nature of our enterprise, both literary and scientific. Drafts, Kyra insisted , because they were absolutely a kind of writing, Bunny, only fucking better, going beyond the LePen. But though they were all compelling in their way (we cannot stress this enough), and though we were conjuring magnificently (had it down to an arty science essentially), we were still somewhat dissatisfied (shall we say?) with the Results. We pined for that glittery feeling. For the world to feel imbued with Magic as it had with Aerius. For the Sun to be more than itself once more.

Hence the axe.

Which, as you know, was ultimately necessary, Bunny.

That’s the curse of being a Creative, isn’t it?

Which brings us, of course, to the night we’ll never forget. End of November. We’d decided to take four of our Darlings out on a lovely dinner date. Test drive them , as Vik would say, which we did love to do. Fyorg, Rainbow, Armand and Deviant we believe were their names, though who fucking knows, Bunny. Hard to keep track after a certain point, it really is. Which we were already past, we’re afraid to say. Definitely Fyorg was there though. The one-eyed boy we’d conjured after Aerius. (He’s sort of important, k? There’s a little foreshadowing for you.)

We’d mostly gone to Mini in the past, but Coraline suggested we branch out that night and go to the Bistro. She’d had a lovely lunch there with her mother back in September, she said, before she’d lost her soul to this. Okay, Bunny, we said, sure, we’re down. The Bistro was surprisingly very accommodating of our special needs, the servers most understanding, almost as if they’d dealt with such occurrences before. They were happy to give our boys plates of flowers, for example, make them Shirley Temples in plastic to-go cups with lids so as to minimize spill.

But the date itself was a disaster. Our Darlings were listless before their foliage. Picking at the petals half-heartedly. Complimenting us quite half-heartedly too.

“Your hair is so hairy,” they offered.

“Love your whatever,” they said idly.

The conversation was, shall we say, wanting . There was a kind of electricity in the air too that had not been there before. “And what did you make of The Waves ?” Coraline pressed. We’d left our beloved book in the attic for them to ponder, along with a sticky note that said Dinner Convo Material

“Make of it?” Rainbow said and looked worried. Continually staring out the window at the dark. The others, we noted, were doing the same.

“Um, what are you seeing out there?” Kyra asked. Worried, always, that the police were on their way you see, that we were going to be arrested imminently for breaking all the laws of the natural world. But when we looked, we saw nothing, Bunny. “What what? ” And they would not say. It was insolent and we did make a note of it with our LePens. How they usually feared the sight of these LePens, Bunny. Whimpered at the sound of their scratching. (The LePen was a kind of nonviolent axe, really. It had a wonderfully pacifying effect.) But on this night they paid them no mind. So consumed by some outside happening we could not see. Perhaps their rabbit vision continued on even in human form, which was a question fascinating to ponder.

We often wondered where the rabbit ended and the man began.

And then Fyorg surprised us all by suddenly standing up from his chair. Pointing out at the dark and screaming. “He!” he shouted. “He, he, he!” His one blue eye so wild with seeing.

He? What the fuck is he seeing out there ? we asked ourselves in the hive.

But all we saw when we looked out the window were our own reflections, four women with so shining hair and very haunted eyes. Four rabbit-men sitting around us, eating their petals worriedly now.

Defective , we concurred on the drive home (in Else’s Jag, obvi). Absolutely, no fucking question. We conferred about this with a series of glances. Rear view mirror to side view mirror, all of our eyes meeting there, nodding soberly beside our rattled Darlings who were still screaming all the way home . Only one thing to do in this case , we silently agreed. Alas, they left us no choice, Bunny. Screaming at windows. Not knowing what to make of Woolf. If they couldn’t go out in public, then what was the point of this exercise, really?

When we got to Kyra’s, Coraline told her, Bunny, time to do your magic. Take them up to the attic one by one by one and do what needs be done, please. Meanwhile we’ll watch TV in the living room, k? We’ll keep the others distracted until it’s their turn to meet their fate. Maybe start with Rainbow, whose screams were really starting to drive us fucking insane in the Jag.

But Kyra just stood there in her pretty red cloak, hesitating, didn’t you, Bunny? Didn’t love her job as Executioner anymore, you see, now that it had become more full time. “Can’t we just drive them out to a field or something?” she said. Totally resisting her artist’s calling.

“Um, no, Bunny.” We’d tried this just the other week with a couple of them. Waved goodbye as they turned their scared circles in the corn or whatever, their blue suits suddenly looking too big for their bodies. “Not these ones,” we said, turning on the television. “Too screamy.” The boys settled at our feet, chewing their twigs, hypnotized by the TV’s light, its bright colors.

“What about Elsinore’s basement?” Kyra said.

“We’re only putting the ones with potential in the basement, remember?” we yawned, clicking the remote. The Bachelorette was on, thank fucking god.

The Bachelorette was always on those days, strangely.

“I don’t know if I can do this tonight,” Kyra murmured. She looked tired, it’s true. We were tired too, of course, Bunny. But we fucking rallied.

“Of course you can, Bunny,” Else told her gravely. “Because you must. This is the Work and we all must play our parts.” She gripped her diamond dagger pendant and smiled.

“We believe in you, Bunny,” we all whispered.

“I can’t,” Kyra whined. But she was already putting on her kitchen bitch apron with its fake string of pearls. Taking her axe from off its hook on the attic door. Saying to Rainbow, Come upstairs with me where I have many a pixie stick. She had all manner of dandelions up there too, she said, untouched by the winter’s frost. Not to mention the very best Shirley Temple and wouldn’t he love a sip? Yes , he said. They always believed her, Bunny, it was kind of heartbreaking. Followed quite willingly. Didn’t even seem to notice the axe behind her back that she took barely any pains to conceal. Which supported Else’s hypothesis that defective Darlings want the axe, really, they do. Kyra clicked shut the door and shortly thereafter the screaming began. The sound of axe meeting flesh and/or bone. The sound of axe being itself, really. The other Darlings grew more nervous beside us, understandably so. Squirming in their seats. Tugging on their silk ties. Trying to smile at us, but those smiles were like ticking bombs.

Murder?

Oh we don’t really care for that term, Bunny. Doesn’t even seem fitting in this case, right? More like hitting delete a lot. Literally. Because you have to kill your darlings, don’t you? We are instructed to do this all the time in Workshop, are we not? Isn’t that what all the writing manuals, both lame and elevated, tell us? Isn’t that what all the famous Fictions are quoted as saying? Well, fine. Exactly . Ultimately we were just taking that very sensible writerly advice. And it’s not like we killed all of them, Bunny. Some we kept, as you know, sure. Put in a bottom drawer so to speak (aka Else’s basement). Telling ourselves maybe with some revision or time or both, we might revisit. Which was kind of a lie. After our experience with Aerius, we were a bit sour on revision, that whole humiliating fucking enterprise. Far more violent, far less merciful, truth be told. And anyway, there was only so much room in Else’s basement after all.

There was only so much room in our hearts too, you know?

Did the sounds above our heads bother us somewhat? The blood, dark and vital, that sometimes trickled down the steps from the crack in the attic door? It did a little, Bunny, though it was astonishing how quickly we grew accustomed to it. Used the time to decompress, really, to journal. Reflect on the Work and its purpose. But on this night, the noise actually did irk us a smidge. There were four Darlings to kill, you see, so the ceiling was practically vibrating with Bunny’s Violences. We contemplated wearing earplugs or better yet, noise-cancelling headphones, but Bunny had insisted we listen. That we always hear the screams and the swoosh and the all-important crack. So important for our Growth as Artists, she said. Okay, Bunny, fine . We killed time instead by watching The Bachelorette . Though we couldn’t really hear what was going on between Brindy and her many tuxedo’d candidates over the screams, we had a few ideas of who she might eliminate next. Wished she could eliminate more than one candidate per episode really. Cut to the fucking chase, get to Spencer, his sly smile and cruel-kind eyes. Vik asked Deviant, sitting at her feet, who he might eliminate, just to, you know, make conversation. Or to fuck with him, you never knew with Vik. Or perhaps she, like all of us, was genuinely curious about his perspective, Bunny. Our Darlings often got quite lost in The Bachelorette, as though it were a horror from which they could not turn away. Deviant, staring transfixed at the screen said no one, he would eliminate no one. “Or maybe she, ” he said, pointing at Brindy herself, looking so lovely in her red sequined strapless.

“ What? ” Coraline looked predictably horrified. “Why would you ever eliminate the Bachelorette herself?”

“I do not care for her bangs,” Deviant said. “Also she is a cunt.”

“ Cunt ?” Coraline clutched the ghost of her pearls. And how Vik blushed, slouched on her usual chaise longue. We knew of course that she, being a shameless bitch, had fed him this awful word, hadn’t you, Bunny?

“Cunt,” Deviant said again. “ Cunt cunt cunt ,” he sang.

“Oh look, Deviant,” Else said, “Bunny is calling for you to join her in the attic now. Looks like there are some treats up there just for you.”

And then there was only one Darling left. Fyorg. Beautiful, but from the moment he’d knocked on the door, he’d been a bit of an odd duck, Bunny. Rattling on about ravens and a philosophy class he was late for. About the nature of reality and what was for real. Asking if we had any jaeger which, no . Too bad we had to kill him, for aesthetically, we were quite drawn. He had a dreamily psychotic look to him. Very Christian Bale circa 2000. A little Elvish too, in The Lord of the Rings sense, Bunny, like he might be capable of eerie forest magic. Kyra liked to point out that he also looked a little like that missing frat boy, Tyler whatever, and didn’t we think so? No, Bunny, we didn’t. You’re imagining things , we lied. But he sort of did, it’s true. In certain lights. Which of us had been thinking of him during the conjuring, we wondered. Perhaps seen his posters, plastered all the over the school that morning, something of his face sinking into our subconscious? In any case it was really only the very mildest resemblance, Bunny. He really looked way more like Christian Bale meets a hot Scandi elf.

Fyorg was kneeling before the television, watching The Bachelorette quite rapt. Blowing bubblegum, his favorite sweet, sipping on his sippy cup. Vik sometimes added a shot of absinthe to their cups before the axe, sort of a send-off beverage. He had been the screamiest one at the Bistro but now he appeared quite calm. “Fyorg, are you enjoying the show?” Vik asked him, winking at us. Loving to poke the bear tonight and always.

“Nevermore,” he whispered staring at the screen.

“ Nevermore ?” we repeated.

“Nevermore,” he said again, shaking his head at the TV. “Watching this.”

Which, what the fuck? No Darling had ever insisted on a name before.

“You’re Fyorg ,” Coraline insisted like she was a child putting a rogue doll back in its place. And we felt funny, Bunny. Was he fucking with us?

“Nevermore’s too hot right now.” And he took off his leather gloves, throwing them over his shoulder.

“Too hot,” Vik whispered. “Definitely.” Fanning herself. We all stared at his naked hands, Bunny. Fleshy. Manly. Five fucking fingered. How had we not noticed this before?

Just then Kyra appeared from behind the attic door in her bloody apron. She looked exhausted, understandably. The axe, covered in so much blood now, quite limp in her so small hand. But she also looked beautiful as she always did post-kill, when she was deeply engaging the Work like this. Sinewy, we often complimented. Triceps and biceps like you wouldn’t fucking believe, Bunny, the definition was Madonna-level, so much so that some of us were a little jelly.

“Fyorg,” she whisper-sang. “Time to go up to Attic. To have a treat.”

But he kept staring at the TV. Brindy was making her choice now. A long-stemmed rose in her red-nailed hands. Her smile was sorry-not-sorry and a few tears shimmered prettily in her so cold eyes.

He shook his head. “Leave my loneliness unbroken.”

What, Bunny?

Then he noticed the axe in Kyra’s hand. Screamed and jumped behind the couch, oh dear. We sighed collectively, walked as one body to where he sat cowering behind a ficus. As though he wouldn’t be plainly visible there, Bunny. As though he could actually hide. (All these Bunnymen had a very skewed sense of their own physical proportions). We held him down most lovingly while Bunny made her slow way over, dragging her feet and the blade of axe along the floor which she sometimes did when she was super tired.

“Hurry up,” we hissed. “He’s strong! He’s wriggling in our hands!” Not that we were terribly worried, Bunny. There was no escape from the living room, we’d made sure of that. Hid all of the potential weapons. And bunnies, perhaps because they are natural prey, do not think to defend themselves anyway. Fyorg shook his head while Kyra raised her axe in the air.

“Not again!” he shouted. “Not again, not again! Please don’t kill me!”

Which was a strange utterance for him to make. Normally they didn’t scream like this, beg for their lives like this, and it was super traumatizing, Bunny. For us. What did he mean Not again? Perhaps just babble. More evidence that he was truly defective. We told ourselves we were growing as artists, this was the season of our flourishing, as we tightened our hold on his limbs, closing our eyes because most of us really don’t love violence, Bunny, we’re always closing our eyes at the blood part of any movie. We waited for her to finally strike, hit fucking delete, do it .

But she was hesitating now. “What do you mean, Not again ?” she said, her axe wavering over her head.

And Fyorg saw this wavering, Bunny, saw the hesitation on Bunny’s face and shouted: “KILL AERIUS!!! Kill the BUNNY MAN!!!!”

And just like that, Bunny dropped her axe.

2

“What did you just say?” Else whispered. Threateningly, Bunny. Her otherworldly voice suddenly a fucking growl. For truth be told we did not ever utter his name aloud back then. The name of our First Boy. First Draft. First Darling. First what the fuck ever. First Humiliation, Bunny, really, that’s what he was (though he still had our hearts) .

“You know Aerius?” Coraline asked him, still gripping his limbs tight.

He nodded. He didn’t fucking know, we thought. How could he possibly?

“Aerius is the one with the axe,” he said.

We looked at each other. What the fuck, Bunny?

But he was staring off into space now. “Aerius is the one who jumps to many jumping songs,” he said dreamily. “And I jumped with him.”

He looked at us sadly. “Aerius is the one who kills.”

“Kills?”

“ And my soul from out that shadow…shall be lifted nevermore,” he whispered. “ For real.” And then he burst into tears.

We felt cold then. The creeps, oh god, we had them. All down our bodies, Bunny. We looked at this defective Darling. Drunk from sippy cup absinthe. Still staring tearily at Brindy on Elimination Night. There were two suited men waiting to learn their fates, but she only had one rose left. “This is so hard,” she was saying, and we thought, Yes. It’s very hard, Bunny. The work of elimination takes its toll, absolutely. Else shook Fyorg’s shoulders most violently, What are you saying what are you fucking saying , and then he just began to babble, Bunny. About reality and philosophy and how he once had a pet raven but it wasn’t for real. He burst into tears again. Quite inconsolably. We patted his hulking shoulder, said soothing words. All the more reason to kill him, we thought, saying as much to Kyra in the hive mind. Finish him off, he’s making no sense. And obviously suffering, Bunny. So put him out of his misery, k?

But Kyra was staring at him, interested now. Curious even though it killed the cat and we telepathically reminded her of this. Still, she asked: “Do you really know Aerius, Fyorg?”

“Nevermore,” the boy corrected, staring at her with his one eye. He nodded.

Kyra pulled us into a huddle then. “What the fuck? Is he our conscience or something? Fucking with us? Or does he really actually know something?”

“I don’t know but I like being fucked with,” Vik said. “They don’t fuck with us nearly enough.”

“ Of course he doesn’t know anything,” Coraline snapped. “Now can we please just delete ?” She was extremely cut throat with the Darlings when they got screamy, weren’t you, Bunny?

Fyorg meanwhile was crouched behind the ficus, still worriedly watching The Bachelorette from between the leaves. “Nevermore,” he kept whispering.

We all looked at Else, who was staring intently at Fyorg, her crystal dagger shimmering quite like her eyes. “I wonder,” she murmured. On the screen, the eliminated man was hate-hugging Brindy now, wishing her luck on her journey. His bleached smile full of sting.

“ Nevermore, ” Else said, smiling, “do you know where Aerius is?”

He nodded again. Our hearts froze in our bodies, Bunny. We blushed furiously at the thought of him. Those lovely cold eyes, that accidental fucking touch.

“Where?” we asked as one voice, calm as calmest seas, not at all betraying the roiling desperation beneath.

“There,” he said, pointing out the living room window at the black, just like he’d done at the Bistro. We peered out at this black. Seeing nothing, Bunny. The silhouettes of surrounding houses. Our neighbors inside probably wondering what the fuck. But again, probably not. Art project , Bunny explained to them once after the first axing. We’re experimenting with different methodologies. If you ever hear screaming up there, that’s all that is . And the neighbors smiled. Understood or pretended to. Fine art students demand such indulgence. They thought we were such kind, well-mannered girls. Lovely , they often said, seeing us skip by, gathering twigs for our Darlings.

And we agreed, we were. Fucking lovely.

Into the cold, cold night, we allowed Fyorg/Nevermore, to lead us. He was moving pretty quickly, Bunny. Practically skipping down the cold snowy streets so that we had to skip too. To skip after him brought such a wild smile to our faces even though this was very serious, this was so high stakes. We tried not to smile or God forbid, laugh. For if we were to laugh now it might break something like a spell, and then it might all disappear. Our skipping Darling. This night suddenly imbued with a magic we thought we’d lost forever. This tenuous path back to our first boy. Bunny brought her axe just in case. Not that we would do any killing out here in the open, no, no. But just that this was sort of a dangerous city, Bunny, as you yourself observed in your little novel. Especially after a certain hour. Lots of maniacs out there, you know? Lots of psychos and such. So much violence and some of it so terribly unnecessary. The recent beheadings on campus and at the truck stop, for instance. Which we were certain had nothing at all to do with Aerius. Mostly certain. Okay, so we were a little divided on this question, truth be told. Kyra, for one, really thought he might be involved. He did run away with our axe after all, she often reminded us. And she had to buy another online, which was annoying. But ultimately we simply did not think so, no. Because he came from us and we were lovely.

As has already been stated.

“Here,” our Darling said, stopping his skip at last. And we saw we were in a park, just across the street from the Bistro. We were standing, in fact, before a hole in the grass. Freshly dug. Quite like the one Vik had dug long ago in the rose garden with her so gross hands. We all crouched down and sniffed the earth. Oh Bunny, how the tears instantly stung our eyes as we sniffed. For we could smell him in the mud, yes, the spring flowers and grasses of him. The man and the animal. The manimal , as it were. Unmistakable. Like a bit of glitter in the air and we were intoxicated all over again. None of them had ever smelled quite like this. Quite so… forest-y. So of the earth, rich and sweet and deep. So… real . Yes. That was the word.

“Aerius,” we all whispered.

We looked at each other, wild-eyed and hunched by the hole. Our lovely dresses torn, our skins exposed to the snowy night, yet not even feeling the cold.

Fyorg/Nevermore, perhaps out of his own animal curiosity, bent down and sniffed the ground with us. His nose went rabbity, twitched. His tiny ears twitched too, as if recalling the memory of what they’d once been. Suddenly, he sat up on his haunches, or legs rather, looking round at the dark.

“Where is he? Where is he?” we begged desperately.

Down the dark and turny streets we ran with the moon high above us, and Fyorg/Nevermore racing ahead, openly hopping now like the animal he once was. We thanked God there was no one out and about to witness this, Bunny. Because they definitely would have been startled by the hopping man in his Brooks Brothers suit, his silky tie flapping backwards in the breeze he made. At this very late hour, it was too dangerous for most to be outside, even here, in what appeared to be a fairly nice neighborhood, that’s where he was leading us. It had a professorial Boomer vibe, Bunny. Stately houses, boastful oaks. Tibetan prayer flags hanging from eaves and so many Teslas glimmering ominously on the driveways. Wind chimes swaying in the night air making a familiar tinkling music. The sound told us we’d been here before, yes. This was Ursula’s street. Um, why are we —and then he stopped right in front of her very house.

We stared at her gothic turrets aimed sharply at the night sky. “What are we doing here?”

But he just pointed with his trembling human finger. His one eye wild with seeing. Seeing what?

“Aerius,” he whispered.

We looked at each other then. Should have axed him back home , we thought. Waste of time. Bullshit. When we could be watching another episode of The Bachelorette . See who Brindy eliminated next, our dresses splattered beautifully with the evening’s Work. Toasting her choice, whatever it was, with some well-earned bubbly. Watch the eliminated boy hate her quietly, even as he embraced her for the cameras. Going in for that vengeful boob crush (a final fuck you). Such a great show.

We were asking him, why have we stopped here? Why why why , when a little dog, a long-haired terrier, came bounding out of the pet door, barking his head off. He immediately raced toward Fyorg/Nevermore, who screamed and ran away. The dog bounded after him, barking more wildly now, like it sensed the animal in the man, that was all the dog saw. We watched them disappear howling ly into the dark, moving so fast that there was no human way to follow.

And then it was just us again. Standing on our teacher’s porch, amid two rabbit statues made of stone, were those always there? Looking up at that cold bitch of a moon.

What now?

A light on our faces suddenly. The front door open. Ursula standing in her winter smock the color of glittering snow crystals, her voice sounding surprised. “Girls? Is that you?”

“Oh my oh my,” she said. What were we doing out here? And was this blood on our clothes? Whatever happened? We looked at her, staring at us so kindly. Maybe a little impatiently too. Maybe even a little furious (it was very late, and we’d no doubt woken her up). But mostly just wondering what the fuck. And this curious-kindness in her eyes, it broke us, Bunny. Emotionally. Suddenly we felt as cold as we probably were. And helpless. And fucking lost.

We shivered collectively. And then? We sort of broke down quite embarrassingly. And everything—the house, Ursula, the snowy night—blurred into a twinkling snow creature. Who told us gently, gently to come inside.

And tell me.

Tell me everything.

3

Her living room looked especially witchy on this night, the air heady with incense and candle light and flower arrangements, each a kind of fragrant vaginal come hither. A bowl of clementines so very ripe they were on the verge of rot. A Norse music composed mostly of drums and chanting. Her pervy husband was nowhere in sight, thank god. Probably upstairs somewhere dreaming up more obscure poems that would ultimately be lost to Darkness. May he sleep forever , we thought. Forever and ever and ever , we thought, as we sipped the floral tea she’d made for us. Brewed in a black clay pot patterned with dancing rabbits, alarmingly long-eared. “Marigolds and dandelions,” she said. “Both fresh picked from my garden this summer, along with some rose petals and wild thyme, a most restorative concoction.”

“Yes,” we agreed, breathing in the steam. Which smelled of him. So potently. We almost expected him to suddenly manifest, for the steam to become flesh. Tears swelled behind our eyes again.

“All right now,” she said, stirring, “what’s this about, my dears? Tell me.”

My dears. Sitting before us on her lavender arm chair, smilingly waiting for our words. Yet distracted also, we noted. She kept staring out the window, at something in her back yard. What the fuck, Bunny?

“Um, are we… interrupting something?”

“I’m afraid I was in the middle of working. The Witching Hour being my hour, you see. But when I heard the knocking and saw the state of you, I couldn’t very well turn you away, could I? Compassion being my fatal flaw.” She smiled. “Now go on.”

“You’re going to think we’re crazy though,” Coraline whispered. Clutching her teacup like it was the only solid thing left in the fucking universe. Undermining our narrative, Bunny, before we’d even begun.

But Ursula just shook her head. “Please do remember that I went to Bennington. And I was a student here once myself. Long, long ago. An MFA candidate no less. Just like you. You’re safe with me.”

And it was funny but for the first time, we wondered if in fact we were safe, Bunny. Something about Ursula on this night, her energy. The witch of her was in the air everywhere. In the swirling smoke and the quivering candle flames and the floral tea steam. Alive in her voice and in her eyes, which mesmerized us. Tell me.

Else took it upon herself to speak for all of us, of course. Which, fine.

We let her hijack our collective narrative, Bunny, knowing that she must have her little God moments. Bit our lip as she grandly recounted f inding that first bunny in the rose garden. How he seemed to flirt with her (with us , hello?) so flagrantly—such a strangely flirty bunny, that first one. How she ( we , Bunny) turned its eyes an eerie blue with her (our!) embrace. How that hug got us dreaming, dangerously maybe. How he led us hopping back to our very own attic ( um, my attic, actually , Kyra interjected) and the happy sweaty accident we had there. The terrible violence and then the wondrous discovery, not so long after, in the garden behind Narrative Arts, of the creative Result. Standing among the dandelions in her very own nightdress and pearls ( my pearls, by the way, Coraline said).

We described him physically which brought fresh tears to our many eyes. And funny that Ursula had us repeat this description, Bunny. Several times. Asking follow up questions. “What color hair exactly ?” “ How tall roughly, in terms of inches?” We shared our Revision process, so painful to recall. He was so rough, you see. So raw. Wildly resistant to our various narrative and stylistic approaches. How probably we loved him too much. How he eventually ran away from us (we glared at Vik). Leaving us no choice but to—

“Sit down at your desks at last?” she offered. “Put pen to paper? Fingers to keys?”

“Explode more rabbits in the attic,” Vik whispered sadly. Yet shuddering with pleasure, as she always did, at the recollection of this Violence.

“I see.”

We shared our tender hopes of conjuring another just like him. Spoke of rabbit guts and bloody aprons and wondrous knocks on the door. Our desperate longing to return to the wild joy and even wilder despair of that first Happy Accident. The many rituals we’d made in the service of that. “ What rituals exactly?” she asked sharply. And then she had us name our conjuring tools, Bunny: the candles and incense and films and music and such. The smut salons in all their hot pink confessional wonder. The tight circle we made around Bunny’s body, our bodies and minds and hearts aligned and humming with desires like an engorged clit.

“And did it work?” she asked eagerly. Too eagerly, Bunny.

“We were able to conjure more, of course,” Else said. “Many more, in fact.”

“More of the same ,” Vik mumbled under her breath. Sort of bitchily, Bunny. Like it was one of our faults that we were always making “the same dickless dude in a suit,” as she put it. For the record, we did try , in our Conjurings, to go beyond boy creatures, by the way. Of course we fucking did, Bunny, our desire is not a monolith, despite the gross insinuations in your little novel. Sure we sometimes thought of girls (we thought of all manner of creatures, tbh). And yet. And yet, and yet, and yet: no matter how much we attempted, in our creative int entions, to push beyond certain… shapes , as it were, something inside us—or perhaps it was in Bunny, or the very nature of the magic itself—was spitting out this…okay, yes, this dickless man in finance type. And um, we didn’t know why, Bunny. We still don’t. Surely not our own desires, which were so very rich and varied and mysterious. A speculation worthy of its own story, perhaps.

Ursula smiled now. “ More of the same ,” she mused, repeating Vik’s cruel words. “And what does that mean?”

“It means none like him,” Coraline snapped, glaring at Vik.

“And what do you mean by none like him ?”

But we couldn’t very well tell our writing teacher that we couldn’t make a dick, Bunny. Or human hands. Or a soul. So we beat around the bush as it were.

“We’re artists,” Else prevaricated. “We just want to love what we make. And to make something that loves us. Is that so wrong?”

We looked up at Ursula now, so terribly vulnerable. Waiting for her to tell us, Absolutely not wrong. You are in fact the greatest geniuses I’ve ever known . But Ursula wasn’t looking at us at all anymore. She was looking through the window, at her writing shed. “Wrong?” she sighed.

“We just want him back,” Coraline pressed. Desperately, Bunny. Her hand was in her bloody dress pocket and she was licking the balm from her lips with slutty abandon now.

“We don’t even care anymore that he’s dangerous,” Kyra blurted. Then covered her little fucking loud mouth with both hands. Like Oops . But it was too late.

“Dangerous?” Ursula turned back to us.

And then we had no choice, Bunny. We told her, very quietly, about axe. How he had taken ours on his way out the window. Possibly killed a few people, a frat boy and a couple of bar flies, we weren’t totally sure though. Warren and its environs being a violent place overall. “Things happen here,” we said to her floor.

Ursula agreed quietly. Yes, her eyes said. They did.

“So um, he might be a murderer,” Kyra said.

“But also he might not be,” Coraline retorted.

Ursula stared at us over her steaming cup. “And if he is?”

“Well, that would be so terrible,” Else murmured . “But it might also just be a most unfortunate misunderstanding? A miscommunication or something tragic like that.”

“Like in Frankenstein or something,” Vik offered.

“Have you read Frankenstein ?” Ursula asked us.

“Yes,” we lied, still looking at the floor. “Lots.”

“Well. This is a fascinating story, ladies. A very fascinating story, indeed.” She stroked her glittering shawl. We waited for her to tell us that we should be expelled or arrested. For her to call the police. Or to give us a writing medal, we didn’t know. We really felt in this moment, that she could go either way, Bunny. Her eyes were so very inscrutable. She kept looking out at the dark, then back at us, then out at the dark.

“I do wonder,” she said at last, “about the plotting of all this.”

Our fairy tea had grown cold at this point, Bunny. We stared down into the floral mulch. “Um. What?”

“Well, I admire the allusions to Frankenstein and fairy tale and so on. But the whole story seems quite, oh I don’t know, very genre, no? Whore-ish.”

Whore?

“A little too whore, frankly. Probably Allan has you reading too many slashers and such.”

“But—”

“And the violence is quite gratuitous. Axes are such tactile instruments, which I appreciate, but the allusion to Kafka is a bit… convenient , don’t you think? A bit heavy-handed. As for the magic, the transformations…I hate to use the word wacky , but there you are. It’s a stitch too wacky. A touch too camp. Zany. A sort of zany Romantasy , isn’t it?”

And there they were, our very least favorite adjectives in the English language, Bunny. Falling from her mouth in one tacky string. We felt sick.

“Of course, I’m only one reader ,” she humbly qualified. Not looking at all humble, Bunny. “But for me, the plausibility feels a bit… stretched , don’t you think? And as for this boy character of yours…” Not boy, Darling , we wanted to correct. Hybrid. Draft. And not a character, Bunny. “ Him running away from you and such.” She used air quotes around the phrase running away . “It makes you all seem almost a bit… clumsy, doesn’t it? As creators? A little desperate.”

“No.” And it was our turn to shake our heads. “You don’t understand, Ursula. What we’re telling you isn’t Fiction. It’s… real .”

She smiled thinly. “Confusing metaphor with Reality is an all too familiar trap for young artists. And of course the metaphor always reveals us, reveals the real. More powerfully even than the merely real. So it’s tricky. Very tricky not to lose one’s way, one’s grip.”

Her eyes staring into our eyes, so red and puffy and brimming with tears. We were gripping her armrests, her handle-less cups, as though we were literally fucking sinking.

“Sounds like you had a difficult semester creatively,” she said, with great pity.

The hardwood floor sort of began to give beneath our feet then, Bunny. Grow soft as grasses. The witchy room itself seemed to swim.

“But, but,” we blurted softly, “This really was… real .” But the word suddenly seemed like so much silly fairy dust on our tongues. A bubble we were blowing into the dark, so easy to burst. And how she was looking at us. She was Mother saying Just some silly stories, Button . She was our surgeon sister scoffing at our psychic powers. She was our ballet mentor filling our unbridled body with so much instructive shame. She was our typewriter, its cold keys unyielding beneath our fingers. Whispering Not worthy . Whispering Never again .

“ Real ,” she repeated, smiling. Looked at her wrist, that ever invisible watch there. “In a sense, absolutely. Despite the madcappery of this whore story , this rabbit romance that you are describing to me, ladies, the underlying creative crisis actually seems very common.”

“ Common ?” We could feel our mothers shuddering at this word even from a thousand miles away.

She poured herself more fairy tea, smiled at something out in the dark. “You made a thing. A raw and powerful living thing. But it wasn’t perfect or so you thought then. Perhaps because it didn’t love you the way you wanted, to use your own crude phrasing.”

Um, did we say that, Bunny?

“Because it was difficult to shape or control. Or perhaps because it was simply…beyond you in some way.” She looked at us sadly. “So you tried, in the meager, amateur ways available to you, to fix it. And it escaped you, of course it did.” Her smile grew world weary. “And now you’re trying to recreate it and you can’t, of course not. Everything seems but a Pale Shadow of this First Attempt, for all its flaws.”

“Yes.” We lowered our heads, our faces hot with shame. All but Else’s. (For God will never be shamed, will she, Bunny? You did look pale though.)

“Well let’s extend the metaphor, shall we?” Ursula continued. “Probably it needed more experienced hands. Probably it went elsewhere, to seek such hands. And who knows? Maybe he found them. It’s the nature of Art to seek the right hands for its making, after all.”

We stared down at our own hands, so very small. So very pink and pulsing with want. Covered in a film of sweat. No grip at all.

A bark ringing through the house now. Her demonic sausage dog back from his hunt. He trotted adorably into the living room, bearing a little scrap of dark blue fabric between his teeth. From Fyorg/Nevermore’s pants, we immediately recognized. The dog laid this scrap before Ursula’s feet like a spoil. She picked it up and smiled.

“Brooks Brothers,” she said. “A favorite brand among a certain ilk of undergraduate. Orpheus has been harassing our young republicans, no doubt.”

We watched Orpheus go barking away, disappearing through the kitchen door flap into the backyard. The moon had come out, illuminating her garden. Once more we saw her shed, that dark little house in the back corner of the snowy grounds. An electricity passed through our bodies when we saw this shed, Bunny. How the dog immediately ran there, turning maniacal little circles just outside the door. Barking and growling his head off. A light we saw now, flickering in the windows.

“Tis getting late,” Ursula said.

Tis? “ But what do we do now ?” Coraline pressed.

“Go away,” she snapped. “For winter break,” she added quickly. “Take a much needed Pause from the Work and from each other. We can revisit this in January, once I’ve had an opportunity to Process this… story of yours. In the meantime, I should really get back. To my own work, that is.”

“What are you working on?” Kyra asked, playing politely interested even though we knew she didn’t really care, Bunny. None of us did. We were too devastated, too vulnerable, too embarrassed for reasons we couldn’t even name. Just going through the mannerly motions of conversation now. But Ursula took her query seriously. A light in her eye brightened. So desperate are writers, all writers, to converse about their work. It made us sad and sick even then.

“It’s only just revealed itself to me,” she said, her eyes on that shed in the dark. “But perhaps you’ll see it when you come to my showcase in Spring. I’ll be presenting on the work I managed to Manifest. When I was given time to do it, of course.” And she looked at us, now, like fucking go. I have given you enough of my Self .

We looked back at the shed, that flickering light in the window. Our skins still humming strangely. What’s in there? we almost asked her.

But Ursula was standing up now, beckoning us to move along . “Leave the hot house of campus, the hall of mirrors that is Narrative Arts. Get some perspective. Some reality. A grip.”

And then we were back out in the dark.

Our hands empty of everything but each other.

4

The last two weeks of the semester were something of a blur for us, Bunny. We floated through those final days on campus as if in a kind of dream. Somehow we managed a Friendsgiving, survived (barely) our last workshop with Allan. Turned in our portfolios as if those bound pages (or panes of glass), hastily compiled at the eleventh hour, were actually the true sum of our creative Oeuvre that term.

The Narrative Arts Christmas party was an understated affair due to the Violences, obvi.

“So scary, right?” we said to anyone we passed, shivering appropriately in our holiday wear. We attended the party despite our ennui, Bunny, of course we did. Unlike you we’re not antisocial freakshows, k? We swapped out Kyra’s cat ears for festive reindeer antlers and Coraline even baked gingerbread men for the occasion, didn’t you, Bunny? Complete with blue icing eyes, our little inside joke. “And are the police doing anything to find the killer?” Kyra asked those with whom we mingled, the bells on her antlers tinkling with concern. “They aren’t? How terrible,” we all murmured. “Systemic apathy is fucking crazy,” Vik said, and we agreed, Bunny, as we sipped the rainbow sherbet punch we’d made. It contained every alcohol under god’s sun.

Drunkenly, we stared out the window at fucking New England. Still hoping against hope for any sign of his wondrous silhouette in the bleakly falling snow. For his mellifluous voice to call out to us. I am so sorry I ran away! Twas only because I loved you so much, it afeared me.

“What are you looking for out there, Fictions?” the Poets sneered. They’d sallied up to us like spiders, donning their usual military vampire bat wear. One of them, Evil Jesus, was wearing a Santa is Satan sweater. We noticed that they were also hovering near the window, like they too were looking for someone out there in the cold.

“Nothing,” we lied. “You?”

“Nothing,” they sighed, sounding uncharacteristically forlorn. They’d had a bad semester, so we’d heard.

We turned back toward the window. There were some very angry looking people out there suddenly, Bunny, in bleeding black t-shirts. Protestors it looked like. They were shouting into megaphones (we couldn’t hear the screamy words), holding up giant photos of Tyler Fields. In some photos, he had an eye patch. We stared at his handsome jock face, so fratty-pretty in his polo. Smiling yet also sad-seeming at the same time. And strangely familiar-looking, both with and without his patch. We thought of Fyorg/Nevermore, lost somewhere in the world with that hole in his pants. The resemblance had always made us a little cold, Bunny.

The protestors appeared to be shouting at us now through the window, what the fuck? One pale girl in particular was glaring and gesticulating wildly like she thought she was in the French Revolution or something, Bunny. Pointing judgily at our lovely seasonal attire, or perhaps the celebratory cups of high octane rainbow booze in our hands. She looked like she could have been your friend, Sam. Her pony tail was the saddest fucking thing we ever saw and her army clothes screamed champagne socialist. She looked ready to set something, anything, on fire. In the name of “justice” or whatever, but really more just to watch it burn, Bunny. She wanted to burn the world with her anarchy eyes, you could tell. We stared at her sort of screaming at us, poor uncomprehending Marie Antoinettes, with what looked like a little toy axe in her hand.

Um, what the fuck is this, please?

“AAARV,” the Poets mumbled, seeming to hear our thoughts.

“ What ?”

“Artists. Against. Axe-Related. Violence ,” Matthias enunciated with his Poet’s cadence.

“Axe-related?” And for a moment, in the hive mind, we screamed. But we gathered ourselves. Smiled bemusedly. “Axe-related,” Kyra sniffed. “ Huh .” Antlers tinkling.

“They seem to think Narrative Arts is somehow involved in the Killings,” offered Colby.

“How funny,” Else said, gripping her dagger, which had turned a disconcerting shade of vermillion. “When art making is such a peaceful enterprise. So monkish, really.”

“They came by our house and interrogated us,” the Leader said bitterly. “Perhaps they’ll do the same to you.”

We looked back at the group, chanting and waving their toy axes around quite wildly, as the police appeared to be dragging them away. We smiled, even as the hive mind was now ringing with Interrogated?! Don’t want to go to jail! This is all your fucking fault, Bunny!!!

“We look forward to it,” Else said. Her smile daring fate.

As the Poets turned away, probably in search of free food, we noticed the braids in their hair. The fishtails, the medieval ropes and knots. Plagiarists! we heard Coraline shriek in the hive mind. Her shocked rage ticking in all our fingers. Is this a fucking joke? Where did you—

But then Allan was before us, eating one of our gingerbread men head first.

“Glad you could make it to the Party,” he said. Or some such genial nothing. Being a prick, he wanted to engage. To wish us well before subjecting us to the Catherine Wheel of his grading rubric. “And how did you enjoy your first semester?” He hoped we’d learned something with him this term.

“Oh we did , Allan,” Coraline slurred drunkenly. “ Truly .” Not at all keeping her shit together like we’d talked about. She raised her glass like she was about to throw a punch.

“In fact, in many ways Allan,” Kyra added sweetly, taking Coraline’s sloshing drink from her hand, “you’re sort of responsible for everything we’ve done this fall.”

He licked an icing eye from his lip. Glanced out the window where the screaming protestors were still getting dragged away. And then he turned to us and smiled, sort of bowed in his milady way. Self-deprecating but not really. Not fucking really, Bunny. “Cool,” he said. “Well, I’m looking forward to reading your portfolios.”

We smiled . Sure. Of course we’d done the final assignment, Bunny, click click . Name and year in the top righthand corner of the front page, table of god damned contents, here you go. But our souls were not in those double-spaced pages (or glass panes), Bunny. That was no longer where we spilled the Heart’s Blood, where we housed the pulsing prick. That lived between four steepled walls covered in rabbit guts, painted with bright blue sky and fluffy white clouds. It lived in our held hands and in our shuddery breaths and in our awed silence before the knock on the door. Where he and his smug red pen would never find it.

Unless he ran into a beautiful boy with an axe, of course.

“We hope you enjoy .” Coraline said, snatching her drink back, smiling bleary daggers. Her voice was fuck you forever .

Allan was staring at us sort of funnily now. Why is he staring like that, Bunny? The party had suddenly emptied, only us first year Fictions left (the Poets having found and promptly taken off with all the food). And you, Samantha. You showed up late as was your socially delinquent way. Hovering in the periphery, waiting for your moment alone with him, remember that? Not surprising that you didn’t mention the protestors in your screed of lies, Bunny. You were kind of checked out by then, weren’t you? Living in your head mostly, which apparently is quite the little whore novel of its own. You’d brought all of Allan’s novels with you, tucked under your black lacey arm. You wondered if he might be so kind as to sign them? Only if he had the time and was willing of course! Allan nodded absently. “Sure, Sam. I’ll meet you in my office.” And you blushed, Bunny, shamelessly.

But he remained standing with us, almost like he was waiting for something. What the fuck was he waiting for? It crossed the hive mind then that he might know something. Do you know something Allan? But we just stared at him tipsily as he stared at us, not at all afraid.

“How are those allergies, by the way?” he murmured at last. “Under control yet?”

“Not exactly,” Kyra confessed. And Coraline kicked her. Like I love you, but shut up, k? We couldn’t trust Kyra with authority figures, that she’d keep those wintry cherry lips shut. Did Allan notice the scuffle? No, he was staring out the window now.

“Allergies,” he mused. “A terrible affliction. And it seemed to be really affecting you. Creatively.” He watched the protestors outside, some of whom were now resisting arrest. A few of them ran desperately toward the window, Bunny, toward us. Thumped the thankfully thick glass and mouthed Murderers right in our lovely faces. Our turn to blush, Bunny. We looked at Allan like Omg, the world. Crazy, right? He meanwhile sipped his wine in his withholding way. “Well, m aybe you’ll bounce back in spring. With Ursula,” he offered.

“Maybe,” we murmured. Bounce?

“Or you might need to go back to the rose garden,” he added quietly, turning back to us. “Try another approach.”

And that, Bunny, is when our hearts exploded like rabbits in our bodies. What?

But he just looked at us. Smiled his infuriating smile that had made us want to kill him in the first place. Slugged back the last of his wine in its little plastic cup.

And then? He left us.

As he was leaving, Vik called after him. “Hey Al lan.” Fucking loving to poke that bear. To not just disturb the shit but roll around in it, Bunny, orgasming grossly.

Allan turned back, brows raised inquiringly. Almost playfully, like he was fucking with us. Was he? It was on the tip of our tongues to say, We conjured a Bunnyboy who wants to kill you, by the way. Please do keep an eye out for a handsome young man in a blue velvet blazer and pearls, brandishing an axe. But then maybe you already know? Instead, we all just raised our rainbow punch, the pretty colors of which had melted into a sad brown mulch and whispered “Merry Christmas.”

He winked, making our souls cold. “Merry, merry, Bunny.”

And with that mic drop, he was gone.

We watched you scamper down the hall after him like a puppy. If the puppy in question were a tall, nihilistic bitch-goth. Definitely you two were fucking, though clearly, obviously, he was holding all the psychosexual cards. We almost felt sorry for you, we did, but mostly we just felt sorry for ourselves. And worried. What does he know? What does he fucking know? Nothing he knows nothing. We looked back at the window. Just our own reflections there now, poor lonely Marie Antoinettes. Pressed against the cold glass and staring out at the dark.

Which was violently empty of magic.

Violently empty of all but snow.

5

And so? We took our leave of each other for winter break, Bunny. Reality, perspective, a grip. We needed them now more than ever before. Left our remaining Darlings in Else’s basement with a bounty of sweet provisions and Love, Actually playing on continuous loop on the wall, not to mention a playlist that was really just George Michael’s “Last Christmas” on shuffle and repeat. “Stay here while we’re gone, please,” Coraline warned them. “The world is a cold and terrible place full of murder and you are safest in this cozy basement with all this delicious candy.” They nodded dully at the wall with their lovely vacant eyes. “Terrible,” they murmured, shivering in an imagined winter. “So beautiful you look in your candy murder.” Sitting in their blue suits and silk ties like they were about to do serious business, Bunny, with stocks.

Vik, being a borny whore, offered to stay with them over the holidays. “My mother really doesn’t need to see me,” she pleaded.

But we said fucking no and Coraline nearly throttled her and Else was most adamant.

“ Reality , remember?” she said, quoting Ursula.

To that end, we locked Else’s basement door. Double-bolted it, Bunny, then cracked a window. Got into our various Ubers and then on our various planes and trains and cruise liners.

And, bye.

In our respective homes, we attempted to Decompress. Reality, Perspective, a Grip , this was our mantra. But it wasn’t easy, Bunny. We were met with all manner of questions from our loved ones.

“How was school?” our parents or siblings might ask us over dinner. “Did you write anything?”

“Oh lots,” we prevaricated. Picking at our plates of whatever.

“Like what?” some asshole at the table might press.

“Mostly experimental stuff.”

“I heard about the violence on campus,” another might say. “Some beheadings around town? That a boy went missing? That true?”

Here we’d shrug evasively. “Don’t know for sure. Probably just a prank.”

Our loved ones would exchange looks then. Chastise us for our life choices. “I told you, Darling,” one of our mothers might say, “didn’t I tell you, not to go Ivy? All these Ivy schools are in such terrible towns. Why didn’t you go to that other program, you know the one in the little nowhere town where they grow corn?”

“May I please be excused?”

Because it was too hard, Bunny, to answer this question. To answer any question, really. So we stayed in our rooms mostly, k? To write , we explained importantly. So much writing to do, oh my god. And we lay there and cried into our duvets, listening to our various playlists, which so perfectly soundtracked the falling of our tears. We barely even partook in the caroling, the sleigh riding, the mulled wine making, the Mariah Careying, etcetera. That year, all the Christmas cookies tasted like so much sugary fucking dust. In fact, this season actually reminds us of that part in your own novel, Bunny (the saggy middle part, remember?) when you’re alone over winter break, and you’re ill and heartbroken over your many, many creative failures? And as you lie there, plague-ridden on your poor people mattress, you imagine us (of course you do) thriving and celebrating in a so pretty elsewhere, happy and rich and way better dressed than you? When we read that part, we belly-laughed, Bunny. I mean yes we were rich and better dressed by comparison (obvi), but you seem to think you’re like, the only person in the world who’s ever been sad? And even worse, that this saggy sadness of yours is what makes you like a real artist or something? (You would tell yourself this palliative lie.) Well, guess what, Bunny? Fuck off. We’re artists too, real honest to god suffering ones, k? And that Christmas was proof. Hard to take part in any rejoicing when your heart is broken into a thousand unmendable pieces. When you’re perpetually, achingly aroused for something you realize you’ll never touch again. Because he didn’t love us, yes, this baffling fact was finally sinking into our souls. Because he was also maybe a murderer. Because ultimately, even in the very best-case scenario, we were still essentially sharing him with three other bitches (no offense, Bunnies).

Mostly, though, because he was gone.

We actually did try to write during this time of pain, by the way. Perhaps the Muses would be kind to us, we reasoned, after all we’d endured. Compensate us for our great loss. But alas even Muses can be elusive cunts, Bunny. A tender adjective or just-so clause might find us and we’d jot it down, sure. But mostly not. Mostly, we… grieved . Watched the snow fall over New Hampshire, the palms shiver in Monterey county, the Virginia sky go grey with sickly clouds, the red sun rise bloodily over the Kona volcanoes. We closed our eyes and dreamed of that cold blue glare, that accidental touch. Reality, perspective, a grip , we told ourselves as we sank into our so-soft beds and kept sinking, losing ourselves in ceiling fantasies, grabbing our phones.

Because we could not reach for him, you see, we reached for each other.

Miss you, Bunny, we texted .

Miss you too.

Did we maybe make a murderer?

Maybe

Did I lose the only thing I’ll ever love again?

Will my Aura never again turn the shade of primroses?

Am I ruined spiritually and sexually for all future entities?

Was that bloody autumn in the attic the happiest fucking time I’ll ever know again?

Don’t know

Our loved ones worried for us. Whispered about us behind closed doors, we heard them. Unstable. Not herself. Taken a turn down a dark mental road.

In Virginia, our mother was deeply suspicious of our lack of appetite (not to mention jelly of our new waistline). How come Button isn’t eating Mother’s holiday blondies? she asked with a murderous sweetness. Not hungry, we said and for once, Bunny, it wasn’t a lie. We attended her book club meeting under duress, wearing a dress the color of a dead sky that hung on us. Watched her get drunk on wassail, flirt flagrantly with the arborist attending to her evergreens. Watched her with a new kind of seeing, Bunny. Thinking, You made me .

On a foggy beach in Big Sur, we got gutter drunk on diet prosecco, then did detox yoga with our mother. Loving for the first time how deeply uncurious she was about us. Asked us no questions apart from whether we were hydrating enough. I do wonder about this writing thing , was all she observed once, between our downward and upward dogs. You seem a little too in your head these days. We grunted noncommittally though later on, alone in our dark bedroom, cradling our old bloody toe shoes to our fucking heart (that empty vessel), we wondered about it too, Bunny. This writing thing.

Across the country, under a New England moon, we lay on our quilted bedspread the color of blood, praying for the old entities to enter us. Please , we whispered to the air, please fuck me like you used to . And nothing, Bunny. We just lay there in the swirling fucking dust, empty. Our shelves of typewriters looked like what they were: rows of cold dead clicking machines. We could hear the mundane sounds of our Austrian-Japanese mother making strudel in the kitchen, our Irish father, who taught us everything about storytelling and axes both, chopping fire wood outside. Every strike made us fucking shudder with arousal and PTSD.

In a volcanic mountain lodge on the edge of the abyss, our surgeon sister took one look at our pale smiling face and said What have you fucking done this time? Nothing , we murmured, because Denial, at this tender juncture, was our spiritual survival, Bunny. Thankfully she was too blind to truly see, let alone attend to our psychic wounds. And so we wandered alone by the crashing white shore, looked to the natural world for healing. For the Universe to smile upon us once more. To tell us, in her language of Signs and Wonders, what surely must be true: You are so very special. What you are doing is terribly important Work. We fucking love you, Bunny, we do.

We closed our eyes and opened our third one to the Yule moon.

We thought about our creative crucible.

We begged for guidance, a way forward. Perspective. Reality. A grip.

Even though we weren’t so sure anymore, Bunny, if we really even fucking wanted those things after all.

6

In late January, as you know, New England is a horror show of snow and ice. Especially in this town named after God and Fate. And yet, we were anxious to return to campus for spring semester, Bunny. Would we come back to find all of Warren beheaded, we wondered. To find him waiting for us in Kyra’s attic turning a bloody axe in his hands like a rose? Saying, So sorry . I love you . Dance with me, please.

We would have danced with him even then, is the sick thing.

There had been no Violences over the break, no more beheadings, which, phew. We told ourselves it was a good thing, Bunny, that he seemed to have vanished into thin air.

That there was basically no evidence of him in the world like at all anymore.

We returned to a basement full of sleeping Darlings huddled together for warmth, surrounded by Pixy Stix dust. George Michael still giving his heart from our pink Bose and Love Actually still playing on the wall. “Beautiful Aurelia,” our boys quoted lustily, rising from their rabbity slumbers. Not looking at us but at each other. They’d stripped out of their suit jackets and shirts and were only wearing their silk ties now, which appeared slightly chewed. We gaped at their very cut bodies while they took us in coolly, their eyes more hollow than ever before.

“Sometimes things are so transparency, they don’t need evidential proof,” one whispered.

“And the very next day,” another sang, tugging on his half-eaten tie. “you gave it away. Like a whore.”

“I have been perusing the works of Austen,” a third one called from his shadowy corner (and we observed the gnawed pages by his clawed foot). His lovely mouth was flecked with paper and sugar. “I find you to be both the Senseless and the Sensibility.”

Cringing, we shut the door.

As for the attic, how different it looked to our eyes after so much time away, Bunny. In the wintry afternoon light, it seemed smaller than we remembered. Less holy. The blood spray on the walls, the painted clouds, did not fill us with dreams but instead, an anxious dread. Had we gotten reality, perspective, a grip after all?

Not fucking really, no.

Well, what was it then? What had caused this atmospheric shift?

We looked at each other in our slouchy cashmeres, breaths coming out of our mouths like so much cold minty smoke. And we knew that something essential had flown from us. Our creative fire, the heat of our hearts blood, had grown cold. The hive mind was dark, Bunny. And in its place? A deadness. A sick desperation.

“Spring workshop tomorrow,” Kyra said in a hopeful voice, her words a tremulous cloud in the cold air.

“Yes,” we murmured.

It couldn’t come fucking soon enough.

7

We arrived at the Cave early that first day, of course we did. Waiting, breaths held, for her to appear out of the dark. Notebooks and mind vaginas wide open, Bunny. LePens fucking gripped in our hands. Because this was serious, k? This was a god damned creative emergency. Way worse than we’d first feared. Last night, Vik snatched a rabbit from a neighbor’s bush, and brought him upstairs. Just to see, Bunny, she’d said, cradling the creature in her arms, which were shaking as ours were fucking shaking . Can we still? He didn’t even break a sweat, Bunny. Though we circled him, stared at him, until we felt like our eyes were bleeding. Else let out a most unholy shriek and Coraline shook her golden bob crying NO BUNNY NO BUNNY NO BUNNY not stopping even after we’d slapped her. She was still whispering it in the Cave now, no bunny no bunny no bunny, like a nightmare she was trapped inside of, Bunny.

We all were.

A judgy cough from the opposite shore of the table. You, Samantha. Sitting across from us in your cardigan of despair. Blinking through your bitch curtain like a bitch. Bracing yourself probably for the arrival of the Word Witch. You were in a nightmare of your own, we guessed, what with your boyfriend Allan being gone and Ursula now taking the reins. We remember how you winced when at last her voice pierced the dark. And we? Smiled for the first time that year.

“Creatives,” she intoned from somewhere in the shadows.

Fucking finally , we thought.

Oh how our souls brightened briefly at the sight of her shimmering toward us in her art smock! A north star on this blackest night of the soul. What we’d come here for, dreamed of for so long.

She came into the light, murmuring apologies for her lateness (she was very late, that should have been the first clue). She looked much younger than we remembered. Taller strangely, thinner too. A pinkish glow to her greying cheek, like when one of our mothers got a vampire facial. Weird. When we’d last seen Ursula that snowy November’s eve, you see, she’d seemed positively grandmotherly.

“Welcome to spring semester,” she said in a so rich voice. And smiled at us. Wildly, Bunny. Ran a hand through her witchy locks, which seemed to have far more gold in them now, than silver.

“Thank you,” we murmured. A little discomfited by her distinctly unmotherish appearance. By that unbridled grin, which seemed just not very…professorial enough. Which seemed far too… happy . Flustered. Almost like she’d just been fucking or something, Vik said later. Her lipstick, one of us observed, was an alarmingly wanton magenta.

Still, we smiled back, gripped our LePens. Awaited her nurturing guidance. For her to go round the table widdershins, perhaps. Draw out our personal stories with tarot cards and birthing gestures. And yes, we know you made cheap fun of her admittedly unorthodox pedagogical gifts in your novel , Bunny. Her occultisms, her gynecological metaphors, her use of sock puppets, her deep love of what you called Trauma Porn. Well, sometimes you fucking need that shit, k? We needed it. Wanted her to Tap our Wounds, oh so tender but generative. Reanimate us from the creative dead with a choice writing prompt or an all-seeing crystal. We closed our eyes. Ready, so fucking ready, to be Unearthed.

Instead, Bunny, she handed out syllabi, remember? Please pass these around, thanks. Went through her attendance policy for what felt like five hours. Pulled out some handwritten notes from what looked like 1989 and read us her very long list of workshop protocols, do you recall those? Each week we would be submitting pages (or Wounds , as she preferred to call them). Handwritten only, please , for she liked the Wound raw and freshly bleeding . And no submitting drafts until the day before Workshop, please . She wouldn’t read our Wounds before then because, and here she smiled, I like to have them fresh in my head . She preferred a paperclip to a staple, by the way. A double rather than a single space, k?

Um. K. But —

“Wonderful. Well then. Let’s go Tap, shall we?” And she rose from her chair, like dismissed .

WHAT? we almost screamed. You were already out of your seat of course, Bunny, gleefully fucking running out the door. Meanwhile we watched, panicking, as Ursula hummingly gathered those ancient notes and shoved them back into her witchy satchel.

“That’s it ?” one of us couldn’t help but cry. Coraline. Blood dripping darkly from her dress pocket. The hand in there a fucking fist.

Ursula looked at us perhaps for the first time since she’d entered the Cave. Witheringly, Bunny. “ Excuse me?”

“Well, but…aren’t you…going to give us, like…” This from Vik. Trailing off, poor Bunny. Fumbling for her words for like the first time ever.

“Give you what exactly?”

Oh the shame we felt, Bunny. But also the righteous outrage, k? Um, some guidance maybe, hello? As our teacher? Because we took your creative advice, by the way. Reality. Perspective, a grip, we tried to get them. And now look at us. Broken of heart. Empty of attic. And no bunny, NO BUNNY!!!

“Maybe a writing prompt?” Kyra blurte d at last.

A flash of annoyance in Ursula’s eyes then. Pity too. Like oh my, oh dear. What did it say about us, as artists really, that we needed our creative hands held in this way? “ Tap ,” she said at last, “how’s that?”

And we felt psychically smacked in the face.

The hive mind went completely black then, Bunny. The candle of hope nearly snuffed.

“Ursula?” Else whispered desperately. Yes, even Else sounded desperate. A crack in the otherworldly bell of her voice. The dagger on her neck pale and limp-looking. “Could we please speak with you for a moment?”

“Oh, I have to run today, I’m afraid,” she said. “Engagement.” Her voice very sorry-not-sorry. A kind of singing in it that made us sick.

“But it’s about that conversation, ” Coraline pushed, she loved to fucking push. And today we loved her for it. “You know the very important one we had just before break, remember? Where you told us to—”

“Engagement,” she snapped, cutting her off. “As I said. But perhaps you can come see me during my office hours.”

Office hours?! Um, were we fucking FRESHMEN, Bunny? But we played grateful.

“Oh of course, thank you! And when are they?” And we waved our LePens, cracked now like our smiles, pretending to take such mindful note. Feeling this whole time like we were fucking drowning.

“By appointment,” she sang, not even looking at us.

“So can we make the appointment now ?” Coraline cried. Dress pocket dangerously bloody now from gripping that new razor of hers. A breath away, perhaps, from losing a finger entirely.

Ursula smiled coldly, snapping her satchel shut. “Email me.”

What could we do, Bunny, but sit there, stunned, watching her wrap herself in her many glittering shawls, watching her leave us. Practically skipping toward the exit. Just before she was about to disappear through the doors, she turned to us. “Oh girls, I almost forgot.”

And for a moment, Bunny, hope rekindled so stupidly in our hearts. Is she finally going to be curious about us? Our mind vaginas? Our lives?

“Yes, Mother?”

“Toward the end of term, I’ll be presenting a Showcase of my new Work. I hope you’ll all attend? I’m quite excited to share it with you.” That unnatural smile stretched her lips again, painted that too-bright slut shade. Fuck no , we thought. Don’t want to attend, Bunny. Don’t care about your new work. This is about US, OUR work. That’s in fucking crisis right now, k?

“Of course we’ll attend,” one of us simpered. Kyra of course. We hated her for it even as we all nodded along, smiling so hard our cheeks would ache later from the fake. “So exciting,” we said, or some such writer lie.

“Thank you. It’s just come pouring out of me recently.”

And we thought of shit, Bunny. Glistening sickly rivers of it. “How wonderful for you.”

“It really is,” she agreed. “ So wonderful to feel connected again.” She bit on her bright lip, like a girl talking about a boy band crush. How terrible writers look, we thought, when they are happily working on their Worlds . When they are deep inside those Worlds, utterly immune to Reality, seeing only glitter in the dust motes. We watched her literally bound out of the room without another fucking thought or word for us, her dearest students. Just sat there in the dark Cave still clutching our cracked LePens, still hunched over our open notebooks.

Which were more blank than they’d ever been.

8

Spring semester sort of went downhill from there, Bunny.

January, February, March, April.

The days, weeks and months ticked by like a most terrible clock.

We spent the long cold hours together, mostly. Holding our collective breaths. Waiting (dare we say hopefully?) for more beheading news. For some evidence of Aerius. For our love, our souls to return to us. But the Violences had ceased, Bunny, along with our Art. AAARV stopped their daily protesting and outcries, which, thank fucking god. And still no bodies found. Still no confirmed sightings of Tyler Fields either, though some students had claimed to spot him on campus, near the Philosophy building, looking lost. Perhaps he’d run away was the general consensus. Young people today, so very unstable . Yes very, we agreed with whomever, truly . The posters of his face, once plastered all over campus, started to wilt and peel from the lampposts and walls and corkboards. Got covered by new play advertisements, announcements of poetry readings and visual art exhibits.

Visit the Hall of Infinite Reflection!

Attend Dr. Ursula Radcliffe’s Spring Showcase!

Tickets now available! Pay what you can! Bring your Friends!

Pathetic, Bunny. The exclamations. The blatant begging. Artists, we started to think, in the winter of our Creative Standstill, were truly a little gross.

The fall began to feel like a kind of dream, Bunny, a Fiction. If we didn’t have those hollow-eyed Darlings in the basement, demanding Pixy Stix, offering to slow dance with us (however clumsily) to our harp-forward favorites–we might have really thought it was.

Sure we did our best to move on, to start fresh. But it was fucking hard, k?

We couldn’t seem to even hunt rabbits these days, you see, let alone explode them anymore. We tried, desperately, to gather the little fuckers into our arms and lure them back to the attic. But they no longer came to us so willingly, Bunny, and we had to give literal chase. Racing across gardens and fields and sometimes streets and driveways and other people’s yards, our backs and pits and underboobs sweating so profusely beneath our lovely outerwear, arms outstretched wildly to catch, gloved hands fucking clawing the air. Whispering, “Come here, Bunny, please come fucking here, k ?” Kyra was the best runner among us , which is funny because she had the littlest legs. But she was quick on those legs, Bunny, like a magic millipede or something. Still the creatures would elude her, disappearing into some big bush or ducking coyly into the nether regions of the earth.

“What the fuck are you girls doing?” an old man once asked from his doorway, shotgun cocked in his hand. He’d caught us in his garden, in pursuit of a wily winter hare, now hiding (we suspected) among his evergreen shrubs. We froze, staring into the cold gun barrel aimed right at our faces, Bunny, into the man’s dead eyes.

“Writing,” one of us whispered.

“Fucking,” said another of us, at the very same time.

“Tapping the Wound.” Another offered, chin quivering.

“Trying so very hard to find Love again.”

Tears fell from all our eyes from the truth of it. He shook his head, and shut the door.

Eventually we had no choice, Bunny. No choice but to make our way to the mall, to fucking Pet Smart. “Hello, good day, how are you?” Else told the clerk most smilingly. “We’d like to purchase all of your rabbits, please.” We stood hovering by a cage of them all cuddled so sweetly together like Easter. And us smiling just as sweetly, Bunny. Quite like Easter ourselves.

“All of them?” And the clerk just looked at us in our lovely dresses like we were, I don’t know, weird or something. Admittedly, there may have been a wildish sheen to our faces. A want, unholy and bottomless, gleaming in our many eyes.

“We just love rabbits so very much, you see,” Coraline said very reasonably, “that we want to provide them with a beautiful loving home.”

“With lots of flowers to eat,” Kyra chimed in.

“And grasses to munch,” Vik added.

“And candy to suck,” Coraline finished.

The clerk frowned now. She reminded us a little of you, Samantha. Depression lipstick. Suspicious bitch blink. A silver ankh dangling from her neck on a cheap black rope. “I don’t know that I’m allowed to sell all the—”

And then Else slapped down the platinum credit card, Bunny. Smiled her mother’s smile that meant Business. That pushed open every door. Demanded it be pushed open for her to glide through, so prettily, not suing you this time.

Back in the attic, we lowered the lights. Lit the vanilla cream candles and the lavender-rosemary incense like we were on a date, which, weren’t we ? Played Bush, we were bringing out the big guns this time. The whole of The Sensual World . Gathered in our hot pink circle, lips balmed, bodies spritzed with various scents emulating the natural world in all its fucking wonder. Stared unblinkingly at our box of fuzzy bunny until we couldn’t fucking see anymore, Bunny.

Were there explosions?

Oh yes, there were explosions in the end.

After hours and hours and hours.

But the results, oh god the results. We still shudder to recall how they came into being screaming or else frozen into a kind of open-mouthed silence. All of them a pale eerie blonde like the children in the Village of the Damned , haircuts like Little Lord Fauntleroy. Pink eyed and wearing pretty lavender suits with furry white paws for hands. Hot , Vik said and she really wanted to keep one of the less screamy ones, but we said fucking no. They creep us out, k? But not in a good way at all, Bunny.

Off with their heads, please.

The Pet Smart bunnies were kind of a new low for us, Bunny. Creatively speaking. (Our basement Darlings seemed like pontificating geniuses by comparison.) We grew more slaphappy with the axe during this time, what else could we do? We were lost, k? Lost and at a loss. In the dead of fucking February. In the crotch of rainy, never-ending March. In the wet blush of April. And then there was that terrible spring day when we’d run through all the pet store rabbits and all the wild ones eluded our grabbing hands. We watched a last little runt run away from us into the cold rainy spring dark, into the wide world.

And we, stunned, just stood there in the cold mud, watching him go.

No longer even giving chase.

We recalled Aerius running away from us into the autumnal night.

It was triggering, Bunny.

Of course, it wasn’t our lack of innate talent—how could it be, given our amply demonstrated genius? No, circumstances were blocking our Potential, Bunny, as Else so often pointed out. Our ongoing heartbreak for one. Not to mention sheer fucking teacherly neglect—first Allan’s and now Ursula’s. The indifference , Bunny, likely systemic to Warren as an institution, was stifling our burgeoning Greatness, totally.

Case in point: Spring Workshop.

You stopped going to class, remember? In your novel, you cite us, our laughter, our togetherness, as the reason, and it’s so funny, Bunny, that our laughter’s what drove you away. Maybe we were laughing on the outside, k, but on the inside?

That was a whole other fucking story.

We hated Workshop, maybe more than you, which is saying a lot. We didn’t whine about it like you or stop going like you because unlike you, Bunny, we don’t live in an 80s high school movie of the mind, we don’t sit smoking and brooding in black on the other side of the fence of Life, wearing so-scary eyeliner and listening to too-cool-for-you music, skipping class and talking to swans, k? We took our graduate careers and opportunities like, seriously. So whatever weird text Ursula assigned, we fucking read it, rainbow highlighter in hand, from that treatise on the fornication of flowers to the photography collection of overexposed torsos. Whatever writing prompt she gave us—from Gushing the Blood to Widdershin the Wheel of Fortune —we did it in good fucking faith. We were there every week with bells basically, cooing at her dog, our paperclipped, double-spaced Wounds in hand, waiting-dying for her to tell us something promising, something specific, something beautiful about ourselves.

But she never did, Bunny.

Instead, she was…fucking strange. Daydreamy. Distracted . Always smiling to herself. Humming a jaunty song whose lyrics we could never catch. Coming to the Cave late and leaving early. Ignoring our very courteous emails, our carefully worded, oh-so-mindful-of her-time requests to meet outside of class, during your office hours, which, um, aren’t you’re supposed to have those? Getting us to lead the discussion on the readings in class. ( Why don’t I turn it over to you? that was her very favorite phrase.) Offering only the vaguest of feedbacks on our Wounds. “Tap more deeply,” she said of every Wound, not even fucking looking at it, Bunny. Not even looking at us . Just sort of staring into the middle distance at something only she could see. “Gush the blood,” she whispered. “Find the throb, the bounce if you will, of raw life.” She smiled dreamily, her whore lipstick painted thick, thick. Ran a hand through her long golden hair which seemed to be getting more lush, more golden by the week. Her line notes were equally baffling. The authorial musicality prevaricates Let the Source speak

She wasn’t a prick like Allan, of course. Didn’t overtly eviscerate us, fill us with a dark shame that left us paralyzed in the rose garden for hours afterwards, imagining murder scenarios.

It was more like she just…wasn’t really there at all, Bunny.

“Be with it always,” she murmured distractedly, as she bolted toward the door.

What the fuck? But she was already turning away, Bunny. Gone before we could blink. And we, in the dark of the Cave, in an even deeper dark of the heart, watched her go.

We always seemed to be watching something escape us that spring.

Broken, we’d return to our Basement Darlings. Sought their company and consolation in the evenings, on the makeshift dancefloor. They said tell me everything and we did tell, Bunny. Lowered the lights and cranked the Bush. Got drunk and leaned on their hulky (if slightly misshapen) shoulders and told them every fucking thing under the sun. “She fails to facilitate our genius,” we whispered into their very hard arms, watching the April rain fall through the window, the frost slowly unfrost on the branch. “We are cruelly thwarted in our artistic growth.”

“You’re so hot though,” they offered. “Also what does the brain matter compared with the heart?” They smiled beautifully, emptily at us. Squeezed our side boob. You could drown in the bright blue nothing of their eyes, Bunny, you really fucking could.

“Sometimes when we think of Aerius,” we whispered, “we are so sad we feel like dying.”

“No dying,” they said, bringing our wrists to their lips, nibbling the orchids we wore there. “Not when you’re this pretty and delicious, k? ” Speaking more to the flowers than ourselves, truth be told. “Forget this Aries,” they whispered, mouths full of petal.

“ Aerius ,” we corrected, practically screaming. Sometimes we’d admittedly lose it mid-Bush, Bunny. Right on the dance floor, under the Prom party lights. “Why can’t you be more like him ?” we’d hiss. And we’d shake them like we were angry mothers and they the most disappointing of children. Shake them until they bit us sometimes. Fucking hard on the finger or wrist OW.

We grew incredibly adept at first aid that Spring too, didn’t we, Bunny?

Yet we couldn’t mend our Hearts.

9

May brought with it a scent of freshly budding green that made our thighs ache. Brought with it such lush grasses, such blooming flowers we almost couldn’t bear it, Bunny. So many bunnies hopping around Narrative Arts, taunting us. Mocking us, really, we felt, for the moment we drew close to them, they’d run. Fine , we thought, fucking run .

Don’t even care anymore, we lied.

Last week of Workshop. After class (which was a joke, we hate to say it, Sam, but you missed nothing), we lay in the rose garden, now positively brimming with life, which only sharpened our sense of spiritual and artistic death. That hole in the earth that Vik had dug was still there. Where we’d first seen him smiling slyly at us, not so very long ago. Long ears twitching with promises, beckoning us, most flirtily, Come on, let’s go . We gazed at this muddy hole, mourning all we’d lost. Pondering the vicissitudes of creation and destruction.

“Well, it’s fucking over,” Coraline sighed. She’d been in a shit mood for weeks, Bunny.

“ What? Please don’t say that, Bunny, okay?” we whispered.

“How can I not say it, Bunny ? We have to face Reality .”

And we, lying in the Ivy grass, had to smile darkly at that word. Reality.

“We’re just not Magic anymore,” she whispered, shaking her head. No longer so bobbed or blonde, she’d let the dark roots creep in again most wantonly. “Aerius was a fluke,” she pressed, articulating our very worst fear.

“And an axe murderer, don’t forget,” Kyra said. Twisting the knife as she so liked to do then. Perhaps she missed her axing days.

“Who didn’t even kill Allan,” Vik said, adding salt to the wound.

“But at least he was alive,” Coraline shrieked. “At least he had…” and she here trailed off. A dick ? we thought. Human hands? A healthy hatred of us ?

“ Substance . And now? He’s gone. And we…can’t even make pale shadows.” She was thinking of those pet store bunnies, we knew, those little Lord Fauntleroys with their bright pink eyes and white furred hands. Or was she thinking of our basement Darlings, growing ever more hollow-eyed, ever more confused in their compliments, ever more stiff in their slow dancing skills? Probably she was thinking of the last bunny, the one we’d tried and failed to transmogrify into Tom Cruise circa 1983, who, despite our staring at him for fucking hours, just kept eating his little mound of woodchips and grass. Eventually hopped away like later. Thanks for the snack .

She cried now in the rose garden, under that bright May sunlight, exposing the many cuts on her skin, her bloody gloves and lying hair.

“Maybe we should just forget about trying to explode rabbits for a while,” Kyra whispered now among the thorny pink flowers. “Try actually writing or something. Beyond those dumb prompts of Ursula’s, I mean.”

“Oh very funny, Bunny,” we said. “Don’t be silly. No, no. Writing ?”

That can’t possibly be the way forward, we thought. Artistically or otherwise.

But what was?

Just then, Ursula emerged from Narrative Arts, almost as if we’d summoned her with our question. Bounding out the door in her Stevie Nicks priestess wear. Reeking of ungodly gardens, we could smell the mugwort from here.

Our first instinct, of course, was to ambush her. Can we please talk to you? Why have you been avoiding us, your beloved students, all semester? But we were arrested by the sight of her skipping across the green, smiling obscenely. Clearly deep inside in her own dream world. Clearly a music to everything only she could hear and she was sort of prancing to it. She tilted her face up to the sun, appearing to bask in its golden light.

Her joy, Bunny, was monstrous to behold.

And familiar. Oh so familiar to us.

We watched as she stooped down and picked a dandelion growing from the grassy verge by the sidewalk. Snatched it most greedily from the earth. Looked both ways as she shoved it, almost guiltily, into the black mouth of her purse. The heat flooding our faces when we saw her pick that dandelion, Bunny. Like we were suddenly on fucking fire from the inside with a knowledge we couldn’t name. Or could we?

We watched her clip clop away. And there was something in her step. Something we’d noted before, all semester in fact, but hadn’t been able to put our finger on until just now.

There was a skip to it, yes, but not just a skip.

A hop.

There was a fucking hop to it, Bunny.

And then, in the rose garden, the pink cloud of our hive mind—dark for so very long—suddenly awakened.

We followed her across campus and beyond, hearts in our fucking throats. Keeping a safe distance, but we needn’t have been so careful, Bunny. She was oblivious to us, to everything, smilingly lost in some sort of 70s tinted daydream. Singing along to whatever enabling song must have been playing on her dated headphones. We caught bits of what we thought might be Fleetwood Mac lyrics. Her high, cracking voice so different from the one she wielded in Workshop, which sounded like runes if they could talk. Her golden hair shining, bouncing in the May sun. Bouncing , Bunny. Yes, it bounced with each hop. Giving us the strangest fucking feeling. Our hands trembled with it, this feeling.

Keep following.

By the time we approached her house, the hive was pulsing wildly with speculations we dare not speak, dare not even hope. We hung back at her neighbors as she hopped ahead into her own front yard like a giddy child. Pulled the dandelion from her purse, clutching it unnecessarily close to her boob. She twirled its stem, then took a sniff like a hit while we fucking watched, hive mind seething. She didn’t go through her front door, no, no. Instead, she looked both ways (not seeing us thanks to her neighbor’s poplars), and made her way through the side gate.

Which led to the back garden, Bunny.

That writing shed.

The flickering light we’d seen in the window.

We must see what was inside the shed, Bunny. Now. Though at this point, we fucking knew. And with the force of this realization, moving as one body now, a body electric, we tore through the side gate, ran through the back garden, all her brazen bushes and flagrant flowers, and threw ourselves, screaming, against her little red d oor.

A dark room that smelled like fire’s ghost. We lay in a heap on the dusty floorboards, which, ouch . F elt the bruises forming instantly on our thighs and sides. We would have to massage each other later, extensively, but there was no fucking time for that now. Where is he, where is he? We looked around wildly, expecting to find him naked and chained to a post, she was such a perv probably.

No sign, Bunny. A ring of unlit candles surrounding us. Some statues of rabbits on the shelves, along with some new agey looking texts and novels. A purple velvet curtain that divided the room, what’s on the other —

A clearing of a throat behind us. We turned.

Ursula. Sitting at her desk in the half-dark, her giant headphones still on. Looking down at us like we were fucking insane. And looking around the place now, which was clearly just a kind of witchy office, we maybe were.

“Girls,” Ursula said, slipping off her headphones, “what the hell is this about?”

It was awkward, Bunny. We really didn’t know what to say for ourselves. Sorry to break in and everything. Don’t know what came over us. We just really, really wanted to schedule an office hours meeting, k? We kept murmuring half-baked apologies to her unfinished floor while she chastised us. Second time you’ve shown up at my door unannounced. This time breaking in , blah blah blah. She looked at us curled in a heap at her foot. Droned on and on about boundaries. But we weren’t really listening, Bunny. We were too busy noticing things in this office of hers. How those rabbit statues were staring-smiling at us, for instance, causing our skin to crawl. A live bunny eating rose petals in the corner, nibbling in a way that made our thighs twitch. That purple curtain behind her, what’s on the other fucking side? And the smell, Bunny, pervading the small space. Spring in its first flowery flush. Autumnal gardens. It made us dizzy with want. Made our nipples and clits hard, our hearts literally ache. We looked back up at her. “Where is he?” we asked as one voice. Growling now.

“ Excuse me ?”

“WHERE. IS. HE?” And we sounded fucking crazy maybe. We didn’t care.

“ Who? ”

“You know who,” Else challenged. Bold as fuck.

“Our cold love,” Coraline said.

“Our happy accident,” Vik added.

“The boy we conjured from a bunny last fall,” Kyra clarified softly.

Ursula let the absurdity of this hang in the air. Perhaps hoping we would crumble, back down, skulk away. But we stayed where we were, Bunny, clinging to her floorboards.

“ Aerius ,” we whispered.

And then, Bunny, the look in her eye shifted.

“What did you just say?” Her voice was low, threatening. Her gaze was suddenly dark matter, swallowing us. We couldn’t bring ourselves to repeat his name.

“Please,” Coraline begged in the smallest voice. “Please give him back.”

“ BACK ?”

She stared at us. So fucking coldly we ourselves felt cold, Bunny. For a second she looked like she might kill us. And then the rabbit eating the rose petals suddenly hopped into her lap. She looked at it sitting there. Closed her eyes. We watched her bury her face in its fur. Shake her head. “No,” she whispered.

We looked at each other. What? “Ursula—”

“I really have no idea what you’re talking about,” she murmured into the rabbit’s body. Making us colder still. The rabbit stared at us with his bright eyes.

“With all due respect, Professor,” Else said softly in her most omnipotent voice. “We think you do.” Which was un-fucking-real, Bunny. It was in moments like these when we were thankful for her God complex. She was more ballsy than our Darlings.

Now Ursula looked up from the rabbit’s fur. Her eyes flashed with how fucking dare you. Was she not our literary idol? Were her works not what first lit up our mind vaginas so long ago? Did we not sit in her living room only last fall, looking at her like she was God? You’re why I wanted to be a writer. You’re why I’m alive at all, had we not gushed these fawning words to her face? How could she ever possibly steal from us when she fucking made us everything that we are? “ Girls,” she began gravely. “I’m afraid you’re deeply mistaken.”

Suddenly we felt sick. We thought of that tattoo of the Crystal Thief on his forearm. We looked at each other, still clinging to her floorboards. Oh god.

“And not only about this Aries business— ”

Aries?

“But about the very nature of Creation in general. Perhaps it’s my own failing as a teacher.” She was petting the rabbit now, staring at Else.

“The nature of Creation?” Else repeated. Not sounding so much like God anymore, Bunny.

“Well if this… Eros is his name you said?”

“ Aerius ,” we corrected. And why did we have the feeling, Bunny, that she had once more purposely misremembered?

“If this manifestation is yours ….” And now she looked us dead in all of our eyes. “Then, with all due respect , why isn’t he with you ? Why do you have to hunt him down like this? Break into my home?”

The rabbit in her arms regarded us coolly. Our hands gripping the floorboards grew slippery and hot. Ursula smiled now. “Creation shouldn’t be a struggle . You shouldn’t have to go chasing it. After all, one has one’s dignity to think of, doesn’t one? It should be an ecstatic Visitation…when you least expect it. It should…visit you .”

And here she flushed, as at a delicious memory. Our eyes stung with tears, Bunny. Of Envy, obvi. And her homely, inevitable sister: Shame.

“Now was I fortunate enough to be visited recently? Yes, I was. After a dry season. A very long, very dry season. But I can assure you that this Visitation was quite authentically my own. As you’ll see when I give my showcase next week. I do still hope you’ll all come?”

We stared up at her from the floor, sinking now beneath us, why were all her floors so fucking unstable? Bodies bruised and dripping with shame. Envy and outrage one in our hearts. No grip at all. “Sure,” we whispered.

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