I Am Legend

by Richard Matheson

Better do this and better do that, he thought morosely. There were so many damned things to do, he’d never get to the real problem.

If there was a rational answer to the problem (and he had to believe that there was), he could only find it by careful research.

Well, I will know! he raged inside. And he forced himself to study.

Was the life force something more than words, a tangible, mind-controlling potency? Was nature somehow, in him, maintaining its spark against its own encroachments?

But it was hard to keep his hands still. He could almost feel them twitching empathically with his strong desire to reach out and stroke the dog’s head. He had such a terrible yearning to love something again, and the dog was such a beautifully ugly dog.