Someone You Can Build a Nest In

by John Wiswell

This revelry was a kind of fear, for hatred was the fear people let themselves enjoy.

No matter whether she survived this one night or a thousand more years, she would never suffer another handsy rich man to live.

Nobody actually helped each other. That’s why people had religions, hoping gods would provide help where people refused.

He could only work his mouth to make noise if she consented.

What they feared didn’t matter to her anymore. Perhaps these humans had never met someone with actual compassion, and it repelled them, like rosemary repelled her.

Homily held onto her both like she was fragile and like she would slip away into the sea if she released her grip. She wanted to tell her it was all right to hold on. That she was monstrously durable.

Homily had another way of sidestepping humanity’s penchant for complaining: enjoying herself. People could simply choose not to hate things.

All the unwanted rosemary poison went straight into the lung, a temporary bladder that, being human-grown, would not wilt from the poison. The poison still tried to burn and osmose its way through the lung’s membranes, and she forced the lung lower in her body, through one leg, until the entire organ was discreetly shitted into her boot.

She was going to eat her mother-in-law for the common good.

“You do not dislike being in love with a puddle?” Catching her breath, Homily reached for Shesheshen. An offer of consensual touch again. “I’ve been a puddle on the floor too many times myself.” Shesheshen let herself slump into Homily’s hand, forming her shoulder to match however this woman wanted her to feel. “I do not horrify you? You do not want me slain?”

Reading feels complicated when you haven’t done it. You’ll learn. It’s normal to be intimidated.” “I’m not intimidated by books. I would crush them in a fight.” Homily guffawed until she had to rest against Shesheshen’s shoulder. “That’s the spirit. Here. What does this letter look like to you?”