Don't Let the Forest In

by C.G. Drews

Andrew hated the way his brain did this. Destroyed beautiful things. It was like he couldn’t just hold a flower; he had to crush the petals in his fist until his hand was stained with murdered color.

“I think someday you’ll hate me.” Thomas’s voice stretched with a loneliness Andrew had never heard before. “You’ll cut me open and find a garden of rot where my heart should be.”

They were pressed so tight together, hearts pounding and chests heaving in rhythm. Everything smelled of mud and sweat and blood. Dirt crumbled above them and pattered into their hair.

Andrew didn’t know. Life didn’t fit against his skin and it never had and sometimes everything was just too much.

The night was a living thing, breathing with them as they stood in the forest. Moss thickened in their lungs and they could taste autumn leaves.

The wind picked up and scattered leaves over the path as they set off to hunt. No use waiting for the monsters. The night pressed close to Andrew’s spine, cool hands sliding up his sweater and over his ribs. It seemed fascinated with the concept of his beating pulse, and it left inky fingerprints along his collarbone. If it asked to kiss him, he thought he would say yes. If the trees belonged to Thomas, midnight was in love with Andrew. It made him braver somehow, invisible, hiding his delicate edges and leaving behind a lean and hungry shadow. In the dark, no one could see his hollow and empty places. Instead he looked like he could have teeth.

October arrived with cold teeth sharp enough to split bone.

What would it even look like, to cut their feelings out, bloody and aching and raw, and compare them? To find they didn’t match. To be left with guts vivisected and no way to sew themselves back up so they looked the same as before.