The Home

by Judith Sonnet

“It’s Mr. Friendlyman,” a strange, high-pitched voice whined. “I’m on my way, Griffin. I’ll be there in no time at all!”

Christ, but we are shells, aren’t we? Crumbling shells, designed for vigor, with a short shelf life!

and then he was laughing, and his laughter was shrieking, it was the sound of suffering girls, oh God, and she could hear herself joining the choir, wanting to scream but laughing instead, and the hurt was there . . . it was there inside her . . . the hurting was present and past and future, and the hurting was God Himself.

He was only tangible so long as he was in The Home . . . where he and Mr. Friendlyman had become one.

He’d removed his teeth himself, knowing the ghosts inside him would rot them anyway.

The earth will rot beneath each footstep. All who see him will fall. All who hear his voice will weep and wail. He is the manifestation of destruction, death, and the end of all things on Earth. All of us will be forgotten. All our accomplishments. All the ways we lived. Soon, we’ll be fossils buried too deep for his kind to care to discover.