Dark Across the Bay

by Ania Ahlborn

Every family is an isolated incident. Worthy of investigation. No matter how good or bad you have it, there’s darkness and there’s joy. There’s confusion and miscommunication. There’s someone who isn’t speaking their mind and there’s someone who’s speaking theirs too often.

For, what is family if not an entity with an unavoidable voice? An organism the defies easy classification? And, even when all the members are asleep, a thing that yet dreams?

It’s going to be a disaster or a revelation. There will be no in-between.

But that was Lark’s Achilles heel. She told people too much. Trusted too quickly. Loved too hard.

Rain was, after all, one of the only things that seemed to quell the anxiety that constantly lurked beneath her skin.

And if you can’t handle a bump in the night, the voice inside his head whispered, then you’re more far-gone than you think.

Because when grief putrefied, all that was left was the black sludge of vengeance.