Maeve Fly

by C.J. Leede

My kind of debauchery soils not only my body and my thoughts, but also … the vast starry universe, which merely serves as a backdrop. —Georges Bataille, Story of the Eye

You do not need a moral and noble story to do what you want. You do not first need to be a victim to become a monster.

The rage. So much more real than the blood inside me. So much more powerful than love or fear or death.

Fear. Excitement. Too difficult to distinguish between the two. Too … disarming.

I have never understood, and still do not understand the notion that a woman must first endure a victimhood of some sort—abandonment, abuse, oppression of the patriarchy—to be monstrous. Men have always been permitted in fiction and in life to simply be what they are, no matter how dark or terrifying that might be. But with a woman, we expect an answer, a reason. But why would she do it? Why, why, why?

never stop moving, fill your time, and fill it wisely. If you cannot fill it wisely, then fill it exquisitely.

But every day in this life, we’re all only telling each other, and ourselves, stories. We may as well make them good.