Dawn came with an array of pinks and purples against an orange backdrop, a signal for perfectly timed yawns and tired eyes to close. The majority adhered to this law of nature, most but a group of rebels who made the night their playground. This cluster of nonconformists lived on the fringes of society, excelling in the glory of shadows. Those elongated specters of beautiful extremes and layers, a creature whose features were a detriment, existed.
Black leathery wings whose veins and bones stuck out indelicately, limply hanging on its sides with a leisurely defeat. Fur sprouting in contrast over the rest of its frame, daring to deepen the chasm with brown instead of the traditional. A splendid mass of objectionable vulgarity served as a face, a strange assortment of features mashed together. Two ears pointed and cursed with gigantism grew from its head with comedic cruelty.
This carbon copy of every other was named Kat. She remained a spectacularly similar replica in all aspects but one. A defining feature that seeped the life from the tiny creature, maliciously tearing at any bright spot and obliterating the source. Each day, while the others retired to the safe harbors of their imaginations, those winding pathways of either glittering ceramics or mud, safely in the comfort of their wings. During this peaceful interlude, Kat rested on the edges of the cave. She watched the waning day longingly as the world of her dreams faded. These actions and desperations defined her every inkling or thought. In contrast, her nights were filled with dangling lollipops and sweet fibs to combat her reality, a lovely fantasy. A rollercoaster at its peak before taking a downward turn.
One day, a rumor landed in her ear, landing with a pop and planting itself to sprout instantly. A weed that grew nonsensically, spurring her imagination and fueling a crazed momentum. A whirlwind of snippets lacking details, essential pieces of the puzzle missing.
In the corners of society where the lowest slipped and sunk, a creature of lousy behavior occupied a cave. This dredge, called Drusilla, was infamous for all the wrong reasons beyond petty indiscretions. No, this eccentric claim was its ability to make anything happen. Its means beyond the realm of shady businesses. All the feeble-minded loafers looking for an easy route were easy targets. This kernel of gossip squatted in the back of her mind when something caught her attention one morning amid her daily pinning. It altered her mindset from a simple yearning to desperation, strictly being the stoic individual.
A ladybug crept across the ground with an ineffectual pair of bifocals and a cane, a toothy grin pulling at the wrinkled face. The distance between reality and its happiness displaced its mind as absentminded chaos controlled her face.
This sight kickstarted Kat’s appetite as the walking beefsteak disappeared from view. A dear and fleeting bit of perfection tainting the world with the cruel memory. The tainting allure left a nasty trail of lamentation behind.
All day, her dreams churned into nightmares, shadows disappearing beyond her reach, an intangible fantasy. A racing heart propelled her into consciousness, serving a heaping dose of her circumstances.
The next night, Kat rushed from the cave. She rummaged through the forest, degrading basic needs to nothing more than pests. Kat’s stomach pleaded and begged for respite, only to be taunted by her objective. Until she chanced upon a cave, a massive deterrent cropping up without subtly.
“what brings you to my abode?” a voice said with a southern twang as she stepped into the darkness—two specs glowed in the dark suddenly, their iridescence a distinct kind of terror. Straightening her shoulders, Kat began.
“You can make things happen?!” the words slung forward in a slurred and rushed way, a stitched-together mess nearly fumbled. Her muddled thought process was in action as every desire fought for dominance.
“Yes,” the simple and drawn-out syllable instantly overrode by the forthcoming diatribe, more obnoxious than detailed as it hoped around. It turned into a mediocre speech about nothing and everything at once, an awkward silence announcing its end.
“Is that all?” the edge of sarcasm completely wasted on Kat. Its perfect execution couldn’t compete with her self-absorption. “If I give you what you want, you must give me something I want,” the faulty alarm bells in her brain failed at the pivotal moment. “And what I want is your soul,” the words hardly made a dent or captured the weight of the situation, not even taking a moment to reflect, raise questions, or even weigh the consequences.
Instantly, Kat nodded as simple-minded focus struck. “You will have one day.”
The next moment, a scroll appeared in midair, unfurling around Kat as it glowed. It ended right before her eyes, a self-sufficient upstart as a pen materialized. An ostentatious mess in gold plating, a thick bolstering casing without the benefit of a thin frame. It opportunely hovered over the line she was to sign. And without fail, she placed her mark. The next second, the scroll poofed out of existence, replaced by a bubbling pink liquid.
“One day,” the voice said, a fading laugh attached to the end. Kat downed the contents.
A tongue-twisting disaster seared a trail down her throat, morphing into a gut-wrenching pain that drove away sense with all-consuming force.
The bright light of midday caught her attention first, shining down as she found herself beneath a tree. Leaves rained down casually, jumping ship that the time of year demanded. Kat sat gaping as the pieces refused to fall into place, remaining a walled-off slate. Kat sat amid a wonderland of foliage, perfection in every decaying inch as this new world opened.
A group of trees squeezed together, the various colors of their final stages a striking occurrence. The sight occupied Kat’s attention until a more exciting instance moved her eyes.
A beautiful trail of golden feathers caught her attention, that stream of gleaming and glittering aureate. She marveled at how grand she’d become as she realized her attachment to this display, from head to tailfeathers. Kat’s interpretation of happiness came in the form of a little jig. The sickening display only ended when a stray bug flew around, sobering her mind. Reality became the downer of her grand expectation, a minor scratch before returning to optimism.
Kat wandered forward in awe, taking in the scene with all the time she didn’t possess. Finally, after exasperation whispered its negativity and the first aches turned her mood, the precursor of delights appeared. It waddled along the edges of trees, obliviously happy in its bubble.
To Kat’s horror, it disappeared. It wandered behind a tree slowly and carefully, leaning from one foot to the next in a constant struggle for balance. Kat scurried after the creature with a shriek, a pulsating terror rushing her movements. Time, that inconvenient threat was piling up against her, leaving her behind. But, to Kat’s delight, she caught sight of her wandering meal along the edges of a pile of dirt. Meanevering beyond view the next second, much to the horror of the predator. With another shriek Kat would feel later, she rushed forward. Fear drove out every thought beyond the current objective.
Kat rounded the corner, the steep curtain falling into a big pile of nothing—an empty spot without a hint of suspicious activity. Kat’s eyes darted in every direction, scouring the area with a critical eye. Searching until a strange occurrence presented itself, a nearly imperceptible instance that only gave itself away by the cool breeze wafting from the depths. An almost invisible hole forgotten in the general scheme of the forest remained an unassuming peculiarity.
Kat threw herself into the opening with her typical thought process. The euphoric excitement was not to last as the tunnel dwindled into a narrow travesty, encroaching on her personal space. Kat fought against this oppressor, squeezing her frame through this claustrophobic shaft. The intense struggle carried on, nearly sending her into a spiral in its short-lived trajectory. If not for the dull light ahead, she may have spiraled. Kat caught sight of this anomaly between general whines, beckoning her beyond her struggles and toward the balmy glow. Its growth was the center of her misguided focus. A single erratic thought crossed her mind with careful perimeters.
Eventually, it materialized into a simple thing. Sticking slightly to the side in perfect askewness was a pole leading up to a peculiar box. Its sides were made entirely of glass and stood at an angle, topped off with a simple lid.
“Oy,” a thick accent called. “What are you doing?” in a huff, a large-scale ant stumbled forward in a three-piece suit, its elegance only enhanced by its words. Without establishing this refinement further, it grabbed Kat’s arm. Tearing her away from the lampost, that exquisite iridescence the like of which she’d never seen. Tugged along like a ragdoll, they came to a series of hobbled-together buildings that stood in the opposite direction. A block of run-down, torn-about towers overlooking a cobbled street, hardly resembling anything decent.
The firm grip led her down this street to a random edifice sporting more than a few missing bricks, the unlucky few windows missing those vital panes as jagged shards were the only remaining survivors. Through a door whose hinges were barely clinging together, an intense stink immediately commanded all attention. An indistinguishable mixture of the worst odors combined to form one massively supercharged, deadly reek. One minute, it was onions. The next rotten food appeared, only to be replaced by a wet dog. Sticking and clinging to every inch, the stench forced and wound around to choke and strangle. Kat found it hard to breathe.
An abundance of bugs filled the room, from a grasshopper to several beetles with a variety that would make an entomologist salivate. A forced-together cluster whose melancholic attitudes united them. With each glance directed Kat’s way, pity or malice dominated their faces.
“Ollie, I’ve got a new worker,” its head held high, a particular pride dominating its voice as it invested in its hype. The ant stuck its torso out as far as possible, a brief moment of unregulated confidence before deflating. It inched backward in anticipation of Ollie.
A vile, horrid creature emerged from the darkness. First came the spindly sources of terror, disjointed angles emerging like a frightening nightmare—only the start of the madness. Next, an innumerable set of eyes appeared, crowding its front as a pair of pinchers rested beneath. Its body consisted of two fused parts, the second an apparent afterthought.
“What is this?” a nasal voice said, disinterest attached to each word with an unimpressed air. Its question was never to be answered as a moment later, its mind concluded after only this brief interaction. “Put it in the cellar,” dismissing Kat as it moved back into the darkness.
Dragged to a door and pushed into a pitch-black void, Kat danced down the stairs. She nimbly landed at the bottom, a perfectly graceless tap dance that had her fighting with her limbs. Finally, her wild anatomy stalled out in the overwhelming darkness. She passed several minutes in restless indecision before relief arrived. The guise began to lift to reveal a small room of a simple design with only a wooden bench in the corner.
With this sight, Kat threw herself on these planks with the necessary dramatics, her inability to produce tears an added injustice.
“Could you kindly move?” a whisper had Kat jumping up, ready for confrontation. The overwhelming emptiness stared back, calling her sanity into question. With the second hand ticking by and no answers on the horizon, Kat settled back into the cozy comfort of complacency. Liking it to her imagination, the quirk of a delusional mind as it began to slip from her mind flippantly. But, despite convincing herself another blossoming step of progress, she flipped that diagnosis on its head.
A shape developed, amounting to a blurry spectacle that took its time to slide into formation. The whisp of fog quickly grew into a fully formed entity of translucence. A blank canvas in the form of a sheet, eyeholes cut into the fabric that betrayed nothing. A tophat sat haphazardly atop its head, skewed to the side without care.
“Many thanks,” placing itself on the bench, wiggling and twitching until set correctly and comfortably. Once satisfied, the creature leveled Kat with a stare before continuing. “Welcome to my abode,” it stated calmly, an edge of pride sticking to the words. “I’m Alvin. And you?”
“Kat,” the word sputtered out with the undignified trappings of spittle that followed in an airborne trajectory. Without comment, Alvin nodded. “Welcome.” This fading projection caused a stir in Kat’s heart, a whiff of isolation sending her into a frenzy. “Wait,” reaching toward the creature, “What are you doing here?” These vibrant and confident inflections felt the convictions of each.
“Well, that’s rather personal,” with just the right amount of emotion, never more than necessary, Alvin looked away. The undignified moors of such topics turned his head in disgust. The silence stretched into nothingness, bearing down with effortlessness. A long voyage into this madness, the insufferable stillness drove the minutes along. Kat felt this immensely, about to burst from the strain. She reached her breaking point a moment later, and the first thing to come to mind ejected itself from her mouth without those pesky thoughts.
“Know a way out of here?” a chuckle accompanied the so-called joke, choosing a ridiculous path to a conversation without much expectation. As a result, Alvin fidgeted and spasmed as it looked down. This unease ultimately ended with him bounding upwards.
“I can’t take it anymore,” he sprang up, gliding to a corner before turning to face Kat. “There’s a hole.”
Kat rushed forward, desperately groping at nothing in particular until the crinkling of paper gave away the location. She pulled it away as a shaft of light announced her escape route. Without comment, she dove into the space. Kat crawled upwards and caked every inch of herself in the dirt, hurrying up the incline with glee.
“Well! Goodbye, and you’re welcome,” Alvin spoke indignantly.
Not long after, two pions stood as tension escalated. Lost in hand gestures and exasperated motions, that intoxicating form of expressions. It remains the most exhilarating height of social interaction.
“How did this happen? Drusilla’s not going to like this,” this creepy crawler of the centipede variety shoved the other before stomping up the stairs, the other following behind with shouts of anger. It became a competition for the upper hand and reverberated through the building.
Meanwhile, a particular mist filled the air before disappearing again, floating into oblivion.
“It was me,” Alvin spoke quietly, giggling in the darkness.
Time was slipping from Kat. She searched the street on the city’s edge, carefully evaluating each face until they hurried away with concern.
“Over there!” these shouts of her previous captures wafted into her ears. Just as Kat found the object of her desire, her captivation cut short of its potential when the shrill overtones flustered her into movement.
“Let me help you,” wandering up to the lady who tipped from side to side. The teetering creature looked up and smiled, possessively clinging to Kat’s wing as they made contact.
“Hello dearie, thank you! What’s your name?” patting Kat’s wing before launching a tirade of random topics as they approached a walkway.
Those nasty gnats closed in, ready to wrap their claws around Kat. Their unstable footfalls took more and more of her attention.
“Help me up, dearie,” refusing to return her wing, Kat’s victim quickly fell into her lap.
The door closed just as the pair rushed up the walkway, horrified expressions watching their catch slip behind their reach. The clicking lock ended the
competition, finalizing the point accompanied by frantic pounding.
“Do you hear something, darling?”
“Nope,” Kat responded happily, nothing to displace this attitude.
A small room unfolded, with only a large table and a china cabinet to crowd the space. Along the wall, a ridiculous amount of tiny frames wrapped with attempts at design. Vines and flowers were the vague descriptions surrounding the felines in various poses. Their eyes looked at Kat with accusation.
“Come and sit down,” the creature spoke as she wandered away, leaving Kat amid the pink disaster. As time ticked, Kat’s impatience fought with either a blatant attack or tactical advantage. Neither was wholly right or wrong.
The ladybug returned with a tray equipped with an arsenal of choice foods. She handed Kat a fork before again wandering off with that omnipresent smile.
This torturous episode of self-inflicted misery continued until the third or fourth trip when the ladybug took a hard look at Kat. “Oh, you look tired,” the ladybug said, then led Kat away and up a staircase.
It was a bare room with a bed draped in a colorful quilt that was the sole source of color.
Once tucked in with little pats and goodnight, the lady stepped away.
Lights turned off one by one as the lady traversed the tiny house. Kat spent an ordinate amount of time struggling to keep her eyes open, waiting until snoring came from the other room.
She crept into the hallway, arriving at the doorway of her victim. Her silent steps led Kat closer until she hovered over the body. Her wings were ready to grasp the creature, to finish the deed, when a new problem presented itself. A spark of consciousness blew into a blaze, uncontrollably inflamed beyond being able to be snuffed out. It seared its way through her frame, accompanied by frustration.
The following day, the lady awoke to find a still and empty property. The stillness pealed as loud as an ensemble band. In the next room, only the pulled-away covers held a clue.
“Well! How rude!” a force of resentment committed to her feelings, a story reserved as a bonding experience over tea time later. Outside, the pions lay on the steps, snoring into tranquil peace.
Although nobody could say what had happened to Kat, there were times when the occasional cloud bore a shocking resemblance.