100 Words

I’m wasting your time. 

I’m wasting mine too. 

Ticking down the timer until the bees come out. 

The bees that have been trained to eat our flesh and render us down to just our bones. They’ll liquify our bodies for their sweet, taboo honey. It will be sold in tasteful jars in cedar lined back rooms to those with big enough bank accounts. They’ll write our first names on the labels with a little edition number. 

Lacey-Jane 00/100 it will say. 

How modern they’ll exclaim.

Then we’ll be together, a gift on the shelf, too expensive to be eaten.

The light rippled through the leaves, falling in strange patterns on the wall. 

On a bare mattress on the floor lay a sorcerer, trying to stay cool on this hot day. 

He was stripped to stained boxers and his morning coffee sat nearby on the floor, a cool sweet sludge attracting flies. 

Soon he’d have enough flies, and he could trap a spider. 

A good, fat spider would get him a bird. 

And with that bird he could catch a cat. 

And with the cat he could–hopefully–attract a child. 

A nice, sweet child was such good bait for the demons.

The sorcerer at night. 

He changed my brother into a cat. 

He did it with a knife, slicing away his small boy skin–revealing a sleek black cat with a heart-shaped nose. 

In the morning my mother didn’t remember my brother. Everyone did not remember my brother. Chuckling softly, but with eyes that held a sadness they couldn’t recall. 

If you don’t mind your mother’s words, a wicked sorcerer will cut your brother down to a tiny cat. You too will be looking to change him back. 

With only my own skin, I pursue a knife that mends. For my brother.