This is what you want, isn’t it? You want to know what I saw in that house. You want me to describe it as though it were like any other organism on Earth. Well, it isn’t. What I saw is like no living creature. It was made out of darkness.

This was not my mother’s house anymore. But with every room full of her memories, it would always feel that way. I had to shake whatever imprints she’d left behind. I had to remove her from the atmosphere.

I couldn’t look at Nyla. I couldn’t feel anything but cold all over. The shadow person stopped pacing and stood just behind us. It bent down, long arms spreading wide, resting its clawed hands on the back of the couch.

He told me he was worried about the old guy inside the house. I felt my stomach start to harden as I told him I was the only one who lived there. “Ma’am, I don’t want to alarm you,” he said. “But there’s someone inside. I can see him moving around through the window. Tall, thin, hard of hearing? He was walking sort of hunched over.”

It was the best and the worst three days of my life. It was the best because I felt like a good mother for the first time. It was the best because I was falling in love for the first time. It was the worst because, well, you know why. That’s why you’re here. To know the worst of it.

We are all just playing chess. On a roller coaster. In a hurricane. I don’t know what your plan is, but I want to enjoy as much of the ride as possible. Even if I lose a few pieces off the chess board, I guess it doesn’t matter as long as I can use my brain.

When the people of Gruntings get up in the morning, they roll out of bed and fall right into a mud pile they have on floor. It’s standard in the Gruntings culture to be covered in mud all day long. To be seen without mud all over your body would be like any of us stepping outside to see our neighbor mowing the grass naked.

You’ll know years before her death that the time was going to come soon. What you won’t realize is how you’ll lose her before she’s actually gone.

I turned back to the window. The drones hovered only a moment, then toured to the right to spy through another apartment window like hornets trying to find their way into a hive. Some bored dudes in quarantine were probably trying to score a peep show.

Shockingly, I was placed on the ground outside. Outside! This had never happened before. My fear washed away and I was overwhelmed by the feel of grass, the way the light touched my skin. I stretched out into the dirt, face down, and breathed as though I’d never breathed before.