The day after I got your letter, I walked half a day into the wind’s scoured territory. After an hour I realized I’d forgotten a weapon & picked up a no-parking sign.
There were engine noises in the distance, but whatever was humming & shrieking, loud & louder, never turned the corner. So I turned around. And now I’m at my house & my right pocket is full of softening teeth...
I’m still trying to digest your letter. I’m still trying to understand the blood & shit smeared on the front door of my house, the broken windows. How it looks like the trees burned.
I think you’re sick so often because you’ve been practicing bad hygiene. Have you been washing your hands in between rampages?
Okay, that was a dig. But your symptoms…they sound a lot like radiation sickness.
I spent most of the last before-day in the basement vault at the bank where I work, doing the monthly security check. So maybe I missed the detonation. Or maybe I’m only a few weeks behind you & I’ll soon be adding my cavity-ridden teeth to the collection in my pocket…
I find myself rattling them like coins.
Also, there’s no fresh food left. Except root vegetables. And, as my daughter noted once, turnip tastes like ass.
I’m antsy. I feel like climbing into the tallest tree I can find and watching the neighbourhood, to see what’s moving out there.
Shit. There’s noise outside. Gotta go!
But hold on. Please!
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Or, if you'd prefer to hear it rather than read it:
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This was part eighteen of our exquisite corpse. Darryl Joel Berger's seventeen can be found here:
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