My lighter kisses the cigarette. The flame eats the paper and licks the filter. It nibbles the tips of my fingers and disintegrates in black clumps. Embers are carried away by the wind.
If I reach my hand out the window, I could touch the rat carcass that hangs between the fork of a tree branch. Yellowed bones, exposed, held into place by the bare minimum muscle it needs to not fall apart. A butcherbird hung the rat’s body a few days ago. It came back and hacked away at the tissue. Peeled off ribbons of flesh. Once satisfied, the songbird flew away, leaving the decomposing rat behind.
I adjust the tarpaulin on my lap. Piles of ash pool in the centre of the blue, plastic surface. This blue is vibrant, a contrast with the sky now milky with cataracts. Shitty midwinter weather.
Something inside my chest rattles. Moans. On the wall, I’ve tally marked the days that have passed since I attended therapy. Seventeen days. Engraved them with a butcher’s knife. When was the last time I ate something?
I look at the dead rat. Its ribs are spread like angel wings.
Chapter 6.1, now up on Wattpad!
Click here to read it.
sandpapertongue 