A Real Monster

An old, outdated chapter that has been reworked into a short.

A Real Monster
By Alira Cohen

The forest was alive on this night, pregnant with the sounds of cicadas and crickets.
His red raw hands swam in the dirt. It speckled his knuckles and palms like blotches on a cow. Earthworms wriggled between his fingers. Clovers sprouted from the earth in his wake. He heard the wind moving through each leaf and branch like a song, like the trees could speak and their voices were desperately trying to reach him. His jaw, all bone, all naked, rasped as he acknowledged them:
“What do you say to me?
What must be so important, that I must heed you, when you never move?”
He laughed, a gentle sound that drifted from the meaty chambers of his purple throat and hovered meekly in the air. The nightbirds whistled from far above him, perhaps in competition with the fragile melody that had left his maw. They watched him safely from their homes in the treetops. When he looked upward, he could see how the dark, twisty branches caged his view of the sky.
He heard everything. The sounds of restless animals, the sounds of young plants reaching up from beneath the soil, the sounds of people. Many times, he would try to drown out that last one…unless, of course, he felt like they were getting too close.
The skinless, furless flesh that made up his form began to bubble along his abdomen. He let out a dry sigh. As he hunched, his arms dangling and horse-head hanging low, pink buds erupted with fervor from his belly. It was sharp, but quick. The pain, if he could even call it that anymore, was fleeting. It was akin to a thousand needles for one moment, and then a fizzy numbness for the next several. His blood, cherry-black and thick, trickled down his body like honey. The buds could now breathe. And he felt them. He felt them breathing. Their little petals clutched tightly together like tiny clenched fists. He pulled the hanging portions of the moss-blanket that had grown from his back downward and together across his chest, using them like a robe, a small piece of comfort.
Things grew from him every day. There was one month when so many bright green vines hung from his vocal chords. Eventually, though, they unraveled and fell dead. That was a sad day for him. The things that grew from his body normally stayed with him for longer periods of time. He imagined that these little buds would soon grow into bright pink flowers, and adorn him with beauty that he felt he didn’t deserve.
He sank to his knees and leaned against the trunk of an aging oak. The fungi that made their home at its base were much duller in color than the ones that grew from his shoulders. He knew that he blended in almost perfectly here, despite what some may have thought. He, a huge mass of plants and meat, a thing the likes of which matched no human nor animal in all of planet Earth, could have been expected to be easy to spot in a forest. But he was one with the foliage, and knew his dwelling inside and out. It mattered not to him if he left signs of his existence behind for humans to find, mostly because such a thing was unavoidable. Whenever he had to deal with human folly, he did so.
He began to feel himself sinking. Sleep was overtaking him. He rose to his feet, knowing that he would need to travel to the depths of the forest, a pocket which remained unexplored by humans. It was the only place he could rest peacefully. He gently poked at some of the buds that had burst out of his stomach. They were so delicate. So precious. He wondered if they loved him as he loved them.
Out of nowhere, he suddenly grew wise to the sound of human footfalls nearby. He scrambled forward into the brush, trying to make as little noise as possible. He heard giggling, groaning, and the sound of skin on skin. He had been around long enough to know what it was, and he paid little thought to it. What interested him, but didn’t surprise him at all, were their words coming through the shadows:
“Doesn’t this scare you? It could see us at any moment.”
More giggling.
“It.” He knew what they spoke of.
The tragedy of being called “it” was not lost on him. But he didn’t blame humanity for that mistake. It was his tragedy to be forever misunderstood. It was the human tragedy to misunderstand, and to be so confident in misunderstanding. That would never change.
He wasn’t afraid that they’d seen him; he knew they hadn’t. It was simply that his “legend” was very well known around these parts. It was a cursed thing that he was confined to only one territory for the next hundred years, right here in Blue Hill. He never stopped to wonder what he’d done to deserve that fate. There were worse territories to be stationed in. He just wished he was free.
He stood before the black wall of foliage at the end of the path. It moved aside for him, and he could see the violet abyss that was the mouth of the forest depths, the place he belonged. Now that he was safe from being potentially spotted, it amused him that two humans had traveled so far into their half of the forest just to rub bits. He laughed about it…that long, dry, quiet laugh.

Author's Note

As always, respectful feedback is greatly appreciated.

Reviews

[Soren]

Such a creative tale of transformation. Conscious reincarnation as a plant so far from human conception. I love it having respect for all life forms, feeling none superior to another only different.

[Alira]

Thank you!! I’m glad you enjoyed it and I love your interpretation of the narrative

[Joss Jeffrey]

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