Short Reads for Short Days and a Sneak Peek at Eric LaRocca’s They Were Here Before Us

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ALL THAT REMAINS IS YOURS TO KEEP

I can still so distinctly recall the moment when it first happened to me: the crucial, soul-defining moment when I realized that I loved her and loved her in such a way that I understood I could never fully possess her as I had always intended.

Perhaps “love” wasn’t exactly the right word.

In fact, perhaps “love” was far too benign of a word given the intensity of my feelings for her.

After all, the word “love” usually implies that there are two consenting individuals, both capable of giving and receiving respect, admiration, esteem, tenderness. Though she might have once loved me — might have cared for me, nurtured me the way I had hoped, the way I had dreamed and wanted — that opportunity was now decidedly nonexistent, considering the fact that she was dead and had been dead for several weeks when my parents first stumbled upon her corpse in a shallow ditch not far from a busy motorway.

For my siblings and I, she was our first cradle, our bassinet — the very framework of our existence. All thirty of us were more than grateful for her body as we had already begun to make
our home, our refuge, our haven from the delicate intricacy of her cadaver. Her nostrils were our secret passageways where we could lose ourselves, where we could wander aimlessly until we were found. Her lips were our velvet cushions, luxurious pillows where we could sleep and dream until our next feeding. Her pried-open, ever-vigilant eyes — our relaxing sauna, far more preferable and far more tepid than any mountain spring. Her flesh — our holy communion, our sacred bond, the thing that kept us tethered as a family.

We had gorged ourselves on her body’s offerings day in and day out, our parents sometimes feeding us with bits of her they had taken and tucked away for safekeeping. For a family of beetles, we were keenly aware just how fortunate, how privileged we were to maintain such a luxurious environment. Our parents often regaled us with tales of former residences where they had to make do with the corpse of a shrew or the rotted body of a small possum. To find a human so healthy and in such excellent condition as she hadn’t been dead for too long was a work of pure magic, an object of enchantment.

Of course, as I look back on the moment when it first occurred to me that I loved her and loved her in earnest, I comprehended that those feelings, those sentiments, were present as long
as I had been a living thing — a measly insect that crawls, creeps, and chews its way through the brawn of existence.

After all, her body was all I had ever known.

Still, as I looked back and recalled the moment I had first described these feelings as “love,” I realized I had always been innately curious as to how such a radiant, mesmerizing creature ended up flat on her back in a small ditch hidden away in the darker corner of a lonely thicket. I couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to her. I wondered why she always appeared frightened, her eyes and mouth permanently open as if forever caught in the moment of some terrible surprise. I wondered why parts of her silky auburn hair were now crusted black with bits of dried blood as dark as motor oil.

I yearned to know her secrets. Perhaps the most beguiling and mystifying one had to do with the fact that her stomach was always distended. Our parents assured us that this was normal and that all different types of bodies often decompose in such a way that causes them to bloat obscenely or inflate with gases.

Regardless, I will always recall the moment when I was crawling my way across her belly and I felt a distinct sense of affection, an indescribable feeling of joy and how it seemed to overcome me almost instantly. It wasn’t because I felt safe or because I knew my parents cared for their brood in such a way that meant we would never want for anything as long as we lived. Although those feelings were quite frequent and were well founded given the love we were afforded, the thought that suddenly came crashing into my mind had nothing to do with that.

It was a tremendous, remarkable moment — when I realized that I loved her and loved her for far more than the mere use of her body as my home, my shelter. It wasn’t long until I found myself scurrying across her face and weaving in between her nostrils, playing a game with myself that I knew she might appreciate if she were able to see me in all my glory.

A curious part of me wondered if she might be disgusted with me, if she might despise me for all I had taken from her or simply detest me for the fact that I was a mere bug — a small, pathetic insect undeserving of such beauty, such magnificence, such grace. After all, my parents had ravaged her and made a nest, a viable home in her body for their starving, insatiable young.

To her, we might have been monsters. Perhaps we were. But she didn’t object. How could she?