{"id":428,"date":"2018-02-12T22:59:20","date_gmt":"2018-02-12T22:59:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/?p=428"},"modified":"2024-10-17T16:57:08","modified_gmt":"2024-10-17T15:57:08","slug":"flash-fiction-hungry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/2018\/02\/12\/flash-fiction-hungry\/","title":{"rendered":"Hungry"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018I don\u2019t think you need to highlight it for me with the big red circle,\u2019 she said. \u2018I mean, thing kinda stands out all on its own, don\u2019t it?\u2019
\u2018Yeah,\u2019 Evan said, \u2018I suppose you\u2019re right.\u2019
\u2018I suppose I am.\u2019
He tapped the screen. The circle vanished. He angled the display back at her again. The girl squinted and scrunched up her freckled nose and poked her tanned face into the phone\u2019s screen like someone sixty years her senior.
\u2018What the hell is it supposed to be anyways?\u2019
\u2018That\u2019s what I came back to find out,\u2019 he said.
\u2018Came back?’
\u2018Yeah, I rode through here a couple days ago. Was reviewing the helmet cam and tail cam footage-\u2019
Evan stopped. The look on the girl\u2019s face said it all, said she had no idea what the hell a \u201ccam\u201d of any description was. \u2018A video camera, you know? I got a little one on my helmet and one on the back of the bicycle, facing rearwards. Just in case I get into an accident or something. Was going through the footage from the one out back and it picked this up. Lot of rocks along that trail, lot of bouncing up and down. This is the clearest grab I could get.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n


\u2018Yeah. And?\u2019
\u2018And\u2026 I couldn\u2019t get it out of my head. Wanted to find out who or what it was.\u2019
\u2018Who or what do you think it is?\u2019 the girl asked, starting to walk away, back up the path toward the porch.
The house was some turn-of-the-century-before-last, ramshackle affair, choked with weeds and overgrown foliage, the windows thick with grime and dust.
\u2018You live here?\u2019 said Evan.
\u2018Some of the time.\u2019
\u2018Some of the time? Oh, like a summer house,\u2019 he said. Would explain the state of the place. It was early in the season. Real early. As in hadn\u2019t-properly-begun-yet-but-Evan-had-decided-to-cut-college-anyway-early early. Maybe her parents were on the way here or gone to get cleaning supplies. Christ knew they were going to need them. All of them. Every chemical cleaning agent the store had.
Big old place too.
Too big for her to be living out here on her own.
There was something about the girl. Something na\u00efve. Something not quite right, but something damned undeniable.
\u2018Miss?\u2019
She stopped and turned around to him.
\u2018Yeah?\u2019
To hell with it. \u2018Can I come in?\u2019
\u2018I never said you couldn\u2019t. What are you waiting for? An invitation? You a vampire or sumthin?\u2019
\u2018Nope. I\u2019m not a vampire.\u2019
\u2018Glad to hear it. Come on then.\u2019
Okay then.
He jumped the gate. Not out of any need to put on a courtship display. The thing simply wouldn\u2019t budge, its hinges seized with inactivity. Hopefully a couple of gallons of WD-40 were on her parents\u2019 shopping list too.
\u2018You got a name?\u2019 he asked, as she wrenched the screen door open.
\u2018Sure.\u2019
Funny. And cute as hell.
\u2018And it is\u2026\u2019
\u2018Harper.\u2019
\u2018\u201dHarper\u201d. I like that. Unusual.\u2019
\u2018Not really. Not as unusual as that picture of yours. Go on. Show it to me again.\u2019
Evan unlocked the screen and handed the phone to Harper. \u2018So whereabouts is this?\u2019 she asked.
\u2018Trail just above us here, behind the trees.\u2019 He craned his neck and looked up into the hills backing onto the house. \u2018Actually, directly above us, I think. Here, let me see the picture, the GPS details are tagged on the image.\u2019
Harper fumbled as she handed the phone back to him and it fell out of her hand, bouncing on the porch with a crack and then falling through a gap in the boards.
\u2018Crap,\u2019 Evan groaned.
She didn\u2019t say anything. Not about the phone anyway.
\u2018Just looked like a jogger to me. Stopped to stretch as they crossed the road.\u2019
\u2018I don\u2019t think so.\u2019
\u2018Grey sweatpants, one of them hooded tops. Kinda obvious.\u2019
\u2018Is there a way to get under the porch, under the house?\u2019 Evan started down the steps.
\u2018Get it later. It\u2019s not going anywhere. Why don\u2019t you come inside? It\u2019s hot out here. And I\u2019m hungry. Real hungry<\/em>.\u2019 She disappeared inside, letting the screen door bang behind her.
The speed at which he was able to turn on his heels and follow Harper was matched only by the speed at which he could read between the lines.
It took him a couple of tugs to get the screen door open again for himself. It led him into what might have been the living room.
Might.
The house\u2019s interior was a match for its exterior. Dust motes swarming in air that could be best described as brown, the place reeked of damp and vegetation and rot. The furniture looked like it was fused to the floor, laminated in funk.
If somebody lived here, it had been decades ago, not months.
And it may have been noon, but the lack of light caused by the filth on the windows meant it may as well have been midnight. Difficult to see much of anything.
Harper\u2019s voice came from somewhere within.
It had an echoey quality to it.
The bathroom?
\u2018You know,\u2019 she called, \u2018I recognize you.\u2019
\u2018You do?\u2019 Evan took a step forward, trying to pinpoint her position. There was a hall. And at the end of it, on the right, a door, slightly ajar. It opened and her silhouette exited swiftly, padding on what sounded like bare feet into another room, directly facing him, the door of which she threw wide open to reveal what was clearly a bedroom.
\u2018Yeah,\u2019 she said. \u2018I think I saw you, on your little bicycle. Yeah it was definitely you alright. I\u2019d recognize that ass anywhere.\u2019
Her top flew through the air and hooked on to the door handle.
Evan ventured down the hall.
Her denim cut-offs followed.
As he reached the door, her panties joined them.
\u2018Maybe you recognize me?\u2019 she said.
He stepped into the room as another garment, one she hadn\u2019t been wearing before, hit him in the face. A silk night gown. He peeled it off and held it out in front of him. Flesh-colored, like pantyhose, with a hood of some kind. It had a face on it.
A human face.
A girl\u2019s face.
Harper\u2019s face.
Her actual face.
No, not silk.
Skin.
\u2018Well?\u2019 said Harper.
He looked up to see her crouched on the bed, coiled like a mountain lion, poised to pounce.
Naked.
Completely naked.
Of clothing.
Of underwear.
Of human skin and hair. In its place, a smooth, matte gray hide that was almost rubber in nature, like a wetsuit. The head was hairless, bald. The ears were nothing but small indentations on either side. No nose to speak of. Just two tiny holes for nostrils, beneath totally black eyes that were without pupils and fixed on him. Just two tiny holes for nostrils, above a mouth from which a black tongue forked the air, the similarly black gums within lined with dozens of razor-sharp, piranha-like teeth.
The floor was sticky, for sure, but something more primeval held Evan\u2019s feet in place.
The creature held up a finger with a two-inch long, shiny black claw and pinched the air between it and her thumb. \u2018That picture of yours. Of me. I was this close to you. Nothing’s ever outrun me before. Must have been those wheels of yours. But you don’t have them now. You wanted to know who or what I was. What does it matter? Only things you need to know are that this time you will not get away. And that I was not lying before. I am hungry. Real hungry<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018I don\u2019t think you need to highlight it for me with the big red circle,\u2019 she said. \u2018I mean, thing kinda stands out all on its own, don\u2019t it?\u2019\u2018Yeah,\u2019 Evan said, \u2018I suppose you\u2019re right.\u2019\u2018I suppose I am.\u2019He tapped the screen. The circle vanished. He angled the display back at her again. The girl squinted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-428","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-flash-fiction","category-short-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=428"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1391,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428\/revisions\/1391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}