Mannika Mishra

Dearest

My darling lives in dark brown woods. That is where he lives. His house lies surrounded by dry hisses of gorse bushes.

The rest of the forest is moist green and no light reaches the ground

Dead (things) leaves litter the ground of the woods where my love lives.

His house is long and black and low and alone. But he is not alone. He lives there with an old woman with a broken neck. She wears a purple dress with a high collar and weeds trail after her and grow on her purple skirts.

She puts a china plate on a tray. There are already some things on the tray

there is a clay pot

some toast with pale green mould on it

a jar filled with thick yellow liquid

a delicate little cup filled with sugar

severe white and purple slices of aubergine

She carries the tray through halls and corridors and through dull mahogany doors and (finally) finally enters a room with a long low table where he sits

Yes. I do take thee to be mine oh isn’t he beautiful? My sweetheart wears a suit of the darkest blue. His hands lie in front him hairless and white, his nails translucent. His lips are a pale pale pale pink and his eyes are a dark dark dark black.

The woman puts the tray down in front of him.

He reaches a hand slowly smoothly sinuously for the silverware and (slowly, smoothly, sinuously) spreads the yellow liquid on his toast. The smell of raw eggs rises into the air.

He eats it slowly, with relish and with small echoing wet gulps. He licks his lips quickly and neatly with a flick of his tongue after each bite.

My dearest weeps to himself when he finishes

and the woman has left. Tears run down his fine cheeks and he feels oh so alone so very very alone

alone with the dead

he rages and smashes things vases furniture windo

He sees the pot made of clay sitting innocently in front of him. He picks it up and examines it curiously. It feels cold and smooth and damp. It smells of wet earth. He inhales the smell long and slow and deep, yes

He takes the lid off

*

And picks up a tiny green caterpillar the colour of fresh, young leaves.

He puts it in his mouth where it lays twenty three eggs. The worm crawls out of his smiling mouth slowly; fat, blind and milky white now.

The eggs fall towards the base of his throat as he tilts his head back and in the midst of their fall moths erupt from within them, unfurling dark furry wings as they block all air

My sweeting is happy now.

He waits for the woman to bring him food the next morning.

bio:

Mannika's fiction has been published on Hazlitt and Your Impossible Voice, and a story is forthcoming in Gargoyle Magazine. Other writing has been published in indie zines like Into the Fold, Daughters of Didion, and Contemporary Lynx. She is currently directing a short film which she wrote, and working on multimedia research projects in India.