I carefully make my way across the crispy autumn leaves upon the floor so as to not make a noticeable sound. There's still a faint crunch but it's definitely not as noticeable as kicking them up in your strides. I smelled smoke on the wind and decided to follow it, knowing it would lead me to someone. I'm able to see a bit better as the sun continues to drop below the horizon as the gentle breeze starts to kick up. This helps me pinpoint the fire even better as I'm easily able to follow it now.

After about 15 minutes of walking I reach a clearing and dip behind a tree and carefully peek out. I can see two campers dressed in matching flannels and jeans resting around a campfire up on a small hill, laughing and drinking beers as they roast my favorite treat, marshmallows. I cautiously get down onto all fours and creep towards them, crawling up the hill in the shadow of a large oak.

“Ya know there have been sightings of a monster out here right Terry?”

The man says as he takes a stick and pokes it into the campfire kicking up some ashes.

“Quit pulling my leg Gus.”

“I'm serious! They say it's some sort of  a deer monster like one of them wendigo’s in Native American legend or whatever!”

This Gus guy pulls the stick out, the tip of it now burning. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a cigarette and ignites it with the flaming wood. I peek out a bit from behind the tree.

“They eat people and stuff!”

I notice this Terry fellow looking a bit more nervous. He shuffles in his rusty folding chair then looks at Gus with a mortified expression. “Lucky for me one of them is chicken shit, these people should be easy to deal with.” I thought to myself as I began to slowly and cautiously creep out from behind the tree, claws at the ready. 

“There's no way that could be real, no way.” He said.

“I don't know man, we live in a world with lizard men from space and cell creatures the size of basketballs. I wouldn’t put it past whatever sick God we have to have made something like that.” Gus then looks towards the tree I was behind and  notice’s me.

“HOLY FUCKING SHIT!”, he yells and drops their marshmallow to the ground as Terry immediately snaps to look where his buddy is looking. Both of their faces run white as they look at each other, get up, and book it towards their incredibly beat up pick up truck. They hop in and book it down a dirt road leaving a trail of dust and all their belongings. At this point I stand tall and cautiously get closer to the fire, staying behind the seats they left so as to not get too close to the fire as it scares me greatly for what it can do to me. Even though it's damn terrifying, I know smelling one means food. I quickly reach around to the front of the chair and pluck up the marshmallow and pop it in my mouth. The delicious sugary sweet flavor taking over my tongue as its warm goo spills out over it. If I could smile and shut my eyes they would be for the absolute bliss this marshmallow has provided me. 

I look at their tent, and spot a reflective silver plastic upon the flap of it. I look at my own reflection, a bit of marshmallow goop is running down my lower jawbone. I wipe it off with one of my sharp claws then lick it off. I noticed a bit of a crack on my right eye socket that must have been caused from that fall I took a few weeks back off of a cliff and a bit of damage to my antlers on that side as well. I pluck a leaf off of my dark ash gray fur and watch it float towards the floor as I drop it before it's whisked away towards the fire and it caught alight. The updraft of the flames sending the smoldering leaf up into the sky. I back up a bit in fear as I watch the leaf vanish in flames. I turn back to the tent and pull open the flap and look inside to find only sleeping bags. I grunt in disappointment not finding any more food in there and look back towards the fire and notice by the other seat a whole bag of marshmallows sitting next to it, an old rusty machete mounted to a stick too as well as a portable cassette player. I walk around the fire to the chair, pull it back a bit away from the fire and sit in it. The legs of it bow under my weight a bit but thankfully doesn’t give out. I take a marshmallow from the bag and eat it. Not as good as when they’re gooey but still delicious. 

It's been several months since I figured out that sugar seems to mostly suppress my blood lust and hunger for humans, lizards and any sort of being. Most of the time now I consume other creatures of the wood, the occasional stray dog for example, or even a corpse if I’m desperate. This is the first time in two months though that I’ve been able to find a full bag of marshmallows to devour.

I reach for the cassette player and hit the play button and it starts a little ways into a song about a spirit in the sky. After a moment I get a bit confused as to how I knew how to work this thing but in the end I shrug it off and relax a bit as I let the singing and guitar riffs play out while I take marshmallow after marshmallow and consume them. After a couple minutes the song faded out into ‘Vacation’ a song I vividly remember the name of. Befuddled by this, I pause the tape to think for a moment. How could I know this song if I have never heard it before? I think long and hard for several seconds before recalling what that one guy said about wendigo's and being formerly human; though I'm pretty sure they don't have a deer skull like mine so I'm likely something similar to that. I look down at my long clawed fingers as I ponder this and have a revelation. “I must have been human.” I speak my thoughts aloud in my deep gravely airy voice. “Since I was once a human this might be a memory from beforehand same with me knowing exactly how to work that cassette player.” I lean back a bit and consume a few more marshmallows. 

I looked to my left and glanced at the machete spear. Then at the treat in my hand.
“I wonder if I can put a marshmallow on the end of this and cook it in the fire like those men were doing.” I knew it would be a bit scary to do so but I did it anyway. I took a marshmallow and stuck it on the tip of the spear and took it by its wooden handle and shoved it into the fire. After a few seconds I pull it out of the campfire and…Oh God, oh fuck, the marshmallow is on fire! I panic, my heart going from a state of rest to about to have a heart attack as I jump up from my seat. Just then a loud crack rings out from behind me and the marshmallow explodes, flaming pieces going everywhere. Thankfully none of it got on my fur as I would have been toast. I quickly turn around and see the two men have come back with someone else, someone with a scoped gun.

“GOD DAMMIT YOU MISSED CARLOS!” Gus yelled. “SHOOT IT NOW BEFORE IT DECIDES TO MAKE US IT'S SUPPER!” 

“Fucking Christ you don't have to yell straight into my ear!” Carlos yells in return looking rather annoyed by Gus as he works the bolt action.

I hear the crackling of the fire grow louder and I look back at it and see that dry leaves were set alight by the bits of burning marshmallow.“I better get out of here fast, that fire is really moving!” I grab the cassette player and wedge it in a tight spot on my left antler and I get down on all fours and start to book it down the dirt road away from the fire looking for some sort of fireproof structure. The men yell in terror as I run straight towards them and Carlos misses another shot at me in his panic. I run past them and keep going down the road as the forest soon catches fire. After a minute I hear the roar of an engine and another gunshot rings out and its bullet hits my antler cracking it. The roar of the trucks engine gets louder by the second as it gets closer to me. At the last second before it hits me I jump into the tree line and keep on running. Shortly after I trip and fall forward and slide across the ground and down a steep slope. I roll down the hill for several seconds before coming to a stop right in front of an old bomb shelter.

“Lucky break, shelter.” I said to myself as I slowly got up from the ground and looked around a bit more. I can see the ruins of several flattened and long ago scorched houses through the naked trees. I sit for a moment and wonder what this place must have been like before whatever calamity struck this long dead neighborhood. I turn to the thick rusted door of the bomb shelter and put my hands on the handle of it and pull. It scrapes across the leaf covered concrete as its hinges wail from me pulling open the once rusted shut door. I look down the flight of stairs and can see a shallow pool of standing water. I make my way down the steps into the shelter and step into the ankle high water.

I make my way through the hall, my feet splashing with every step before I reach another metal door. It's a much thinner door and is completely rusted through at the bottom. I try the handle of the door only for it to break apart in my hands as I pull it. I try to push the door and it doesn't budge so I give it a kick and it snaps off the hinges and falls flat into the water with a loud splash. I step into the room and examine it. It's filled with lots of old, long forgotten furniture and belongings. There's a moldy couch and a rotten table with a collapsed television stand across from it and on the table there's a cassette sealed in a plastic case. I walk over to it and open the case to find the cassette completely intact. I remove the tape player from my antlers and pop out the cassette that was in there and replace it with the new one and hit play.

“Hello, My name is Ron Stevenson and today is the day the world decided it's time for me to go.” The pained voice of an old man spoke from the tape.
“It’s been 15 long years since whatever the hell that was that happened that ruined everything for the lot of us, that great blue pulse, the bombs after, as well as 3 years since I lost my wife to a nasty infection.” The man coughs a bit.
“I ended up getting myself shot in the lung by my own 1911 pistol, forgot to unchamber the damn thing while cleaning it.” I look down and notice the skeleton of the man mostly submerged in the water at the base of the couch.
“I ain't got long but I wanted to leave a message to anyone who may find this place down the line. I’ve got a load of ammunition in the gun safe in the bunker's bedroom, code 0770.” The man wheezes.
“I also have a stockpile of non-perishable foods in the storage room, canned beans, carrots, peaches… some sugar, flour and baking powder…” The man gurgles and coughs a bit as he begins to drown in his own blood.
“M-marshmallows… she loved those…” I immediately pay close attention to the tape.
“There's also a can of gasoline back there too… i-if you got a car… arghblghh…” The man hacks hard.
“Before I stop this recording I just want to let you know that I’m rootin’ for ya whoever you are… you can come out on the other end of all this and build a new world… live long and be kind to those around you as that's what matters most in this world.” The tape whirs on in silence for a bit before it abruptly cuts into Raindrop Prelude, the sounds of the piano echoing throughout the bunker. After a while the song stops and I hear the younger voice of the man speak.
“That was very wonderful honey, you have gotten really good at this. I know you can win the grand prize at the town talent show this year!” The voice of a woman comes after his.
“You think so Ron?” There's barely a pause before he says.
“I know so.” There's then some quick footsteps before the woman says,
“I love you so much!” The man replies with,
“I love you too sweetheart.” The tape then falls silent before it clicks off.

I make my way down the hall that continues deeper into the bunker and find the room that says storage and manage to easily open the door. I quickly find a bag of unopened marshmallows and make my way to a grimy rotting table and chairs and sit down. The chair creaks under my weight and by some miracle holds firm. I slowly begin to hear the crackle and pops of wood burning outside of the bunker echo through the halls. 

As I sat there I could do nothing but think about that tape, especially that bit at the end about love. Why did it cling onto my mind like tree sap to one's hand? Then images filled my mind, ones of me and a blonde haired woman with rosy cheeks and cherry lips. I could see an arm wrapped over her shoulder, it was my arm and it had a golden band on it, as the introduction to a show called ‘Golden Girls’ played. Then I heard myself speak.

“I love this show almost as much as I love you Denise.” and the woman giggled a bit. Then it was over. I just remembered something from my life before and wanted more.

There I sat for hours, trapped in the decaying structure as the fire raged above me, thinking and trying to see if I could remember anything more of my old life. Sadly I could not, all I could remember was I had a wife and I loved her dearly. I heard a faint trickle and noticed the popping of fire had stopped. I then looked at the skeleton of the old man laying in the water and recall he had a wife but lost her as well. I get up from the chair and then open the bag and take out one marshmallow and walk over to the skeleton and leave it on the table near him.

“Hope you are with her.” I spoke before I looked up the hall to the stairs. Pale shrouded sunlight and water poured down the stairs. I make my way up to the surface and gaze upon what is left up there. Ash, charred wood and a sludge of ash and water as rain fell upon my skull and dripped off into the muck as I gazed off into the smokey ruins as great broken spires rose in the distance, beacons of a world I once knew but have forgotten. I begin to move forward into the ruins with a new found goal in life, to remember who I once was.