The smell became unbearable. I folded my hands over the corners of the bookshelf and began pushing.

SCREEEEEEEECH.

A hole in the wall. And a note. I picked it up and started reading.

“I wonder if Nicole would recognize me. I wonder if her eyes would swell up and if tears would splash at her feet. I wonder if she can sleep, and I wonder if she knows I haven’t. I can’t remember the smell of daffodils or pastries or spring. Like melting snow my flesh clung to the bone. It wasn’t so bad then. Just hungry. An angel came for me, but he didn’t have food so I didn’t listen. Screaming and yelling and crying. Days and months and years. Out of the hole, I screeched. Not an ear it touched. Hungry again I became. So I bit my leg and I didn’t feel it. Then I bit again and I didn’t feel it. And again I bit and I didn’t feel it. What a shame. But my belly was no longer empty.”

There were scribbly drawings of faces beneath the words. I dropped the note and bent into the hole. Waddling through as I clinched my nose.

BUZZZZZZZZZZZ.

The tornado of flies grew louder. I crept further. At last, I was there. Tornadoes of insects made the flesh tough to see. Smelling so horrid I had to vomit. The corpse faced up at the skylight above. What to make of this?

SCREEEEEEEECH.

The shelf closed behind me.