Page 25 of Molt

The jar is crooked.

She touched it, waking up the memory which strengthened the connection.

Fuck.

I crawl toward the cabinet beneath the oldest shelves.

My hands shake as I unlock it.

Inside are eight boxes.

One for every time I failed.

I pull out the last. 1988 the photograph sits on top.

I shouldn’t look but I do.

Lenora is smiling at the camera. Short dark hair. Red lipstick. My arm around her waist.

We look happy. We were.

For eleven days.

On the back, in her handwriting:

Maybe this time we get to keep each other.

I turn it over. Underneath are photographs I don’t need to see.

Medical notes. Newspaper clippings. Pieces of me. A tooth. Two fingernails. A lock of hair that isn’t the color of mine anymore. And the final page. My handwriting. Barely legible. Written while I was dying.

DAY 12: Dermal transfer.

DAY 18: Vocal changes.

DAY 23: Memory integration.

DAY 31: Skeletal replication.

DAY 37: She remembers everything.

Then one final sentence written darker than the rest. Pressed so hard the pen tore through the paper.

DAY 41: I am gone.

I stare at it.

Forty-one days.

That was the longest we ever had.

This time, the molt started before she even touched me.

I look toward the floor. Toward the apartment beneath mine. Toward Lenora.

Something is different. Something has changed.

My phone vibrates.