Vestige

It started with a heat.

Not the fire of pain, not the sting of torn flesh, but a bloom of warmth that rooted itself in the crook of my wrist. It spread, slow and insistent, like the creeping fingers of a rising tide. I didn’t notice it at first—not really. Adrenaline drowned out everything else. The bite throbbed, sharp and wet, its edges ragged where teeth had latched and twisted. The warmth, though—it was quieter. Patient.

But now, it’s all I can feel.

I press my hand to the wound as if I can hold it all in. The blood, yes, but also the part of me that’s slipping away. My hand trembles, and for a moment, I tell myself it’s just the shock, the blood loss, the aftermath of surviving what no one is supposed to survive. My breath staggers out of me in short, rasping bursts.

But the heat grows.

It climbs up my arm, a silent predator, filling the spaces behind my ribs, crawling into my throat. It’s wrong. I am wrong.

This is it.

I’ve seen it before—the telltale fever, the faraway glaze in their eyes as their voices fell quiet and their bodies moved without thought. There’s no reversing this. I should be screaming, sobbing, begging. Instead, I sit here, trying to remember what it felt like to be whole.

I press my hand to my chest, right over my heart, and feel its beat—still human, for now. I count the seconds between each thud, as if I can measure how much time I have left.

I close my eyes. It’s not to block out the heat or the bite or the growing hollow where my thoughts used to be. It’s because I want to see myself again.

I used to know who I was.

I see flashes—shards of a mirror I can’t quite piece together. My mother’s laugh, the kind that shook her whole body and made the room warmer. The way my dog would press his nose into my palm, his fur still damp and earthy from the rain. And my kids—God, my kids.

I see their tiny hands gripping crayons, fists sticky with the juice they spilled on the carpet. I hear the hum of their giggles, soft at first, then rising into uncontrollable peals that bounced off the walls. The way they ran down the hall, bare feet slapping against the floor, their voices shouting for me to watch, Dad! Watch! I smell the faint tang of bubble solution on their skin as they darted through a maze of shimmering spheres in the backyard. I see their faces at bedtime, cheeks flushed, eyes drooping as they leaned against me, heavy with sleep and trust.

I can feel the weight of them now, their heads resting against my chest, the warmth of their little bodies pressed close. I can almost hear them whispering, Goodnight, Daddy, in voices soft and pure, unmarked by anything cruel or broken.

But the images shift and blur. The warmth fades. And I am terrified that this, too, will be taken from me.

I see them all.

I see her.

The woman with the freckle just below her left eye. The one who made me tea when I couldn’t sleep, who kissed me in grocery store aisles, who said my name like it was a prayer. I remember how her hair smelled like lavender. How her fingers would brush mine as she passed me the Sunday paper, her thumb lingering for just a second longer than it needed to.

But the memories are slippery now. Their edges blur, their colors dull. The heat inside me pulses, a reminder that there won’t be room for them much longer.

I think of her face, the way her lips curved when she smiled. I try to hold onto it. Just this one thing.

But I can’t.

Even now, I feel it unraveling, pulling away like smoke through my fingers.

Who was I? I know the answer, but it’s slipping into the quiet, and I’m terrified of what will happen when it’s gone.

The heat turns to ache. It digs into my bones, gnaws at the sinews, scrapes the nerves raw. My fingers twitch, and it’s not me moving them. Not entirely.

I try to steady my hand, to clench it into a fist the way I used to when nerves got the better of me. But it’s like holding onto rope in a storm; my grip falters, my strength ebbs. A tremor ripples through my arm, down to my fingertips, and for the first time, I feel it—not the heat, but something else. Something outside of me, hollow and vast, slipping into the spaces where I used to live.

A shiver crawls up my spine. My breath catches, and for one frantic moment, I can’t feel the beat of my heart. I press my palm to my chest, willing it to keep going. Keep pounding. Don’t stop. Don’t give me over to this.

But the rhythm is fading, isn’t it? Not in speed, but in weight. It feels farther away, as though it belongs to someone else entirely.

I stand—or try to. My legs buckle beneath me, weak and foreign. I’m not sure if it’s the fever, the blood loss, or the thing inside me, but I fall to my knees. The world sways, a dizzying blur of color and sound.

And then there’s the hunger.

It doesn’t come in a roar. It doesn’t crash over me like a tidal wave. It creeps, subtle and vile, like a whisper in the back of my skull. A tightening in my stomach, a thought so faint I almost miss it: I’m starving.

No. That’s not me. I’m not hungry. I’m not.

But I can feel it growing, stretching, unfurling in the pit of my gut. A craving for something I can’t name but already know too well.

It’s wrong. It’s so wrong. My mind reels, searching for anything to anchor me. The warmth of sunlight on my skin. The sound of rain tapping against the windows. Her hand in mine. Think of her. Think of her. I can’t let this thing devour her too—not her memory, not the pieces of her I still carry.

I dig my nails into the ground, trying to anchor myself. Dirt and blood smear my fingers, but I don’t care. If I let go, I’ll float away. I’ll lose myself. I am still here. I am still here. I am—

The heat surges, blinding and merciless, and my thoughts scatter like leaves in the wind.

I close my eyes again, not to remember this time, but to cling—to clutch at the fraying thread of what’s left. Her image isn’t steady; it flickers like a dying bulb, faint and untrustworthy. But I see her. She’s on the porch, barefoot, the floorboards creaking beneath her weight. Her hair is loose, catching the breeze as the light of the rising sun wraps around her like molten gold.

Her lips are moving. My name, I think, but I can’t hear it. Her voice is muted, as though the memory itself is choking on its own decay. Her eyes catch mine—soft, familiar, achingly human. But even as I reach for her, the colors start to melt, the scene slipping away like water through cupped hands.

I try to hold her, to drag her from the abyss, but she’s dissolving faster than I can catch her. The light around her fades, her figure hollowing out until she is nothing more than a shadow on the edges of my mind.

The breeze becomes a stillness that aches. The sunlight cools, leaving me in a cold, black void. I reach for her one last time, my hands shaking, my chest heaving, but she is gone.

She is gone.

I close my eyes, though it no longer brings comfort. The darkness behind my lids is restless, alive, twisting with shapes I can’t make sense of. My name, my voice, my memories—every thread that held me together—is fraying, falling into silence. I try to hold them, to keep myself whole, but they slip away, one by one.

Yet I am still aware. For now. I feel the hunger, vast and relentless, curling around the last fragile pieces of who I was. It whispers promises I don’t understand, ancient and wordless, but I know the meaning all the same: You are mine.

My body moves, heavy and unsteady, dragging itself forward without thought or reason. My hands—these hands that once knew love and purpose—curl into claws. I hear the snap of bone, feel the shift beneath my skin as it shapes itself into something new. Something other.

The air changes. I catch the scent of life—warm, rich, pulsing—and my steps quicken. I try to stop, to scream, but there is no voice left to scream with, no will left to stop.

There is only the hunger.

The last of me splinters away as I take another step, and for a fleeting moment, I wonder if the others felt it too—the cold finality of their humanity falling away.

And then, I feel nothing at all.

I open my eyes, but they are no longer my own.