Evie Doster
Bloom
The day after my twenty-fifth birthday, in the gray kind of morning that traps us somewhere between day and night, she plucks something from my spine. I turn on my side to see her twisting the sprout around and around between her thumb and index finger. Two bright green leaves unfurl from a short, thin stem. The roots are translucent, each an inch long.
“Our bodies start dying at twenty-six.”
Celeste places the sprout on the bedside table. Propped up on one elbow, I reach over my shoulder and rotate around, searching the skin stretched over vertebrae and finding only a smooth plane.
“Who says?”
The sound of the bedside drawer sliding out and back in. The bitter, earthy smell drifts through the room, curling into the cavity behind my nose.
“Twenty-six,” she pauses to glide her tongue over the edge of the wrap, “is when your body stops creating cells faster than they die.” She pinches the paper together, seals it.
“Who told you that?”
“It’s just something I know.”
The soft click of flint against steel, a stray spark. Fuhp, fuhp, fuhp, then the orange glow fills her face.
She lets the smoke writhe inside her mouth and lap at the edge of her lips before exhaling. When I take the blunt from her fingers, they linger on the edge of my palm, slide down the skin beneath my wrist, and settle on my thigh.
“Are you hungry?” I ask.
Her eyes follow the blunt to my lips. “Starving.”
The next seedlings come in a week later. One from the dimple in my lower back, the others from underneath the curve of my right shoulder blade. When Celeste begins to uproot one, it feels like she’s tearing a nerve from the surface of my skin.
There’s nothing on the news about a fungal virus, or any parasite that causes plants to protrude from the body.
By the time I go see the doctor, more sprouts have appeared on my back; one of them has a small bulb at its end. She pulls up the back of my shirt, places her cold hands on me, her cold stethoscope, and asks me to take deep breaths.
When she runs her hands over the leaves, goosebumps ripple over my flesh. She asks me if I’m sexually active.
“What does that have to do with anything?” My ears turn red; I feel like a child.
The doctor looks at me over her clipboard before writing something on a piece of paper and pushing it into my hand. A prescription for a drug with too many letters in its name.
In the morning I wake up with a pitching in my gut that does not go away until all the contents of my stomach are emptied into the toilet. I call Celeste, already at work.
“It’s just your immune system reacting to the pills. It’ll get better.”
“How can they be helping me if I feel like this?”
“Do you want me to come home?
“No.”
“I’ll work something out.”
“It’s really okay. Really.”
That afternoon, I sit on the porch, smoking and drinking ginger ale. Summer air is thick and settles on me like a blanket, drawing moisture from my skin. Between the warmth and the smoke, my head. The sun beats against the side of the house, bright orange. Without a thought, I rise to my feet, peel off my shirt and let the light touch my back. Relief washes through me, and the muscles in my abdomen finally relax. My head tilts back, a sigh rising up from deep within my chest. I feel the seedlings perk up, the roots and tendrils quiver and buzz. A smile pulls at my lips.
There’s a sound to my right, a shuffle. I whip my head around. Next door, standing on his deck, dressed in blue jeans with dirt caked at the knees; our neighbor. His collar is stained with sweat, beady eyes fixed on me, and a gap-toothed grin. I run back inside, slamming the door behind me hard enough to shake the house’s foundation.
At night, Celeste brushes my hair aside and fingers the little pink petals blooming from the base of my neck. More sprouts have begun to flower, and a cluster of fleshy beige mushroom heads huddle together at my sacrum.
She massages my skin and I feel the roots in my nerves shift, as though instead of blood I am filled with earth. The pills are small blue circles that lie flat against my palm. I raise them to my mouth.
Twenty-five years old. In eleven months, my body will start to die. But an entire ecosystem flourishes on my back. Flora and fauna, reclaiming my being, drawing me back to a form of love too divine for words.
That night, after Celeste’s breathing deepens and sleep swells in her chest, I disentangle her limbs from mine and pad quietly into the bathroom.
When I step from the shower, the linoleum is cold against my bare feet. Fogged by steam, the mirror blurs my reflection. I swipe a hand across it, revealing my face, and the vine that’s made its way up my back and over my shoulder. I touch the leaves gingerly; they tickle.
The pack of medicine lies flat on the countertop. I pick it up and pour the little blue pills into my hand, satisfied with the weight. They leave a residue on my palm, chalky and thick. It smells like death. A stinging sensation flares up where the tablets touch my skin and instinctively, I drop them into the sink. They hit the basin the way raindrops strike a tin roof. The pills start to dissolve against the wet alabaster and run down the sides, creating faint, blue trails like the veins on the inside of my arm. The color makes me hungry.
I reach out and turn the faucet, watching that wonderful blue light up the sink before washing down the drain.
The day after my twenty-fifth birthday, in the gray kind of morning that traps us somewhere between day and night, she plucks something from my spine. I turn on my side to see her twisting the sprout around and around between her thumb and index finger. Two bright green leaves unfurl from a short, thin stem. The roots are translucent, each an inch long.
“Our bodies start dying at twenty-six.”
Celeste places the sprout on the bedside table. Propped up on one elbow, I reach over my shoulder and rotate around, searching the skin stretched over vertebrae and finding only a smooth plane.
“Who says?”
The sound of the bedside drawer sliding out and back in. The bitter, earthy smell drifts through the room, curling into the cavity behind my nose.
“Twenty-six,” she pauses to glide her tongue over the edge of the wrap, “is when your body stops creating cells faster than they die.” She pinches the paper together, seals it.
“Who told you that?”
“It’s just something I know.”
The soft click of flint against steel, a stray spark. Fuhp, fuhp, fuhp, then the orange glow fills her face.
She lets the smoke writhe inside her mouth and lap at the edge of her lips before exhaling. When I take the blunt from her fingers, they linger on the edge of my palm, slide down the skin beneath my wrist, and settle on my thigh.
“Are you hungry?” I ask.
Her eyes follow the blunt to my lips. “Starving.”
The next seedlings come in a week later. One from the dimple in my lower back, the others from underneath the curve of my right shoulder blade. When Celeste begins to uproot one, it feels like she’s tearing a nerve from the surface of my skin.
There’s nothing on the news about a fungal virus, or any parasite that causes plants to protrude from the body.
By the time I go see the doctor, more sprouts have appeared on my back; one of them has a small bulb at its end. She pulls up the back of my shirt, places her cold hands on me, her cold stethoscope, and asks me to take deep breaths.
When she runs her hands over the leaves, goosebumps ripple over my flesh. She asks me if I’m sexually active.
“What does that have to do with anything?” My ears turn red; I feel like a child.
The doctor looks at me over her clipboard before writing something on a piece of paper and pushing it into my hand. A prescription for a drug with too many letters in its name.
In the morning I wake up with a pitching in my gut that does not go away until all the contents of my stomach are emptied into the toilet. I call Celeste, already at work.
“It’s just your immune system reacting to the pills. It’ll get better.”
“How can they be helping me if I feel like this?”
“Do you want me to come home?
“No.”
“I’ll work something out.”
“It’s really okay. Really.”
That afternoon, I sit on the porch, smoking and drinking ginger ale. Summer air is thick and settles on me like a blanket, drawing moisture from my skin. Between the warmth and the smoke, my head. The sun beats against the side of the house, bright orange. Without a thought, I rise to my feet, peel off my shirt and let the light touch my back. Relief washes through me, and the muscles in my abdomen finally relax. My head tilts back, a sigh rising up from deep within my chest. I feel the seedlings perk up, the roots and tendrils quiver and buzz. A smile pulls at my lips.
There’s a sound to my right, a shuffle. I whip my head around. Next door, standing on his deck, dressed in blue jeans with dirt caked at the knees; our neighbor. His collar is stained with sweat, beady eyes fixed on me, and a gap-toothed grin. I run back inside, slamming the door behind me hard enough to shake the house’s foundation.
At night, Celeste brushes my hair aside and fingers the little pink petals blooming from the base of my neck. More sprouts have begun to flower, and a cluster of fleshy beige mushroom heads huddle together at my sacrum.
She massages my skin and I feel the roots in my nerves shift, as though instead of blood I am filled with earth. The pills are small blue circles that lie flat against my palm. I raise them to my mouth.
Twenty-five years old. In eleven months, my body will start to die. But an entire ecosystem flourishes on my back. Flora and fauna, reclaiming my being, drawing me back to a form of love too divine for words.
That night, after Celeste’s breathing deepens and sleep swells in her chest, I disentangle her limbs from mine and pad quietly into the bathroom.
When I step from the shower, the linoleum is cold against my bare feet. Fogged by steam, the mirror blurs my reflection. I swipe a hand across it, revealing my face, and the vine that’s made its way up my back and over my shoulder. I touch the leaves gingerly; they tickle.
The pack of medicine lies flat on the countertop. I pick it up and pour the little blue pills into my hand, satisfied with the weight. They leave a residue on my palm, chalky and thick. It smells like death. A stinging sensation flares up where the tablets touch my skin and instinctively, I drop them into the sink. They hit the basin the way raindrops strike a tin roof. The pills start to dissolve against the wet alabaster and run down the sides, creating faint, blue trails like the veins on the inside of my arm. The color makes me hungry.
I reach out and turn the faucet, watching that wonderful blue light up the sink before washing down the drain.
Evie Doster likes to write surrealist fiction and can frequently be found talking to roadkill on the side of the highway.