Sheep and Wolves Read Online Free PDF Page B

He chews and swallows. Inhales.
    “You’re not getting any nutrients from that, Edward,” I say.
    He doesn’t care.
    *
    If your girlfriend surprises you with a romantic candle-lit picnic, you can’t tell her it’s a horrible idea. You can’t tell her that the blanket is too close to the weeds and the Bus and you-know-who. I guess you could tell her all this, but she’s gazing at you, tickling inside you with her phantom toes.
    So you say, “Thank you, Annabelle.”
    I see him staring through the window, drooling. He smiles, and I attempt to hide my fear with a smile of my own.
    “I wish I could see the world through your eyes, Ed,” Annabelle says.
    “Why would you say that?” I say.
    “Because you see such beauty around you.”
    “What I see is grotesque. I don’t mean you.”
    “Your songs aren’t grotesque.”
    “My songs aren’t about the world. They’re about the world in my head.”
    “What’s the difference?”
    An enormous hand crashes through the side of the Bus and wraps around Annabelle’s torso.
    She looks at me with relief on her face, as if she’s always known it would come to this. Maybe she has.
    As Edward pulls her into the darkness, I dive forward and try to grab her foot, but of course it’s only a phantom, and my hand passes right through.
    “Let her go, Edward!” I say.
    I try to climb in through the hole, but a blubbery leg pushes me backwards. I punch, kick, and bite, the way I never did when I was a kid. I was a good boy.
    It doesn’t help.
    I try to yank the chain off my neck, but it doesn’t break, so I lift it off instead. I put the key in the lock, twist. It’s time to end this.
    Immediately a pudgy arm thrusts out of the driver’s door and causes me to tumble onto the picnic candles. I go for the passenger door. This time I dodge the arm that darts at me. I open the door to the backseat and get kicked in the shoulder.
    All of Edward’s arms and legs hang outside of the Bus now, like he’s some headless turtle.
    I lift the hood.
    There he is. He’s eaten the engine. I know that’s not all he’s eaten.
    “Open your mouth, Edward,” I say. “Spit her out.”
    He doesn’t respond.
    “Spit her out!”
    I reach down and try to open his mouth with my fingers, wounds and all. He won’t even budge.
    When I try to use my key, he bites it in half.
    I slam the hood shut and return to the picnic blanket to think. Part of it’s on fire, but I let it burn.
    My head is killing me. I feel like surrendering.
    I feel like lying on the grass, closing my eyes, and sucking my thumb.
    Instead, I walk behind the Bus. Edward’s penis dangles out of the exhaust pipe, and I open the back door. I know what I have to do.
    If Edward won’t let me in, then I’ll force myself inside.
    I do.
    *
    My journey gets a lot easier when I realize I don’t have to fight anymore. It’s time to let go. My body surges forward, twisting and turning through the intestines, but it doesn’t matter which way I go, because I’m going to end up with Annabelle.
    No matter what.
    She may be shredded to pieces, of course, depending on whether or not Edward swallowed her whole. I may only have a few moments to grieve over her remains before the stomach acid melts my flesh.
    And that’s OK.
    Finally, I reach the stomach. I reach Annabelle. She’s alive.
    We embrace, and stay that way.
    Edward starts crawling, the Bus like armor around him.
    The movement gently rocks me and Annabelle from side to side.
    It’s warm in here. Comfortable. Intimate.
    I feel closer to Annabelle than I’ve ever felt to anyone, including myself. But we don’t speak, me and her.
    We don’t need to.
    I’m excited, because I know where we’re going. We’re going to a place where we can be happy. Where I can smell my lyrics in the air, and other nonsense. Where magic is real.
    Edward vomits us up, and we sit amidst the chunky bowls of my old home-sweet-home.
    This is just an ordinary park, but my girlfriend is alive. Edward