hallucinatory fragments.

He pulled up towards me like a foreign dog. His protruding lower lip was duck-billed, too strange to suck. I pushed him away. Although he wanted all, I knew it wasn't his.

If muddy rivers had reflections, his white skin would be stained dull in the loftiness of its own bathwater. Speckled and absorbed into the surface, his battle marks left my face retracting over itself. In defense, my glance repeatedly resisted, crouching away from this suddenly staged reality.

Reminiscences of youth clawed at me like a bitter cat. Daring me. Awkwardly whirling fatal flirtations around my head.