The torch flickers in the wind as you approach the cave. The sconce is shining under the lambent torch. You notice a small heart sticker on the scone. The icy breeze forces you into the cave just to avoid the frost any further.  The back of the cave is perfectly visible under the will of the torch. You immediately are taken back by the markings on the wall. A tally mark counter is carved into the stone; there are hundreds of tallies. Next to the tallies, a worn stuffed bear with an eye missing. A torn picture rested next to the bear, the picture was tattered yet you can make out the faces. Smiling girl resting her arm around your love, happy, much different than the missing person profile. I didn’t know they were friends. A sudden pinch pricks your back; the pinch was sharp and quick. Your love is maximized. Your love is the only person you can think of. The day you met your love. The way you felt when your love holds you and tells you that they love you. The good and the bad, your love is always there to tell you it will be okay. A second prick pinches in the same spot; no pain follows this pinch. Love reconstructs into aversion. Why am I here? The dangers of the Ox are all you can think about like the screech through the marsh. Love crumbles in your mind, you cannot even think about your love, all you want to do is escape.

Departing the cave, sprinting past the marshes, and past the damp poster. The street is barren, street lamps flickering like the torch from the cave, the chill follows you still. The streets are long before any civilization, you have to run, run as fast as you can. The Ox fades behind you. I can’t go back. Your cul-de-sac is nearing, gasping for air, the cold is invading your lungs. Houses pass as blurs, the wind pushing against your skin, stopping is not an option. The key under your mat glistening under the moonlight. You pass by the picture frame without even a glance. Finally, relaxing on your couch, hoping to catch the end of Johnny Carson.

The marshes are dank and cold. The water is high to your knees and thick as honey. Your ears bleeding, dripping slowly, sore and the hum conquers all other noises the forest produces. The icy zephyr creates ripples in the water as if there was an invisible hand skidding across. Moonlight reveals the cloudy mud infested water, filth comes up, knees reaching your torso with each step. Shimmering light shines into your eyes, reflecting the huntress, reflecting you. Mirror shards clutter the underside of the marsh: your boot crushes a large mirror, producing these shards. A tight grip takes custody of your right thigh. The constrict has a shroud of brown marsh and undetectable in the shards. The tightness is present and increasing with each passing moment, narrowing subsides, and your unable to feel your right leg. Paddling to the exit, trying to leave the thick marshes, regretting traveling deeper into the tears of the forest. Sharp agony impales your abdomen. A brown sleek serpent attached to your belly like a limb. Your body adds a red tint to the cloudy marshes. You began feeling tight, fingers becoming unresponsive, losing feeling in your left leg, perception of your surroundings vanishing. Your scream is stolen by the forest, marshes taking over. Peering towards the exit, a third serpent emerges. This one is larger than the other two, same sleekness, with a sage body. The eyes. The serpent’s eyes were magnificent. The large emeralds, white sclera encloses tightly around, circular like a solemnly human. Cracks across the sclera construct black straight hard turning lines that have remanence of ruins. No longer able to move your lower half of your body, out reaching toward the eyes. Your hand began gradually turning into stone. Trying to move your fingers, like you have before, and nothing. Forearm commencing the process as the stone disease takes your body. The eyes never leave yours. A lonely tear travels from your disease-free eye as the emerald ones do the same.