12:14 a.m

At once, I am overwhelmed by the howling. Alert, cool skin pressed against tense flesh, alive and lamp-lit like the stained sheep beast, teeth rending meat in the dead of things. Space folds around me, cluttered with objects, traps, confining me in the dark. The room is thick, drowned with a different kind of me. Me that was once, when being was a concern. Tonight, I am smooth and precise, an instrument finally tuned in the fresh October weather. My bones rattle percussive. My throat vibrates softly, plucking stringy breath into the choking air. This is a pen, noise bouncing electric in the asylum hallway woven in my brain. The world is silent for miles beyond me, but my headphones ring like church bells. The howling is mine. I am a selfish organism. My arm extends, lone moon clutched in my palm. Muscles flex in my hand, knuckles turn white against the regolith. I can only watch.

By Adam Duvall