By Jadyn Marshall
The Spanish moss was visibly sagging in the heat. Its appearance during its life cycle, in no particular order, was droopy, droopy, and droopy, so the difference spoke volumes. Or it would have, if the plant had vocal chords.
James suspected he’d been Spanish moss in his last lifetime. Not the whole species, but definitely a clump somewhere, draped on an allée. He and the plant had so much in common. They both fed themselves on air. His insides were equally tangled in their desperate search for nutrients to cling to. His furry lanugo matched the soft scales on the tendrils.
His lanugo made him wish he had a razor right now—anything to make his body abandon the heat conservation mechanisms it had picked up in his New York dorm room. His skin was flushed the red of picture book toadstools, complete with white speckles. It was tacky from the humidity’s residue, but otherwise alarmingly dry.
He’d snuck out to jog on the Bayou trail before the sun (and the Institute’s aides) noticed. But now it was eleven, and he wasn’t sure he was still in Louisiana. No grid in the Bayou—just paths that looked like a gator’s low, silver belly had formed them.
He jogged past another “Strolling Only!” sign—better to run to AC than to stroll and collapse miles from the Institute. Nausea steered his vision. He stumbled into a Southern live oak and hung onto the lowest branches as his stomach spilled over its levee and into his throat. Great. Now they could diagnose him with Bulimia Indirecta too.
