The Bang

An origin story. It was tricky to think of a beginning. The beginning of what? A world, a character? It hit me yesterday, and it happened. -Kristian

It started with a bang. 

Not a big bang, by any means. It was more of a hand half heartedly hitting the wall type of bang. A bang that ushers in winter compared to spring.

Markee Owens slid into the world on the newly mopped floor of the Acres High girl’s bathroom.

Feebe’s last priority had been finishing this last floor, this last bathroom. She was a thick girl, with her hair tied back in a severe ponytail that stretched her pale skin and gave the skin around her green eyes premature crow’s feet.  She was well past high school but still young enough to be figuring out what she wanted. She wore old, worn sneakers and loose tan pants and a once loose button up. She’d gained plenty of weight in her stomach the last couple of months, and yet no one asked. 

Feebe had just continued trucking on, rolling out of her small twin bed, shuffling in the morning into the bathroom, often hunched over the toilet puking. A new step in her morning routine. No one asked how she felt. No one asked if she’d seen the doctor. No one asked who the father was. No one asked if she was pregnant.

So she convinced herself that the night never happened. That the brief and intense happiness had never occurred. It’d been a dream.

Until her shirt tightened. 

Until her sick spells became more than a cold, more than a sudden virus or infection. 

That’s when the doctor came into play. And the news was spelled out in clear letters. Pregnant.

Feebe had just finished mopping, as if she knew inside, the inside you hid from, that her contractions and birth would speed up at such a rate that the bathroom would serve as the newborn’s first exposure to the world.  She prided herself on her cleaning speed: bending over, whipping that hand towel into nooks and crannies, and catching the smallest debris.

Now those hands held a newborn baby that was staring at her through slitted eyes, mouth open with no scream. 

That night had really happened. Her calloused fingers brushed over the baby’s wet skin, stopping at the pointed ears. Larger and more shapely than human ears.

That's what one gets when meddling with nonhumans. 

Markee continued to stare at her mother in a quiet, nonhuman fashion, like she was staring at prey.

Feebe brushed off the dread, remembering the brown eyes, lean muscle and soft voice of Markee's father. Everything would be okay. 

Feebe stood up, looking down at the mess she’d have to clean up, and began what she knew best. Cleaning. This time her own flesh and blood.