Sometimes you think you're living in a cursed world. Not the one that humans had. You've never seen a real human before. It's simple really, they're just not around that much anymore. Your mother used to say they were all dead, made up gruesome stories about their collective demise for entertainment. You thought of her as overly crude sometimes, snapping out her words with painful ferociousness. You still wonder if it was more personal to her than she let on occasionally. Your mother always did look less inhuman than you. She was a forgetful woman though, began to tell the same stories over and over again. Something compelled you to stay silent about this. You did. The older ones always laughed at the children's scared faces when she told her stories though. You laugh too. Silly children. You're not scared, you've not thought about a human in forever. Humans as a threat is a forbidden subject. You never told her that you always slept uneasily afterwards.
Your mother is gone now. Last you could remember before she disappeared, she was out in the yard at three o'clock. When you went to check on her at six, you could not find her. You don't know what happened in the short time between three and six, but by six you have lost your mother, your memories and something else. Something indescribable. You've lost them but they are not missing, no matter where they are someone will find them. You know there are monsters at home. You were brave enough to fight but weak enough to lose. You feel empty. After that, leaving home was inevitable.
Back in present day, you listen to the chatter of sunburnt tourists. Well, they look like tourists at least. You are in the sunshine state. Florida. The Keys, to be exact. Sitting on an empty patch of grass in Mallory Square, you watch the sunset, reluctant to look at the eerily similar faces of the tourists. They very well might just be the same person. You've not been in the Keys long, and you aren't planning to stay for long either, but something you can't help but feel a sense of fondness for is the sunset. It's brighter here than it was back home, the orange sun glowing with a strange luminosity that you're sure you've never seen before. There is a man selling blood oranges to tourists across from you. His eyes glint yellow and you know you must buy one, to survive at least another day. You peel your orange and viscera spills onto the cracked pavement. Unlucky. The man tries to convince you to try again. You can see that the glint in his eye is gone now though and don't care to humour a scammer. You know you need to leave the square soon, lest the tourists claim you as one of their own.
You wade through the dense crowds for about twenty minutes until you reach the beach. You can't tell the time but you know it was twenty minutes. Everything in the Keys is twenty minutes away from the beach. You see a few tourists heading towards the waves and look away as they walk towards water that's colder and murkier than it should be. What's a few tourists in the long scheme of things? You notice that the sand is almost as white as the lifeguards face when you nod towards the ocean's unwanted visitors. He grips your hand and glances at the near silent beach surrounding the two of you as he whispers, "Don't go into the sea in the dark."
You reassure him with a few slow nods and grip his hand back. There is little that scares you more than the ocean at night. There is nothing that cares about anything less than the horizonless ocean at night. It's a ceaseless void that cares for no one and you have to respect it because, you know, if it wanted to it could blow out whatever little light you put into this boundless earth. You shake yourself out of your thoughts, but the lifeguard is gone. It is darker than it was before. Feeling a faint sense of worry start to rise up in your chest, you notice that there are no crabs, no birds, only the sound of the waves against the shore. You hurriedly leave. You weren't planning to stay for long anyway.
Not long after you've left Florida, you find yourself driving through a place resembling Georgia. You know, deep in your soul, that it is not really Georgia but you pretend that it is. Driving on the highway is uneventful mostly. You pass several small towns, you make sure to only ever stop at their gas stations if you have to. The employees never seem to know what a debit card is. You know the towns will not be there on your way back. You've heard tales of towns that inhabit the memories of the elderly and young alike, towns where people make some of their best memories, towns that people never want to leave, towns that can't be found on any map in existence. You're reluctant to stop at the next gas station you happen upon. You do stop once though, there is a woman with wrinkles around her eyes selling fruit at a stand, watermelons and peaches. "Watermelons are in season," the old woman smiles with far too many teeth. Watermelons are always in season in Georgia. You take a peach and the juice stains your mouth red.
