2 comments/ 5397 views/ 2 favorites The Weeping Thing By: latinplayer The following is a tale of horror with erotic elements. It is part of my short story collection Demonic Murmurs, and although a typical horror anthology might be a tad bland or inhibited, I daresay that my endeavor is decidedly more intense. All characters depicted are over the age of 18. Since he wasn't scheduled for work that day, Donald was carelessly clicking through the personal ads on a couple of social sites. The ads he kept coming across weren't filling him up with any sort of happy hope for finding a date anytime soon. He skimmed over the usual seeking financially secure, prefer a man in the military, must be tall, very good looking, hung like a horse, and in great shape posts, but he did have himself a laugh when he came across some crazy woman's ad asking for a sugar daddy to help her out with a few monthly expenses, in exchange for unspecified favors. "Yeah, right." Donald mumbled, as he abandoned his web browser and sat back in his old executive chair on rollers. The seat cushion was so flat and worn out he'd taken to putting a folded up and skinny blanket on it, and he took a quick moment to adjust said blanket's unruly folds, before he resumed his seat and his eyes scanned across his small bedroom. It was nothing to brag about. He had a twin size bed with covers in an appealing shade of tan, a small desk that was meant for a kid and that bumped his knees whenever he rolled too close to it, a small closet and a short dresser filled with his essentials, and several cases stacked up in a corner filled with nonessentials that he'd never gotten around to unpacking, mainly because he didn't have the room to put their contents anywhere. The bedroom wasn't an eyesore, but it did have a few details detrimental to the upbeat lifestyle of a dating connoisseur; the walls were largely blank, and the carpeting tired, and in some spots it exhibited some ancient stain or other discoloring. Still, he might be able to entice some woman inside, and onto his bed. Maybe. Well, if you didn't consider the mannerisms of the old lady he rented the room from, anyway. Margaret owned the two bedroom house, and along with charging him a rent of five hundred dollars a month, she'd given him a sheet with all of her prohibitions and stipulations. No drinking, no drugs, no loud music, no partying, and absolutely no members of the opposite sex were allowed. Basically, Donald sighed, the overzealous and overly-strict old woman was taking a lot of the fun out of his life, but since he'd been hard-pressed to find a similar rent and accommodations in that part of town, he'd gone ahead and signed the rental agreement and paid off the first month's rent, and the security deposit. The alcohol and drugs he could do without, since he was definitely mellowing in his thirties, and as for the music, he'd purchased himself a good pair of headphones to take care of that. The lack of sex, however, was growing into a very large annoyance. It was as if, since old Margaret wasn't getting laid, neither was anyone else under her roof. Donald recalled a scene from a month prior, the last time he'd been out on a date. That had been with the blond, Sallie, all of five-foot-two, and who kissed in a way that he'd never been able to get enough of. It was too bad that he and Sallie hadn't been talking as much online anymore, and Donald was slowly coming to the conclusion that she'd moved on and left him adrift like an old piece of flotsam. His erratic work schedule that always cut across the heart of the day, and most weekends, didn't help matters here, either. He began feeling a bit depressed, and had he owned a car, perhaps Donald would have jumped into it and driven somewhere far away from where he lived. Perhaps he could get lost out there, and never have to come back to his mundane and boring life. But no, Donald did not have a car, and his prospects for entertaining himself elsewhere rested on the city's public transportation system, or on the more or less reliable foot-mobile. Feeling something approaching resignation, Donald went back to his computer screen, glancing and wishfully scanning over the numerous profiles of happy, smiling women he'd never have the opportunity to meet in person. Later that afternoon, Donald stepped out. He'd taken a few naps, and watched a few comedy shows, and that had lightened up his mood by not much, and now he was on his way to the kitchen to warm up a can of soup. He took a quick glance into the living room, noticing that the news was playing on the tube, but that Margaret was nowhere in sight. The old woman did that sometimes, leave the TV on while she was over at a neighbor's house and chatting the time away. She had explained that habit to him on a couple of occasions, that by leaving the television on, it would deter potential burglars from breaking into the house, because no burglar would ever dare break into a house while someone was in it. But let Donald leave his ceiling fan on overnight when the heat was unbearable, and lo and behold, there would be hell to pay to Margaret in the morning. The woman was paranoid, and possibly, borderline insane, Donald thought, as he emptied the can's contents into a small pot, and added a short spurt of water. When he'd first moved in, she'd taken to following him around the house, and she'd even go into the bathroom right after he'd used it, stink and all, in case he'd inadvertently left any drug paraphernalia lying around like a moron. Thank goodness she'd eased up a bit, about that. As Donald patiently waited for his soup to warm up, and considered what life would be like if he lived elsewhere, or if he were better looking, or a rich man, when his thoughts became distracted by an unexpected sound. It was the sound of a person quietly crying nearby, and concerned, Donald left the kitchen and went into the living room to lower the volume on the TV set. He listened intently for the lamentation, but at first he could not localize it, and afterward, it had halted as unexpectedly as it had commenced. As he ate his soup in the tiny afterthought of a dining room, Donald thought he heard the sound of crying a second time, but he passed it off as having come from the TV set. When Margaret came back into the living room, the first thing she did was to scold him for having fiddled with the volume control on the television, resulting in Donald quickly finishing off his light meal and heading back to his bedroom for peace and quiet. He thought he heard that same strange crying, as he lay in bed and waited for sleep to come to him. It would be unusual for him to get out of bed to investigate, according to Margaret's observations and expectations of him, so Donald simply stayed in place and began to wonder who could possibly be making such pitiful sounds. When sleep finally found him, it brought strange nightmares to Donald's mind. He dreamt that he was running through the woods, panting and out of breath, and behind him he could hear angry voices. He was being chased, he quickly realized, by a mob wielding torches, axes and pitchforks, who were shouting curses at him. They wore an unusual fashion of clothing, made of rough cloth, leather or fur; doublets, vests with white shirts underneath, breeches, knitted caps, straw hats, felt hats and the like. They meant to kill him, Donald understood in a panic, but his movements were sluggish and cumbersome, as if he wasn't running but sloshing along on the ground like a great lump. He felt twigs and bumps below him as he moved, felt leaves sticking wetly to his flesh, felt coarse and rough patches of bark as his glob-like form flowed around trees and bent aside saplings. The men chasing him were much faster. They surrounded him, stabbing at him with their pitchforks, hacking at him with their axes, and Donald cried out from the enormity of the pain ripping through his flesh. They meant to rip him to pieces, he saw, and back in the distance, one man ordered a few of the others to start gathering tinder. They meant to hack him apart, he realized, and to burn the chunks right after. There was nothing he could do about it. Abruptly, Donald sat up in his bed. His breaths were struggling to come out of him, as if he had indeed been running away from a mob, and in the dark, he began to wonder if he'd screamed out, and if the landlord was even now trying to figure out what he was up to, from her bedroom behind their common wall. Donald swung his legs over the side of the bed, as if he had to flee from his very mattress, as if those men would still be tearing him apart if he dared to close his eyes again. That's when he heard the crying once more, like a soft song of despair and anguish, filtering into his ears. As he listened to it, it calmed him, soothed him, enough that his breathing returned to normal, and his heartbeat was no longer pounding away within his chest. "What's happening to me?" Donald asked the night, as the song continued to relax him, like the hands of a gentle masseuse. The alarm clock told him he should be in a deep sleep, and the song lulled him in this direction. He yawned, strangely knowing that the nightmare would not return, and as he lay back down on his mattress, he thought the whimpering sounded like that of a small child, and maybe a boy. He found himself wishing he could do something for that child, like buy him a toy or an ice cream, so he would be happy again. So he wouldn't have to cry any more. Such thoughts were crossing Donald's mind, until he finally shut his eyes and went back to a pleasant slumber. The next day, he'd only been cursed with four hours of work, and he disembarked the transit bus at only a few minutes before one in the afternoon. Normally, he'd get off a few stops earlier than his, or later, only to walk the remaining distance back home in the hopes of nodding at or greeting a passerby, and perhaps engaging him or her in a brief conversation, for such was Donald's deep state of loneliness. Instead, on this day he got off at the right place, and traversed the single block purposefully and diligently, until he stood before the house's front door. As he'd expected, Margaret was not home. During the weekdays, she would often leave and attend to her errands or various doctors' appointments, and he assumed that this was what she was doing today. He stepped into his bedroom, changing into more casual attire, before he sat on the edge of the bed, and listened for the sound of the crying. Today, Donald resolved, he was going to get to the bottom of things. He waited, sometimes patiently, sometimes impatiently, until the inactivity got the better of him. The day was warm, and the bed covers felt comfortable enough to his touch that he ended up curling over them and taking a nap. Half an hour later, his eyes popped open. He hadn't been having any nightmare, and couldn't remember what he'd been dreaming at all. What was it then, that had awakened him? His ears took in all they could, until he heard it. The crying. Slowly, quietly, Donald sat up, fearing that any sudden movement might drive the sobbing away. He tried to trace the source of the sound, and in tiny increments, his head and body shifted around the entire bedroom. The crying was everywhere, it seemed, but it was slightly more noticeable in one direction. The bedroom window. Donald stood up and went to slide the window open. There was a dusty screen in the way, and he turned an ear toward it, moving as close to the filth as he dared. He heard the sobbing, eternal and pleading, and it was coming from the outside of the house. Donald found himself rushing through the house and out the back door, thinking twice about it and going back for his keys. No telling what kind of eruption Margaret would have if she came home to a wide-open back door, he thought, as he locked up. After, he went to his window, and once he'd forced himself to focus, he again honed in on the mysterious, soft crying. He started walking in the direction he calculated it was coming from. A gathering of Red Maples, White Ash and White Oak could be seen directly behind Margaret's house, and the further away from the house Donald went, the denser the woods became. He'd frequented the area before, mainly out of boredom and hoping to catch some possum or raccoon in action, or anything at all for that matter, but this time, he felt like an amateur detective, sleuthing out there to find the secret of the weeping noise. His feet trampled over the uneven blanket of crusty leaves and twigs, the noise forcing him to pause and gain his bearings often, but through it all, the crying continued. It knows, he thought. It knows I'm out here, trying to find it. It's leading me right to where it is. The realization was unsettling, as it implied that whatever he was looking for was an intelligent thing, and capable of reaching into his mind and drawing him out to find it. What if, what if it's evil? What if it wants to hurt me? He was becoming distracted, he realized, as he turned back toward the house. He could no longer see it. I should go back, he considered. That's when the weeping called out to him, reassuring him that it wasn't too much further ahead, and that it meant him no harm. It was lonely, it said, in its weeping little voice, as lonely as Donald was. It pleaded with the man to keep forging ahead, to not turn his back and abandon the thing forever. And Donald, forgetting his disquiet, pressed on. He had to get to the bottom of this, he decided. No matter what, he had to find out what was out there. Donald heard the caws from a trio of crows, right before he came to a strange clearing on the ground, a place where the dirt had become a sinister shade of black. It wasn't a large space, just a few feet across and shaped like a crooked oval, and the man wondered why his attention had been drawn to that particular spot. Then, he understood why. This was where the weeping thing had been butchered, where its little pieces had been covered over with kindling and set on fire. The black spot marked where the thing had died, and nothing had grown there ever since. There was a rustle to one side, causing Donald's attention to shift. Two of the crows had beaten their wings in haste and hopped backward, as if something had startled them, or threatened them. As Donald watched, one crow stalked forward, and began pecking on whatever it had been consuming right before he'd arrived. Inside of Donald's head, he heard the sobbing turn into cries of pain, and he knew that whatever it was that had called him out there, the crows were poking at and eating. Donald gulped, as each time the crow snatched its head down and snapped its beak, another jolt sounded in his mind. He picked up a couple of stones, and launched them at the black birds along with his shouts, but the crows were unnaturally persistent. They hurled their own insults back at him, until he found a sturdy branch and scattered them with a few wide swings. The crows flew up into the trees, where eerily, they took up posts and closely watched him. "Fucking crows!" He shouted up at the broken canopy, before he began the short trek to where they'd been feasting. It was half hidden under dirt and leaves, and from its coloration, Donald at first thought he was looking at a human hand. It was the right size, he thought, as he used the end of his branch to scatter the debris and get a better look at the thing. He shuddered. It wasn't a hand, it was a pale pink glob of meat, with little open wounds where the crows had been tearing away at it, and as far as he could see, it had no hair or wrinkles or fingernails or any other identifiable features on it. He should leave, immediately, Donald thought. Leave this unholy thing behind and forget all about it. Forget about the weeping, and forget about its... The song started up again, like the song of sirens just before they lead sailors to maneuver their ships towards jagged rocks, to their doom. In unison, the crows suddenly descended upon him, using their voices to startle him and their claws to tear at his head and arms. Donald was disconcerted and in shock for the first few seconds, trying to keep the birds from ripping at his face, until he remembered the stick he still had in his grip. He swung hard, smashing it into a crow and sending the creature pummeling in a wild flutter into the leaves. A second blow crashed another crow into a tree trunk, and this one fell like a dead thing to the ground. The last crow cried out for vengeance, but with its strength in numbers so greatly diminished, it had no choice but to retreat back to a safer distance. Or so Donald thought. The moment Donald slightly lowered his gnarled weapon, the crow sped past him to continue its assault on the weeping thing. It was trying to scratch the glob apart with its claws, cawing out loud as it repeatedly struck, and the sheer ferocity of the attack left Donald dumb for a moment. Gripping the tree limb like a golf club, Donald stepped forward, swung and smashed the last crow into oblivion. He was panting again, as he raised his eyes toward the sky and took in the high spots where other crows might be hiding. Finding none, hearing none, and not wanting to risk any of the first three threatening him again, Donald took the next few minutes to inspect the three fallen birds and batter them with his stick until he was certain they were dead. After, he returned to the weeping thing, feeling that same black knot in his stomach, as his eyes took in its pulpy, bloody form on the ground. "What..." He struggled to catch his breath. "What the fuck are you?" The thing replied, in its own bizarre way, by sobbing and gasping like a child who'd just been beaten to tears. Donald watched the thing, heard it crying in his head, and wondered what to do next. He couldn't leave it out there, for some other crows or some other animal might come by and finish it off, and then he'd never know what it truly was. "I've got to take you back home with me, don't I?" He leaned closer to get a better look at it, and made a squeamish face as he took in all the blood. "I don't see how you're going to make it, but here goes." He poked his stick at it, wondering how he'd get the thing to balance on it, when the thing took the initiative all on its own. It swept around the end of the stick like a pair of very fat fingers and held on tight. Donald nearly dropped the stick when he saw this, and he kept a wary eye on the thing, in case it scurried down the piece of wood and tried to latch onto his hand, like what happened in some old horror movie he'd once seen. "I don't trust you, whatever you are." He told the thing, as he stood back up and felt the thing's slight weight on the end of the tree limb. Donald took one last look at the dead crows, before he started on the journey home. He paused when he came within view of the back door, and propped the stick, with the thing still stuck to it, next to a tree. "It won't do to have Margaret see me bringing you inside." Donald explained. "Let me go in first and see if she's come back yet." He walked toward the house, swinging his arms jauntily as if he was only returning from a short walk, and he unlocked the door as carelessly as he usually did. A quick tour of the premises informed him that the house was still empty, and he hurried into the kitchen and grabbed up a glass salad bowl that Margaret hardly ever used. Jogging back out, he came to the tree, only to find that the stick had fallen over, and the weeping thing was in the dirt again. "Shit." Donald said, as he reached out and gently picked the thing up. It felt warm, and creepily, like soft, hairless human flesh. The thing felt repulsive, he thought, as he quickly plopped it into the bowl and hurried back into the house. The Weeping Thing Once he was safe in his room, Donald locked the door and placed the bowl on his desk. He stared at the thing, but with all the blood and dirt on it, he couldn't make out heads or tails of it. Reluctantly, he left the bedroom and went into the bathroom, where Margaret kept the dirty clothes hamper. After digging through it, he found a used hand towel, one he'd tossed in just a couple of days before, one that the old woman was sure not to miss. He ran some cool water over it, before he went back into his room and began wiping off the thing in the bowl. Even when he'd gotten it completely cleaned off, he still couldn't figure out what it was. It had no eyes, nose, mouth or ears, or any other feature he could discern. It was a simple clump of meat. A clump of meat that sings its own little sad lullaby, he recalled. "Well, you must need water, at least." Donald decided, wringing the towel over it and forcing a few drops to evacuate and land on the thing. "And food, too, even though I've no idea what to feed you, or even how to feed you." Donald went into the kitchen and hurriedly made a sandwich. He took extra slices of meat, cheese, and a small portion of lettuce, knowing Margaret would probably make a scene over how much he was eating, for she kept irritatingly close tabs on everything in the fridge. "Stupid old woman." Donald mumbled at her memory, as he went back to his room. Before he ate his sandwich, he deliberated how to feed his creature, his thing. He solved the problem by draping the slices of cheese and meat on the inside edge of the small bowl. The lettuce he dropped directly beside the thing, but if it could eat such food, it was in no hurry to do so while he was watching. Later, he heard Margaret announcing that she'd come home by making noise all over the house, and he reluctantly put the salad bowl under his bed, beside his shoes, and in a spot he doubted very much the old woman would bother to look into unless he gave her provocation to. Donald made a couple of public appearances around the house, as he usually did, and he did this mostly to deter any suspicions Margaret might think up. The last time he'd stayed in his room too long, the old hag had accused him of having a woman in there with him, and she'd threatened to kick him out until he allowed her to inspect the bedroom. He'd had to bite his tongue that time, after Margaret had come up empty-handed. The rest of the time, he was in his room, studying the thing from different angles, whispering to it whenever he thought he could get away with it, whenever it sounded as if Margaret was on the far side of the house. The thing divulged none of its secrets to him. With some reluctance, Donald made ready for bed. He had another short shift coming up the next morning, and he went through his customary routines of taking a late shower and shaving, and after, he set up his work clothes and shoes in their usual place. He went on to check his email, discovering that he didn't have any new messages from any females dying to meet him, or from anybody else for that matter. Afterward, he went browsing through a few sites dedicated to bizarre sightings and strange animals. He'd been hoping someone else might have come across a weeping thing, as he had, but if they had they sure hadn't posted anything about it. He'd become engrossed in a conspiracy site, reading a thread called 'Weird Things Seen In The Woods,' and he was reading up on all the anomalies up until the moment the clock demanded that he call it a night. Donald took one last look at his weeping thing, before he went to bed. It was still there, sitting idle with its slices of cheese and meat nearby, with the lettuce parked on its side. "Well, I guess it's good night, then." Donald said, as he slid the bowl back under the bed, reached out and clicked off the lamp. That night, Donald again dreamed that he was in the woods. He wasn't running this time, simply standing among all the tall and dark trees, and he'd looked up toward their branches and saw dozens and dozens of crows staring down at him. He shuddered, for this time he was unarmed, and if the black horde descended on him all at once, he had no doubt that they would overwhelm him. Already, he imagined the crows lashing their wings in frenzy, and screaming out their sinister caws. In his mind, he saw himself flailing his arms out savagely, trying to batter them all away, but the persistent murderers were diving in at him, embedding their talons and beaks into his weak flesh. Biting and ripping away at his soft parts: his eyes, his ears, and when he tried to scream, his mouth and tongue... He heard the weeping thing. It was singing a song, but not the usual cold lament of before. Instead, it was an unwavering hum of contentment, a single note that seemed to urge the evil crows into leaning away from it, and from Donald. The weeping thing was protecting him, Donald soon realized. He dropped his gaze from the treetops, perhaps hoping to find another stick to arm himself with, or perhaps to try and locate where the weeping thing was in his dream, and that's when he saw the women. He saw half a dozen of them, all young and barely clothed, pale of skin and buoyant with natural beauty. They wore crowns woven of flowers and stems on their heads, and on their bodies, flowing and open wraps of gossamer. The nymphs playfully skipped around him, smiling and blowing kisses in his direction, and holding their breasts out as if they were offering them to him. As the lovelies began a dance around him, the lonely and dejected Donald longed to reach for one of them, to grasp them within his arms and embrace them, and to shower them with those kisses that he'd kept to himself for so long. He did reach out, only to have the targeted nymph dart away with a cascade of giggles. A moment later, she came back to the circle of beauties, making seductive eyes at him and enticingly pressing her breasts together, as if she wanted him to go for her again. They were teasing him, Donald knew, but they weren't being malicious about it. The women were all smiling and laughing with one another as they danced around him. They were smiling at him, too, and in his delight, Donald found that he was smiling and laughing along with them. He snatched out his arms a couple more times, but always, they would scurry just out of his reach. What would happen, he wondered, if he happened to be quick enough to snare one? He wondered another thing, also. In that first dream, when he was being chased down by the mob, he'd been Donald the man, but he'd also been the mysterious weeping thing. And here, with all these half-nude women around, which was he? Donald, or the weeping thing? Or was he some hybrid consciousness of both? The song went on, as Donald's thoughts went back to the sensual dancers around him, and instead of dwelling on the uncertainties, Donald began to revel in his dream, and for the first time in a long time, he was happy. Work was a trying chore the next day, as it always was. Donald impatiently went through the motions, did his duties, carried on, but all the while he was eager to hurry back to that weeping thing under his bed. Donald hadn't noticed that he'd had a smile plastered to his face all morning, until someone else pointed that out to him. "She must have been a good lay, Donnie-boy." His coworker commented and slapped at his shoulder, as break time came around and the small troop of employees strolled like a tired army into the employee lounge. "Does she have a sister?" Donald chuckled. One of the other workers he associated with happened to be a homosexual. "Or does she have a brother?" Donald laughed even louder this time, but if there ever was a time when he'd kept his lips sealed, and his mouth mum, this was it. Eventually, his buddies tired of trying to prod the information out of him, and they left him by himself while they went for their smokes, or their soft drinks, or whatever. Donald merely sat there, in the employee lounge, and munched down the single apple he'd brought in, and drank from his water bottle. As he ate, he wondered what the weeping thing was up to, all by its lonesome back home. He imagined it crawling out of the salad bowl, dragging itself along the carpet and getting all sorts of loose fibers and stray hairs on its meaty flesh. He imagined it crawling up the side of Margaret's bed, while the old woman was still asleep. He pictured the weeping thing making its way over by Margaret's head, and in a spurt of action, driving itself at her face, forcing itself into her mouth, and filling it, and choking the life right out of her as it wedged itself down her throat. That was when Donald laughed the loudest, startling several of the others in the lounge, for his laugh was a maniac's laugh. Donald looked around, as they all stared at him as if he was some sort of lunatic. He cleared his throat and said, "I just remembered a joke. A really funny one." Before anyone could open their mouth to ask, he was already on his feet and heading back to his work area. Donald jumped off the bus, the moment the doors slid open for him, and jauntily, he made his way back to the house. Luckily, Margaret was out, and he quickly hurried over to his bedroom, where he locked the door behind him. He lifted the bed skirt, and ducked his head down to find the salad bowl right where he'd left it. Slowly, he brought it out into the open. The weeping thing was still inside, sitting placidly, ebbing a slight warmth, and it took Donald a moment to figure out that the food he'd left it with was now gone. Also, the pieces the crows had bitten out of it were scabbed over with coarse purple-red coatings, much like a normal person's. "So you can eat people food." Donald marveled, as he studied the numerous little scabs. "And you can heal, too." He thought about what else he could feed the thing, without Margaret finding out about it, when he turned to a corner of his room and spotted a box of kid's cereal. He'd gotten it a few weeks back, when he'd had a craving for it, but Margaret had such a tirade over how a children's cereal should be eaten only by children, that Donald had since grown irritated enough to take it into his room and hide it there. Now, he left the bowl long enough to retrieve the small box, and he brought it over and undid the plastic bag that held the sweetened treats captive. "I'll only give you a little of this, because I don't know how much sugar you can take." Donald spoke to his new pet, as he reached in and grabbed a small handful. He opened up his hand to allow the tiny pieces to fall out, meaning to simply drop them in on the side, as he'd done with the lettuce the day before. What he saw down there in the bowl, however, was enough to make him jump back and drop most of what he'd been holding, and in his haste to flee, he also tipped over the box of cereal and sent a small mob of its pieces to invade the carpet. Absently, Donald clutched at the remainder of the cereal, as he ran to his bedroom door. He unlocked and opened it, ready to run out of the room, out of the house even, when he realized that Margaret was just coming in. "Shit." He muttered, as he quietly shut the door, and put his back against the wall, where he could keep a very close eye on the bowl. He stood that way for a few minutes, before he remembered the last few little pieces of oats and marshmallows still in his grip, and the sweat from his curled hand heating against them. Recalling how much he'd spent on that box of cereal, Donald quickly stuffed the bits into his mouth. Then, he locked the door again, and slowly, cautiously, he made his way toward the salad bowl. The weeping thing was still there, a featureless pulp as it had been earlier, and Donald began to question what he'd seen, what had made him panic to his feet just a few seconds ago. "I'm imagining things, that's all." He reasoned with himself. "Seeing things. I'm just tired from work, that's it." He stared at the thing in the bowl, but it did nothing. Pieces of cereal had fallen on top of it, and gingerly, Donald wiped them over to one side. On the floor, he saw the small mess of cereal that had scattered out of the box, and once he'd scooped up what he could save, what hadn't reached the carpet but only the box top, he wondered what to do with the rest. He gathered the remainder in his hand, and meant to drop it into the bowl, when he had an idea. He pinched a single bit of sugary, shaped oat, between his index finger and his thumb, and he held it over the form of the weeping thing. In terror, he watched as what had happened before started happening again. On the surface of that pink, meaty thing, several tiny slits began to open, as if they were little tiny mouths that wanted to be fed. There were at least a dozen of them, each perhaps half an inch long, if that, and from what he could see, each of them had its own little tongue and was shaped very much like a human mouth. Donald gulped, and with a growing anxiety, he lowered his fingers and placed the bit of cereal into one of the little mouths. He yanked his hand away, and with a dreadful fascination, he watched as the mouth closed up like a Venus Flytrap that had just captured a juicy morsel. Donald dropped down on his butt, wishing there was someone he could call to come over to witness this strange monstrosity with him, that could tell him no, Donald, you are not going insane. This is really happening. He looked back into the bowl, and this time, the mouths hadn't closed up. The first one had gotten a taste of the sweet, and now, the others wanted a taste too. He glanced into his palm, knowing there was plenty of cereal for all of them. The next tiny mouth got a taste of colored marshmallow. This was bound to make the rest jealous, he nervously chuckled to himself. He began alternating, piece of oat, piece of oat, piece of marshmallow, until all the mouths were closed so tight they were practically impossible to locate, and the rest of the cereal he dropped down into the edge where the first bunch had gone. Afterward, Donald just sat back and again began wondering at just what he'd brought into the house. It was nothing like he'd ever seen, nothing, as far as he could tell, like anything anybody had ever seen. The days began to flow by, with Donald being no closer to discovering a romantic interest than he had been before. He did take some consolation from the weeping thing, however, and dutifully he fed it and spoke to it in soft tones, as if it were a new puppy he'd brought home. Its scabs had all healed over and fallen away, leaving it an unblemished and plump-looking mass of meat. The thing seemed almost to lean towards his fingers sometimes, as Donald reached over to caress its flesh, and it returned his attention and concern with its own special little warmth. The steady diet was making the thing grow as well, and whereas before it had only been about the size of a fist, it was now the size of two and a half. A full half of the salad bowl was now being taken up by the thing's form. It had stopped weeping, too. The constant lamentations Donald had first heard had been replaced by a pleasant and steady hum. Perhaps this was the thing's way of purring, he wondered. More days passed, where the weeping thing had grown to take up nearly three quarters of the space of the bowl. It weighed about as much as a cat, Donald surmised, as he'd become comfortable enough to pick the thing up and settle it on his lap. He stroked its curve tenderly, speaking to it as one would to a favored potted plant, and he considered how it looked like a semi-firm, semi-malleable egg yolk the color and texture of human skin. He cleaned it up as best he could, with damp towels usually, or with carefully applied moist pads for the more stubborn spots, like when he'd fed the thing soft pieces of chocolate. He tried as hard as he could to see the growing slits of its mouths, but other than the chocolate smudges, he could not discern where they had once been. Then, came the fateful evening when the weeping thing had started to grow larger than the salad bowl, and Donald took it out and set it on his lap, as he tried to figure out where he could house his pet next. "You're getting too big for your britches, aren't you?" Donald asked it, but of course, the thing never replied. "Well, I suppose we can put you in one of my moving boxes, but then you'll be out in the open. I may have to keep the top on the box while I'm out, so Meddlesome Margaret won't come in and find you, and have a heart attack over how she told me there were no pets allowed here." He glanced down at the mass resting on his thighs. "I hope you're not claustrophobic." As Donald considered the ramifications of his new friend being discovered, he absently began stroking the thing, and listening to its low, relaxing murmur. He sighed, comparing how its flesh was so much like human flesh, and in particular, like a woman's flesh. And it had been some time since he'd held a woman close to him. While Donald kept caressing the weeping thing, he began to imagine sneaking a woman into his bedroom, while the old hag was out. "Oh, we'd have some fun then, if I did that." Donald mused. There was some motion from his thighs, and he paused his soft rubbing of the thing, and observed that many of the little mouths were opening. They were getting quite large by then, each one perhaps half the size of an adult human mouth. "Don't tell me you're hungry again?" Donald asked. "I just fed you a little while ago!" As he observed, many short tongues began emerging from the many little mouths, and the ones closest to his hand began wrapping themselves around his fingers, or licking at his palm. Disconcerted, Donald took his hand away. With more than a little apprehension, he asked, "What are you doing now?" The tongues slipped back into their mouths, and the mouths closed up so tight he could hardly tell where they'd been. They must sprout instantaneously, he figured. Slowly, cautiously, Donald lowered his hand back onto the weeping thing. The mouths soon reappeared, the tongues re-emerged, and again they began licking at this fingers and at the spaces between his digits. Two of them slid across the underside of his hand, leaving wet and sensuous trails across the cracks and expanses of his palm. He watched those tongues slide back and forth, moistening his hand, licking wide, licking narrow, wrapping themselves halfway around his fingers. The man shivered, sitting there on the edge of his bed, as the many tongues attended to his hand. He felt his body responding to their erotic motions, felt himself becoming aroused by them. Excitedly, expectantly, he took in the formless mound on his lap, recalling how previously, he'd seen teeth in those many mouths, which looked much like miniature human teeth. "Don't..." Donald quivered uneasily. "Please don't bite me." He set an index finger at the opening to one of the larger, more attentive of the mouths, and gently, he pushed it in. The mouth was wet and hot, and it wrapped itself around his finger, tight, as the tongue swirled around it in a most provocative way. The mouth was sucking away at his finger, much like a woman would, and within his pants Donald found his lust growing and expanding like a field of flowers ready to bloom. Euphoria, this is what Donald was feeling, in one of those relatively rare occasions in his mostly miserable life. Absently, his eyes drifted over to the clock, and this is when he realized how late it was. "It's getting late." Donald said, as he brought his finger out of the tiny mouth, and away from that delicious sucking. "I've got to get my gear ready for tomorrow." He chortled. "I've got to take my shower, and shave, and brush my teeth." He looked back at the thing sitting on his lap. "You'll go back into the bowl for tonight, but I promise that I'll find somewhere larger for you tomorrow." The Weeping Thing Donald set the thing down, slid the bowl under the bed, and hurried on with his tasks. That night, Donald had another dream. He was in the woods again, and surrounded by those alluring, enticing, and mesmerizing nymphs. They were dancing around him, smiling and giggling as before, but instead of Donald reaching for one of them, they were taking turns reaching for him. Each of those sweet vixens was moving closer to him with every turn that they made around him, until all six of them were close enough to slide their warm hands and arms across his body. They were touching him all over, sending Donald into a daze with their smiling, glowing faces, combined with his own growing want for them. All together, the women embraced Donald and dragged him to the ground, and with their hands, and their mouths, and their bodies, they made love to him among the leaves and twigs of the woods. High above, in the broken canopy of the trees, Donald could see dozens of crows staring down at him. Trying to keep his composure and demeanor cool, Donald arrived home from work a little later than usual the next day. He'd worked a six hour shift, instead of the usual four. His expectations were riding high, as he unlocked the front door to the house and stepped into the living room, but his spirits were quickly drowned when he observed old Margaret sitting on the couch with a glum look on her face. Donald's first thoughts were that she'd discovered the weeping thing. Instead, Margaret said, "Goddamned doctor wants me to go in for another blood test. Can you believe that shit? They've sucked enough blood out of me to fill a blood bank, and now they're telling me they need to take out more? Why can't they just use the blood they sucked out five days ago?" Tactfully, Donald said, "I don't trust doctors." "Goddamned right." Margaret agreed. "I guess they're taking a full gallon this time, because the doctor said I might end up feeling light-headed, and that I should have someone drive me this time." Donald had an active license, but no car, and he wondered if Margaret was indirectly asking him for a favor. Wisely, he kept quiet, while she kept talking. The old woman was shaking her head. "Jenny's supposed to take me, but she should have been here ten minutes ago. If I have to reschedule thanks to her, I'm going to give her a good piece of my mind." Donald tried hard not to look relieved, when they both heard a car horn outside. "Guess that's her." Margaret struggled up to her feet, and ambled toward the door. Just before she opened it, she turned back to face him. "You've been eating a lot more than usual, haven't you? How come you're not getting any fatter?" The boarder knew the old woman well enough to infer that she thought he was feeding a second person. He held his arms up in a strongman's pose, and grinned. "I've got to feed these muscles. I've been doing a lot of push-ups the last couple of weeks." Margaret stared at Donald's puny arms for a moment. "Yeah, you're a regular Hercules now. Lock up after me, will ya?" From the doorway, Donald impatiently watched the old woman mosey over to Jenny's vehicle, and a couple of minutes later, the car pulled out of the driveway and rolled away. Donald hurried over to his room. He pulled the salad bowl out from under his bed, and with something approaching rapture he stared at the blob that was now threatening to overflow its boundaries. "Last night's dream, with those women in it, that was a very nice dream." He said, as he lifted the thing up and took a seat on the edge of his bed. "I know you sent that dream to me, just like you sent the others." He stroked the weeping thing a few times, but today Donald was impatient. He steadied his breaths, and set his hand on it, and sure enough, the thing responded by opening its many mouths and stretching out its many tongues to caress his hand. "Oh." Donald moaned quietly. "You've no idea how much I want a real woman to do that same thing to me." As the erotic actions continued, there was enough growing warmth on Donald's lap that he shifted the weeping thing on its side to take a look at what was going below it. Donald watched as two of the small mouths seemed to gravitate toward one another, and when they met, they joined together and formed something altogether different. Donald was taken aback at first, for this new shape had many distinct folds on it, and he instantly recognized it for what it was. The labia majora, the labia menora, the clitoris, it was all there, and it was already glistening with moisture for him. Donald stared down at the weeping thing, and at its newly formed vagina, sensing its growing hunger for him. He too felt drawn to it, felt his own lustful desire beginning to overwhelm him, felt his prick straining beneath his pants and underwear. Deeply aroused, Donald set the weeping thing aside, and lay back on the bed. He undid his zipper, pulled his cock free, and after taking a long, deep breath, he brought the weeping thing over his crotch and settled its brand new cunt over his body. Smoothly, it expanded to take him in, and right after, it gripped around his cock, snugly, and it started doing the erotic work all on its own. Donald moaned and squirmed, but remained enthralled as the weeping thing coaxed him into making love to it, and eventually brought him up to an unexpected and sensational climax. Finally, when Donald's member had been fully spent, and lay there weak and flaccid like a dead fish, he set the weeping thing aside and slipped away from the bed long enough to retrieve a quick grab of napkins. He wiped himself off, but when he went to do the same to the bizarre thing on the bed, he was stunned to see that a tongue had emerged from the vagina, and was busily licking away the last of his seed from around its edges. He stood there, staring at the thing, wondering what it all meant, before he got busy himself and began looking for a container that would accommodate the thing better than the salad bowl. As he emptied a box of clothes out, he heard a serene hum being emitted by the weeping thing, as if it was telling him that everything was all right. Donald half-grinned. At that moment, everything was all right with him too. Early the next morning, Donald began to stir awake. He wasn't scheduled for work that day, he thought with no little amount of satisfaction, and after casting a casual glance at his clock, he simply shut his eyes and went back to sleep for another hour. When he was good and ready, he roused himself out of bed, and the first things he did were to click on his lamp and step over to his closet, where he'd set the box with the weeping thing in it. As a further safeguard, he'd placed a second box on top of it, and after removing it, he dragged the lower box out into the open. The box felt heavier than before, and once he'd removed the lid, he knew why. The weeping thing was much bigger than it had been the night before, by about a third. "My, how you've grown." Donald stared at it, amazed. He felt a mischievousness thrill through his being, as he thought of the previous day's encounter. "You wouldn't be agreeable to having another go with me, would you?" In reply, the weeping thing basked in a shade of red that could only be considered a deep blush, before a single opening formed on its fleshy substance. Of course, the opening was shaped like a nice, moist vagina. "I've corrupted you, whatever you are." Donald said, hotly, as he lifted the thing and took it back to bed with him. Again, the thing began to fuck him, and it damned near made him scream out loud and jostle old Margaret awake. He started laughing like a lunatic, and had to cover his mouth, as he thought of the old bitch bursting through the door, and saw her shocked face as she witnessed him getting throttled by the expanding lump of flesh. "Ah!" Donald's voice sought to escape past the sides of his hand, as the thing quickly brought him up to a climax. He clamped both hands tight to his mouth. Perfectly balanced over his abdomen, the weeping thing kept up its motions, as if it were a wild beast of a woman, madly slapping its flesh onto his. The only things missing were a woman's moans of passion. Donald's hands left his mouth, and gripped his bed sheet as he felt himself burst into her, into it, and the orgasm caused him to close his eyes tightly. He saw them then, behind his closed eyelids; those same nymphs from his dreams, five of them dancing in a half circle around his bed, while the sixth one rode on top of him and called out his name. "Fuck me, Donald!" The woman cried out, and for a moment they were both out in the woods, and old leaves and twigs dug into the man's nude body, while a cool breeze brought a slight shiver to his arms and chest. "Fuck me!" Donald opened his eyes, certain that the beauty's scream had carried all over the house, but no, it hadn't. There had been no real scream, only the one heard in his mind, and as he looked down to his lower half, he saw the weeping thing suck away the last of his expulsion with its vagina-slash-mouth. When it was done, the creature somehow managed to roll itself off his torso, and with a gentle flop, it rolled off to rest at his side. He heard it purring at him like a pleased pussycat. Donald dared to close his eyes, just for a moment, and he found himself back in the woods, with half a dozen young women giggling around him, taking turns kissing him, caressing his chest and belly, and stroking his cock as if they were intent on making it rise again. It was such a pleasant dream, that Donald wondered what it would be like to wander into that dream forever. He smiled at the fantasy, as his hand absently reached down and started rubbing on the thing resting beside him. In his imagination, he was touching a woman's supple lower back and rear end, and in reality, that's exactly what it felt like. "I wonder what your name would be?" Donald wondered, right before he heard the weeping thing make some sort of noise it hadn't made before. What was it telling him? Going by instinct, Donald shut his eyes, and found himself outdoors and on the ground once again. The woman who'd been riding him, who'd brought him to his climax, had stretched her body up closer to his head, and her pert breasts now rested on his shoulder and chest. Into his ear, she whispered, "Emelina. My name is Emelina." "Such a sweet name..." Donald said, only to be jolted by the sound of a pounding at his bedroom door. "Who's in there with you?" Margaret called out. "I can hear you talking and moving about from my bedroom. Open up this door!" The weeping thing, apparently more agile than it had been before, easily rolled off the bed and disappeared under it. Donald sat up, briefly pausing to make sure he was semi-presentable. He left the bed as well, and hurriedly pushed his boxes into the closet, before he stepped over to unlock the door. Wearing her powder blue pajamas, Margaret pushed her way in and started inspecting the room. "I was just having some kind of nightmare." Donald excused himself. "No, you weren't." Margaret refuted. "You were tussling about on the bed. I could hear you from my room. Now, where is she?" This time, Donald grew irritated. "Well, if you're so sure about that, why don't you find her yourself?" Margaret shot him a menacing look, before she stalked around the room. She poked her head into the closet, and even went as far as shuffling the clothes on hangers all to one side, before she got on her knees to look under the bed. Donald cringed. Margaret dropped down, her head close to the carpet as her hand shot out and swept the bed-skirt aside. Her fat ass was sticking up in the air, tightly stretching out her blue pajama bottoms, and Donald could barely keep himself from swinging back a leg and launching a kick that would probably send her through the back wall. The old woman used the edge of the bed to groan her way back to her feet. "I know I heard you talking to somebody." "I'm telling you, I was just having a nightmare." Donald insisted. "I can't even remember what it was about anymore, because you knocked me out of it when you started banging on the door." Margaret huffed, and did an old woman's version of stomping out the door. After waiting until her footsteps had grown faint, Donald went to shut the door, and rushed toward bed. The weeping thing rolled out, almost casually, as if it too sensed that the immediate danger had passed. "Into the box," Donald whispered as he scooped it up, and hurried toward the closet. "Until Margaret's gone out." Before he set the lid back on the box, Donald recalled the dream of six young beauties, all nearly nude and frolicking with him in the woods. He grimaced in a sad way, as he covered the box up, and stepped away from the closet. Even a couple of hours later, Donald was still grumbling over the incident. It was still too early for Margaret to head off anywhere, and he'd tried to keep himself busy by perusing women's profiles on a dating site. He saw his recent history on the site, and the seven or eight profiles he'd checked out just a few days ago, and then he looked up how many women had visited his own personal page. Zero, he discovered. Zero women had bothered to look him up, to browse through what he thought was a witty, original, and honest description of himself and his current station in life. Zero women had stopped by to view the couple of pictures he'd uploaded, one a self-shot of him smiling and wearing a blue, long-sleeve button shirt; what he called his business look, and the other of him in a more casual environment, at the beach in a tee shirt and shorts, a picture Sallie had taken of him not that long ago. Donald was still thinking of her when he left the dating site and redirected his browser to his email server. There, half-hidden in the quagmire of the usual spam advertising booty calls, pharmaceuticals and Viagra, he saw a message from Sallie. Eagerly, he clicked on it, and scoured over the first few lines. Sallie had always been a long-winded sort, as she was prone to lengthy explanations and verbosity, and that had been one of the things he liked most about her. It wasn't until Donald got halfway through the message that he figured out what it meant. It was a departure letter, a farewell note, a goodbye message. His mind abbreviated the stretched missive into something more compact: It's over between you and me, Donald. It shouldn't have hit him so hard, as they'd hadn't talked much in the last few weeks, but nevertheless, it did. The end of the relationship, in this long letter from Sallie, served as a microcosm of his life. It reminded him that he would always live alone, on the fringes of and being ignored by the rest of society. No matter how many people he associated with at work, no matter how many women he sent messages to online, he knew, they all knew, that he was destined to be an outsider. Dejected, rejected, Donald rolled his chair away from the small desk and got to his feet. He stepped to his single window, taking in the early morning view of the woods behind the house, and he was uneasy as his eyes took in a shock of crows watching him. There might have been over twenty of them, standing on the sturdy posts of the empty clothesline, on Margaret's old barbecue pit, or pacing back and forth on the ground and cawing as if they had an important matter in mind. He'd barely started counting them, when the old woman valiantly appeared on the scene, wielding a broom before her and swatting away at the large birds. They all hopped back and cawed their protests, easily and repeatedly moving out of harm's way, as Margaret complained of all the shit they might leave behind, shit that she would have to clean up later. When she realized how ineffectual her broom was, she instead armed herself with the water hose, and flung a forced stream of liquid at the nearest birds. The first crows flew up and away, and the rest soon followed, and thus, the brief siege was over. Margaret gave Donald a face of disgust, as she trampled back toward her back door, and saw him standing there on the other side of the glass. Donald merely watched her go by, as Sallie's words had left him entirely devoid of emotion. It was past noon when Margaret finally left the house. Donald knew this because that was the time that the weeping thing began humming again, and he stepped out of his bedroom to make certain. Indeed, the old woman was gone. Still downcast and feeling hurt over Sallie, Donald went into his closet and pulled out the box holding his pet, and he took the thing with him and sat it beside him on the bed. "It's just you and me, I guess." He sighed, as he stroked the thing's soft skin. A moment later, he chuckled. "And old bitch Margaret." The weeping thing surprised him by rolling off the bed, and positioning itself in the widest floor space in the bedroom. The thing began to melt before his eyes, to expand all across the carpet as if someone was pouring out batter. In horror, Donald stood up. His first thought was that the weeping thing was dying. His second thought was of how he'd clean the mess up before Margaret got back. The thing halted him from moving further, by singing its droning lullaby of joy, and in effect telling Donald that everything was going to be all right. Still anxious, the man began stepping around it, watching as the thing stretched out further, thinned out until it was perhaps an inch thick. It was shaping itself into a large rectangle, becoming nearly as large as the blanket on his bed, Donald compared. "What are you up to?" Donald asked, as he stepped near the window. The crows, he noticed, were all back again. Perched, standing, pacing, all of them watching him, even as he was staring out at them. This time, there were more than twenty of them. He thought of sliding his window open, and screaming for them to leave, when the pitch of the weeping thing's song changed. It was calling him, he knew, and Donald walked back over and stood beside it. It had become a thin blanket of meat, and in its song, the weeping thing told Donald of how comfortable and peaceful he would feel, if he only took off his clothing and lay down on top of it. It promised to take him away from that house, away from his useless job, and from his lonely life, if only he would trust it, and lie down on it. Donald took a breath, for somehow, somewhere deep in his psyche, he knew this might happen. He might have suspected this earlier, or only become aware of it now, but that didn't matter. He knew very well what the weeping thing was asking of him. "I've got my job and Margaret on the one hand," Donald compared. "And six lovely nymphs in the woods on the other one." He grinned. "It's a tough choice, isn't it?" He sobered up quickly, though. "Will this hurt?" Of course not, the weeping thing consoled him. As nervous as he could ever recall being, Donald stripped off his clothes, for he doubted he would need them where he was going. When he was finished, he stepped onto the thin rug of flesh and settled his body down over it. He waited for something to happen, and he was near enough to panic that he almost felt like rolling away from the thing, snatching up his clothes, and running out of the house again, this time forever. He shuddered, as a new expanse of flesh started to rise from one side and slowly slipped over his frightened form like a pink tidal wave. It went over his head and body, enveloping all of him. Just like a Venus Flytrap would do to a juicy morsel. As the flesh draped down over his face, Donald could see dozens, hundreds, maybe thousands of little teeth forming, but when the last of the weeping thing had enclosed him, he was left in the dark, and could see nothing at all.