Creature

a short about exploring my first apartment. Happy Halloween <3

I wake up on the floor.

No mattress yet. Only bare, bamboo floorboards, cool to the touch. A hint of dust lingers in the air - remnants of dead skin cells left from past tenants. It feels musty in here. I need to open the windows.

The sunrise has flooded the room orange. It’s a warm, blinding light. I sit up and stretch my arms wide, closing my eyes for a moment to soak in the sun’s glow. These windows are perfect, but I need curtains if I want to sleep in.

I flop back onto the floor and roll around like a cat. I find it satisfying to rub my sore back against the cold floor, which creaks under my weight. Occasionally I go still and doze off; belly up, and paws raised.

I am a light sleeper. When my eyes open again, and I realize where I am, I get excited all over again. Flopping, rolling, zooming, and scratching at the floorboards, I whisper to myself, “My floor. My floor. My floor.”

Stop. I hear a shuffle from upstairs. The skidding of a chair across the floor. Just the neighbors. I stand, flaring my nostrils, and move to the wall. The webbed pads of my fingers stick and unstick to the wall with squishy, wet shlup sounds, and I climb.

Crawling on the ceiling, hanging upside down by my fingers and toes, I zip my tongue in and out of my mouth, like a lizard. "My wall. My wall." As I climb, one of my fingers slides into a hole - a leak in the corner of the ceiling. Unbothered, I keep crawling.

My hawk eyes spot a lone beetle crawling along the floor - red and black - a boxelder bug. With a thunderous "CAW!" I launch from the ceiling and tumble into a roll, crashing against the farthest wall.

Bruised and my breath hitching in my chest, I scramble to my knees. Slowly, I open my clutched fist and stare at the little thing. Dainty, weightless legs, and unopened wings. “This is my home, not yours.” Before it can escape, I pop it in my mouth, and it bursts with a satisfying crunch. Its juices flow down my tongue and the exoskeleton gets stuck in my teeth. Carefully, I use my claws to floss, and get back to the business of settling into my new home.

Back on all fours, I decide to mark my territory. I move around the floor, sniffing occasionally and raising my leg to spray piss and pheromones on the wall. “Mine. Mine.”

Finally, as if to baptize the place, I sit by the open window and take a bong hit. My sploof helps the smoke disappear, and nobody is around to hear me violently cough. I finally settle as the plant works through my chest into my bloodstream.

I have sunlight, food, and water. I can be safe here.