1. clump

After the abortion, Min had asked if she could look at the fetus. The whole thing was a sort of pathetic, half-hearted procedure, where she didn’t really mind not being pregnant but also wanted to know what they’d pulled out of her, to decide if she should feel sad about it. She wanted to hold it in her hands and see if it squished like the model fetuses they used at the marches. The nurse looked at her in a sort of pitying way, and then to Jeremy, and said, unsteadily, “That’s not really how it works.”

“Oh,” said Min. “Okay.”

They had explained it to her, beforehand, in thorough detail, but she’d been too distracted by the vein bulging in Jeremy’s forehead to pay attention. This was killing him, she could tell. She wondered if the staff would tell people, or if they even recognized him from the slew of interviews he’d done on Fox News. Jeremy Briar in a Planned Parenthood? After throwing pig’s blood on a group of gynecologists? And having his charges dismissed? Woof.

The nurse looked between the two of them. Min followed her gaze to Jeremy. “Would you like him to remain in the room with you while we go over the recovery process?”

Min looked at Jeremy, and Jeremy looked at the door. Before the procedure, the doctor had asked him to leave, because he kept crying and praying and asking if she was going to die, and if she died would it be his fault, and even if it wouldn’t be his fault legally, Jesus would punish him for aiding in two murders, not just one. “No,” she said, “No, it’s alright.” He all but sprinted out the door when dismissed. Min looked at the nurse, who began to explain what she was supposed to do, and wondered if they’d put the fetus in the hazmat bin by the door.

2. swell

At home, her landlord, Pauly, was sitting in the lobby swatting flies away from a stack of casserole dishes on the stoop. “These are for you,” he grunted, pointing with his broom at the dishes.

“Someone brought me seven casseroles?” Min asked. Her thigh was itchy from the aloe vera she’d rubbed over her vulva in the clinic bathroom. When she stepped forward, a glob of it fell down through the leg of her pant and landed on the hem of her sock. She shook it loose onto the pavement. Jeremy scaled the stairs and inspected the dishes.

“They’re from my coworkers,” he said.

Min bent over and took the card off one of them. It read, in very sweet handwriting,

DEAR MIN,

WE ARE SO SORRY TO HEAR THAT YOU AND STEVEN LOST THIS BABY. REMEMBER THAT GOD HAS A PLAN FOR ALL HIS CHILDREN, INCLUDING YOU. WE WILL BE KEEPING YOU IN OUR PRAYERS.

WITH FAITH AND LOVE,
BETH AND DANIEL

“You told your coworkers I had an abortion?” Min asked, cocking an eyebrow. “Your Iowans for Life coworkers?”

“I told them your baby died,” said Jeremy. “I didn’t tell them we killed it.”

“You also told them that Steve was here?” Steve was not in Iowa. Sergeant First Class Steve Briar was currently in Afghanistan, probably flying planes into children. Min tried not to think about it, preferring to focus on the fact that she’d gotten citizenship out of their marriage without worrying about the DACA renewal fee, and he’d gotten to avoid being dishonorably discharged for soliciting a sex worker while on reserve in Atlanta. Iowa, though, was worse than Atlanta, and worse than she remembered Jeju being. Two weeks before she found out she was pregnant, she’d been researching how to get deported. Kill someone, said the website. Commit an act of terrorism.

“You killed a baby?” Pauly asked. “You want a cigarette?”

“I had an abortion,” said Min. “And yes.”

“Which is murder,” Jeremy corrected. “And she’s fine, she shouldn’t be smoking.”

“Nobody should be smoking, according to the label on the cigarettes and my doctor,” said Pauly.

“The abortion was his idea, anyway,” Min said. She took the cigarette that Pauly was offering, but didn’t accept the light, just pocketed the stick. Later, she was sure that it would burst open in the laundry, forgotten, and make all her clothes smell like tobacco. But she enjoyed watching that vein on Jeremy’s forehead blow up like a balloon. “Thanks, Pauly.”

In the stairwell, Jeremy grunted out between steps, “Really? You’re gonna blame it on me?”

Min paused and turned to look at him, three steps below her and arms full of casseroles. She pointed at his crotch. “I’m gonna blame it on that.”

“I lost sight,” he muttered, that vein throbbing again. “You insisted–you–”

“It’s fine,” said Min. “It’s over now. We took it back. Like those socks your mom got you that you said made your feet itchy.”

“We killed someone,” Jeremy pleaded. “An innocent baby.”

Shrugging, she turned up the stairs. If she was being honest, she hadn’t thought he would go through with the sex when she proposed it; even then, she thought he would last long enough for her to direct him to pull out, or stop, or something, but then his red shoulders were shuddering and his bloodshot, frighteningly Aryan-blue eyes were rolling back in his head, and warmth, and fullness that she failed to wash out in the shower while they counted down the seconds to the New Year.

Min wondered if he would have been okay with it if it was a medical abortion, instead. He’d refused to use Plan B, despite her insistence that the Pope said it was okay, because Catholics, to him, were basically Jews, and Jews were basically Satanists.

When she told him she was pregnant, he’d been aghast. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” he’d demanded.

“I didn’t know until now. I thought I was just bloated.”

“I thought–I mean–don’t you get your–every month–it’s March now–”

“I don’t get one,” said Min. “Because of the anemia?”

At that, he’d fallen to his knees in her kitchen and began sobbing out prayers to Jesus. Forgive me, Lord, forgive me, I was led astray from your Light and I want to return. Let me in! Let me in! Min knew Jeremy’s tears were as much for Steve, who Jeremy saw as more of a son than a brother, as they were for himself. She had turned back to the stove, where the onions sizzled and popped, and imagined what their child would look like–hair dark and thick, eyes cold and blue. Inside her, something vicious scraped against her uterus, and cried to be made real, let out.

3. damp

From how Beth often described it at brunch after church, getting children to do anything was impossible. Min thought that Beth may have just meant her children, who once called Min a slur for joking that they eat their vegetables. Other children weren’t so bad. Min’s child, which had actually been a fetus, and was now in some hazmat bin in an Iowa City Planned Parenthood, wouldn’t have been that bad. Upstairs, in the apartment above her own, the baby bathed every morning at 10. Min lay in bed, eyes closed, listening to it giggle, while she attempted to apply a lidocaine patch to her abdomen. When she opened her eyes, she found that the water stain on the ceiling had grown even larger.

After the stomach cramps subsided enough, Min rolled over to the side of the mattress and reached for the sleeve of saltines she’d left on the floor last night to enjoy this morning. The pain medication they’d given her kept food from ever reaching her stomach. Now, she was in a regular routine: chew saltines into a paste, spit them out. Chew more, spit out. It was like popcorn in a movie theater, as she watched the line of the water draw out a spiral on the ceiling. Min spit a handful of warm, wet cracker mush into her hand, and hid it under her bed. As the baby played upstairs, sloshing in its warm bath, cooing and laughing, the water progressed across Min’s walls, like a blade, drawing out a path that made letters, and then words, and then warning:

DON’T FORGET, I’M FAMILY!

Min blinked and rubbed her eyes. The words remained on the wall, though they faded as the water dried. She took a photo with her phone and zoomed in, where they continued to loom.

4. boris

The food deprivation was driving her crazy, she decided. For the first time in three days, Min found herself in the kitchen, where the casseroles that Jeremy had failed to freeze were developing a foul stench on the counter. All her other cabinets were empty save for the sticky layer of mystery residue that remained on the bottom despite her scrubbing, so Min sliced out a corner of the Minnesota hot dish that Jeremy’s assistant had sent. After a careful sniff, she found that it smelled somewhere between fish and gas. Microwaving it would kill the bacteria, wouldn’t it? She loaded the slice onto a plate and placed it in the machine, watching it rotate until it started to pop and squeal.

HOW DID YOU FORGET?

it demanded.

I TOLD YOU, WE’RE FAMILY,

it hissed.

DON’T DO THIS, MIN.

it pleaded.

Min cocked her head to the side. How was it speaking to her, when it had no mouth? She pressed the button that opened the microwave door and took the plate out, hot on the edges, before setting it down at the dining room table. “You don’t have a mouth,” she told the casserole.

THE CASSEROLE DOESN’T HAVE A MOUTH.
BUT I DO.

On the plate, something fuzzy and teal extended itself to her and waved. Min reached out a careful finger to poke it and found that it was warm and slightly slimy. She wiped the residue on the front of her shirt.

“What are you?” she asked. “Mold?”

I’M MOLD,

said the mold,

BUT YOU CAN CALL ME BOTRYS.

“Is that Russian?” Min asked. “Like…Boris?”

I’M IN RUSSIA, SURE, BABY. YOU CAN CALL ME BORIS IF IT HELPS, BUT I’M EVERYWHERE. I’M IN YOUR WALLS. I’M IN THE WHITE HOUSE. I’M ON YOUR PLATE. WHERE LIFE GOES, I FOLLOW.

“That’s very counterculturalist.”

I KNOW. THAT’S WHERE I LEARNED IT.
DO YOU WANT TO SHARE A MEAL? THIS CASSEROLE IS DELICIOUS.
YOU MUST BE EXHAUSTED AFTER THE PROCEDURE.
WHAT WAS IT LIKE TO BE FULL OF LIFE?

“I’m not sure I should eat it,” said Min. “You have it.” She watched carefully as Boris began to spread his sponge across the layer of cheese and tater tots, taking careful bites. “I didn’t know I was pregnant for very long. I guess I’m relieved, though. I don’t want a baby with blue eyes. I find them scary. And my parents would be disappointed.” Min looked at Boris, and then realized what she’d said. “I’m sorry—I don’t mean you. You’re beautiful. I like your blue.”

THANK YOU,

said Boris.

YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL TOO.

5. order

“You should throw these out,” Jeremy said, pointing at the casserole plates in the fridge.

Min was five days past the abortion, and Boris was only getting larger. Every day, when she got hungry, she would take a piece of him out of the fridge and set him on a plate. He was more interesting than she’d expected. On Wednesday, he’d told her about the time he spent in Jeju, her hometown, eating seafood in the dumpsters behind restaurants. She’d returned the favor by talking about her parents—her mother, an escort; her father, a cook. After Hallasan erupted, when Min was seven, her mother fled with whatever aid money they got from the local missionaries, to Atlanta. On Thursday, he’d told her about what the earth was like before the people or the animals, when it was quiet except for the wind.

OR AT LEAST, I ASSUME IT WAS QUIET.
I DON’T HAVE EARS.

Now, Min heard a slip, and the sound of plates clattering in the sink. The way Jeremy was poking around the dishes had started to make her nauseous. She sat up in bed and shouted out to the kitchen, “I’ll clean it up tonight.” Throwing the covers off her bed, she pushed herself onto the floor. Her bedroom, now, stunk of Boris and his musk. She dashed out into the entryway, shutting the door behind her.

Jeremy threw his hands over his eyes when he noticed her, and her lack of pants. “Oh, cripes, Min, be decent, would you?”

“It’s my house,” she said.

“When was the last time you showered?” He seemed so repulsed by her now. She thought back, spitefully, to how he’d fallen into sin for whatever body seemed to repulse him so intensely now.

YOUR BODY IS AMAZING. IGNORE HIM.

Boris called from the fridge.

“Thank you,” said Min.

“What?” asked Jeremy.

“Separate conversation,” Min dismissed. “Why are you here?”

“I wanted to check on you,” said Jeremy. “And, well, I was wondering when you think you might be coming back to work. We’ve been canvassing in some of the Chinese neighborhoods, and they–well–respond better to someone, who, you know.”

DO YOU WANT ME TO EAT HIM?

Boris asked.

“Not yet,” Min assured him. “I’ll let you know when I do.”

“Well—I, I’d know you’d be coming back because I’d see you at the office.”

“I wasn’t talking to you.”

Jeremy’s forehead vein bulged. “What the heck is going on, Min? Are you okay? Is this because of the—the thing that happened?”

“What thing?”

“The–procedure.”

“The abortion.”

EVERYTHING GIVES WAY TO NEW LIFE.
HE’S AFRAID OF IT.

“I know,” lamented Min. “For a pro-lifer, it’s kind of embarrassing.”

“Min!” Jeremy shouted. “What is going on with you?”

“I’ve moved on,” said Min. “I won’t be coming back to work.”
“But—but, there are target demographics we aren’t reaching, Min, and the election is coming up—you can’t just quit.”

YOUR BODY IS YOUR LABOR. YOUR BODY IS YOURS.
I BELIEVE IN YOU, MIN.
CUT HIM OFF.

“I can,” said Min. “And I do.”

6. chunk

After Jeremy left, Min returned to bed and watched the water patch on the ceiling as it bulged and throbbed. She imagined Boris in the swell, bringing life to dead wood and plaster, growing where planted as long as he could find water. For a moment, she missed her baby. Her clump of cells. Whatever it had been. Min didn’t care about abortion one way or another, but she had enjoyed being less alone for her brief pregnancy. She had loved the feeling of fullness.

Now, she was so hungry. She hadn’t eaten since coming home from the clinic. Emptiness was carving a space in her stomach and killing whatever it touched.

If only she could be like Boris! Bright and vibrant, loving everything enough to grow everywhere. He knew stories of everywhere—ancient Rome, the Pleistocene, even her parents’ marriage. Her childhood. He had been there with her. For as long as she could remember, and long before.

I KNOW YOU. I KNOW YOU BETTER THAN ANYONE.

This time, his voice came from the ceiling. The revelation that he had been watching her elicited a gasp. Min narrowed her eyes and looked at the bulge. She stuck a hand down the front of her underwear. As she began to move, transformed into gasps and stutters and fingers, a flower burst from the bulge in the drywall, unfurling from a stem so long, it nearly brushed against her nose.

7. now

A week after the abortion, the hunger was too much to bear. Min sat for a long time looking at the piece of Boris she’d hidden under her bed. Then, quietly, she confessed, “I don’t want to eat you. You mean too much to me.”

OH, BABY. IT’S OKAY. YOU’RE HUNGRY.
EAT. BE FULL.

Her tears were forming a puddle on the plate. He clung to them, too.

YOU CAN CRY. I DON’T MIND. IT FEEDS ME.

“You’re just so beautiful,” Min sobbed. Boris, since last night, had begun sprouting deep green rings around his usual aqua-blue spores. It reminded her of those satellite maps of the Great Lakes. How could she eat him, when he looked like the whole world?

MIN, I KNOW YOU.
I KNOW YOU LONG TO BE FULL OF LIFE AGAIN.
YOU’VE FED ME. NOW LET ME FEED YOU.

“I just—” Min stopped short. It felt humiliating to say, until she remembered: Boris had been in the room where she was born. Boris had seen her for her entire life. “I’m afraid of what I’ll do without you. I don’t want to go back to work. I don’t want Steve to come back home. I just want to sit around all day talking to you.”

HONEY, I’M NOT GOING ANYWHERE.

She wished she could hold him. She wanted to touch him, feel him, hear him speak. Wanted to wrap her fists around him. The casserole had shriveled up in size and reached room temperature—it wouldn’t be too uncomfortable if she were to just take a part of him in her hands, and then her mouth. Min was hungry, and needy, and longing to be full. Her hands moved before she thought about it clearly, to the layer of tater tots covered in blue. When she grabbed a fistful, it revealed even further beauty: more of Boris, in the corn and cream of mushroom below, gentle and pink and bright!

Min held him, pulse racing, and realized how badly she’d been needing this—to be touched, lovingly.

I’VE WANTED THIS FOREVER

Boris moaned.

ALL I WANT IS TO BE INSIDE YOU.

“Fuck,” Min cried out. “I can’t wait anymore.” She shoveled the ground beef and corn and cheese and potatoes and him into her mouth, found it tasted sour and perfect, chewed haphazardly and needlessly and swallowed and went back for more. His fuzz tickled her throat as he descended into her stomach, taking root, blooming.

DOES THAT FEEL GOOD, HONEY? DOES THAT FEEL GOOD?

“So good,” Min whimpered. Her hands were in front of her, reaching for more, and the food was wetter than she expected, and they were finally sharing a meal together, finally touching, finally she could carry something growing instead of dying.

Min’s body, light with pleasure, began to writhe in her chair at the dining room table, sweat beading on her forehead, the bridge of her nose aching, her legs trembling, and this was life, and this was love, and this was real, which she knew, because her shuddering was matched with a revelation of Boris’ own, a curse—

OH, MIN!—

before flowers burst free from the ceiling, and the water from the bath upstairs began to pour down onto her bed in the other room, and her fingers were turning blue, and she was happy, for once, and free, and in love, and pregnant again, satiated and cradling her belly, where something beautiful grew again, and this time she would let it.