Shannon Solley

Walking into the academic quad, I was met with the sight of crows lining the tops of buildings.

Each faded facade was not without a full line of them, side by side. Hunched, with wings folded back and pointed to the grey sky so as to look at me properly--- like smug men in suits about to collect a large sum; although the absolute dark of their feathers reminded me more of the robes of some ancient black cultists.

It can't be, I thought, my rationality escaping me. They know.

Some swooped down into the bushes, while others returned back to the circle. A twitching squirrel crawled, as opposed the usual hopping characteristic to them, into the bushes.

These plants were dead. Brown leaves cracking off browner sticks, yet they still hid those who dove past their skeletons

The night before, I had talked to the devil for two hours. I didn't want to, but he had screamed and threatened and took a picture of himself swallowing pills. So I listened, more than talked. He told me of how he hated me and how I've ruined everything for him and his demonic state was my fault. He sent me pictures of the person I was years ago, her stomach bulging past narrow hips and hair as short as my eyelashes.

But it was all because he needed help---help that he admonished only I could provide.

Rattling knives and pills and pens and phones he shuffled facts and lies and feelings and reasonings like this was a game of cup-in-ball---the truth hidden under any of these while I wagered my soul, my personhood.

That's what he really wanted.

He screeched that he loved me, that I was the only one who understood him. The only one with soft laughter and softer curves.

I won't lie; I had wavered. A small, feathery white hope fluttered in my chest at these flatterings, but black scars seared this creature back into submission.

When the flattery hit its peak, when he said he'd "love you anyway," I cast him out.

It's a simple thing, expelling the devil. What makes him terrifying is his power to make us savor his presence. All crave it. He's a shapeshifter and he takes the form of orgasmic self-destruction. Our mouth waters over his offerings, so soft and sweet and absorbent of will. But once he has been expelled, it's hard to remember how comfortable it is to be weak---when we were tucked into a dark and warm tree to escape the thunder of life knowing our tree will be struck by lightning.

So after I extinguished his voice--- after I leaped out of the tree and into the thundering sky, I felt guilty in my walking away and felt for that hallow maple. It's a life, giving it a minimum amount of worth required to warrant empathy. But, I don't have the strength to uproot trees so deep in the soil of black belief, so I kept walking.

I walked into my bed. Then, the next day I walked into the quad. And in the quad, I watched in the early, foggy morning as crows took turns diving from buildings and plucked cheese and bread and pepperoni from an open, full large pizza pie left on the ground the night before. It is a college, after all. A squirrel sneaked past me and in my haze I lifted my nose from the fog and tried to forget that he might be dead and I killed him.