Glowing

Remember that time you were a baby?

Kavan Cleary
Sep 6, 2018 · 3 min read
Drawing by myself! Colouring by Gergely Benyi check out his portfolio here.

The Queen! The Queen! Everyone thinks she is so beautiful, so special. Everyone is always going on about how she looks like she is glowing because she is always pregnant. They say there is nothing more beautiful than seeing life inside of someone. It’s not fair. I want to be beautiful. I want to be glowing but only queens can get pregnant. One Queen is born every ten thousand years, then just before our current queen goes back to the deepest corners of the ocean, another Queen crawls out of the depths. One comes out, one goes in. It is how it has always been. I’ll never be a Queen.

Why should I have to live out the rest my life never having that glowing feeling? Never having everyone look at me like I’m beautiful? I want to be beautiful too. Just because I can’t grow a baby inside doesn’t mean I’m any less deserving of love or attention than anyone else.

On restless nights I like to go above to the filthy surface. It’s more bearable at night when the ground isn’t crawling with humans. Some of us are happy to only come here to hunt for food, but not I. I like to try and understand them, as stupid as they are. I jump from rooftop to rooftop till i find one full of warm bodies and then I twist my head over the edge of the roof to watch the people inside. The human language is so simple but they still find a way to spend hours fighting, laughing, playing and talking. If I spend too long looking at them I begin to feel nauseous. As far as I am concerned, all people look ugly to me, whether they are glowing or not. I guess redheads look the most interesting, but they actually taste the same as everyone else. Salty and chewy.

This morning I lay just beneath the surface of the mud of the pond in the centre of the park. A young lady and her two repulsive children picnicked on the dock with their feet dangling sumptuously over the edge of the water. I watched them unseen from my depths as they happily ate their meal. They must have wondered why no ducks or fishes came out to nibble on the crumbs they so carelessly discarded into our domain. I lay there for a good while, really looking at her.

“Mama, you look so pretty right now,” said one of the little girls.

“Oh, that is so sweet of you dear. It is because I am pregnant. One day you will be pregnant too and everyone will say how beautiful you look,” the mother replied.

I noticed her flushed cheeks and the bump on the mid section. Every now and then she put her hand over her belly and smiled. The thought of her being capable of something I wasn’t drove me mad. She thinks she is special but she isn’t special — I’m special! There is a way I can be like her, like the queen. I need to know what it feels like to be glowing, even just for one night.

I wait till the dark sets above and come to the surface. A cool pleasant mist hangs in the city streets. I summon all my power and break bedroom windows with my snakes who grab all the babies from house to house and bring them to me. I swallow them whole, or almost whole. It is disgusting to eat them alive — before they have been been properly soaked in water like a human should be for at least a week. My belly is almost bursting and I can feel them moving around in there. At every moment I want to throw them up but I stay strong and keep them down.

Standing by the surface of the water, I look at my reflection. I should be positively glowing by now but it’s hard to tell, am I glowing or not?

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