Upside Down

Maybe one more?  Maybe? 

The day stretches out before me as I sit on my couch with my elbows against my legs.  Making excuses not to go.  I can feel my heart racing.  Pounding and pounding while that horrid little knot of pressure forms.  Gripping my hands together while bouncing my heels.  Sweating from nerves.  Swallowing and swallowing and swallowing.

I hate how aware I am of the ridiculousness of it all.  It's just a subway.  It's just a subway ride.  Millions do it.

Except I can visualize all of it and it terrifies me before I even move.

Standing is a monumental effort.  I start to wonder if I'm having a heart attack but I know it's not that.

My purse hangs on a hook by the door.  I force myself to reach out and take it down while grabbing the keys from inside the pouch on the side.  I kind of want to throw up.  Maybe I should just go to the bathroom, just in case.  Just stand over the bowl.  Just in case.

Except, no.  I open the door and step into the morning light.  Open door, open air, wide open sky.  Boundless.  Unrestrained.  I'm already small at just barely five feet tall but beneath the blue sky, I'm nothing and I like that.  I can go anywhere and see far into the distance without worrying about being lost and crushed and- I can breathe easily.

One step.  And then another.  And then another until I'm on the sidewalk and walking among everyone else.  Following the throng on their way to wherever they're going.  Down in my case.  This is my eleventh attempt.  I have to do it.  I can't afford to keep taking taxis to work.  The subway is cheap and easy and I have to do it.

Eventually I come to it, stopping while a few people run into me and curse me for getting in their way.  The stairs to the subway are wide and well lit but I can see the shadows down there, and the walls, and nothing more.

I swallow past the hardened lump in my throat and chest.  Breathing quickly.  Grabbing the handrail and then letting go and wiping my hand on my dress.  Thousands and thousands of people use this.  Touch this.  A gust of wind blows past, ruffling my dress.  People swarm around me, curving around me like a stone caught in a river.

One step down. . And another.  Flinching when a mother with a baby tied to her chest yells at me to move.  She rushes down with a hand against the back of her swaddled child, vanishing into the depths.

Another step down.  Another.  I focus on the lights.  Someone is singing deep within.  Playing something.  A guitar.  A busker.  I listen as I walk to help ease my fears.  One step and then my foot joins the lower one.  Pause.  Another step.

Down in the subway, I press against the walls.  It's alive.  Breathing ragged breaths with the murmurs of conversations, rising in tempo when someone begins to talk too loud and others speak louder to be heard and then dying down slowly.  And up.  Inhale.  Exhale.

They're gathered, shifting and moving like ripples on the water.  One person within the crowd steps a little too far to the left and others adjust around them before shuffling closer.  The beast inhales and exhales again.

It arrives and I groan but tell myself there won't be space.  There won't be.  There won't be any room and I'll have to go home.

Only there is.

It's all in my head.  It's all in my head.  I move.  Waiting until the last of them are in and then I rush, forcing myself through the waiting doors before I can change my mind.  And then turning as the doors hiss closed, a venomous snake closing its jaws around me, stealing my breath.  I lean against the pole next to me.  Trying to breathe.  Trying to inhale but it's crushing me, the snake is crushing me.

"You okay?" someone gruff asks and I nod but just so I don't cause a scene.

That would be almost worse, having attention around me, people gathering when I collapse, stopping the train, causing others to be late, bringing the police and EMT.

I can't breathe, I can't breathe, I can't breathe.  Twitching, raising my shoulders.  Twisting my head.  Moving away.  Deeper into the belly.  Away.  There's an empty spot on a bench in the back.  Away from everyone.  The train moves and I fall against a pole, gripping it wildly.

Nails clink against the metal.  Folding, bending, curving nails that scratch the pole until my claws touch the base of my palm.  Dry palms bubbling out with calluses while gray hairs pinch the back of my fingers.  Slipping through my skin like thread through a child's first torn doll.  Remaking me.  Fixing me.  Spreading over the back of my hand as I hiss and scratch with sharp claws, rubbing my palms together.  Lifting my shoulder blades to scratch the fur spreading over my back against the blouse I'm wearing.

Bands of light alternate with darkness as the train moves.  I hurry to the back, passing others until I'm seated.  Bending.  Hunched over.  Shaking myself and scratching at my ears.  Ears growing thin as they stretch and bend and curl and flex.  Whispers of conversations from two cars away.  Clawing at my hair to undo my loose braids.  Pressure in my head.  My ears twitch beneath the hair.

They're looking at me.  Worried.  Wondering.  I move, scurrying deeper into the back.  The pressure expands, pushing against my eyes until they bulge.  Colors leak from them, brown and white draining until my sleek obsidian eyes stare out from the darkness.

Why are they looking at me?

Washing my face.  Rubbing my swollen palms against my cheeks to settle long gray fur growing from my jaw.  Watching.  Staring at the couple to my left, four benches down and the older man to my right.

Movement.  Three benches to my right.  Twitching.  My dress digs into me.  Pull pull pull pull when my tail pushes at it, thick as my forearm and pink with rings.

I'm wearing too many clothes.  Why did I put on so many layers?  It's too warm.  It's summer high above.

Above.  Terrifying.  In the light.  So many people could see see.  Too open.  Too visible.

I tear off my blouse, one layer gone and my claws rend my bra to show my breasts and the reddened skin of my teats waiting to take shape.  Sweat and gray fur - more layers.  Spreading fur creeping down my chests.  My nipples stir when the needle-like hairs pierce the soft, tender flesh of my small breasts.  Too many clothes.  Too many.

"Jesus Christ, lady," the old man says, shaking his head.  "Always fucking someone.  Why can't I have a day without some crazy asshole meth head."

Darker.  Sliding along the bench and into the gap between the wall next to me.  Crouching down.  My dress snaps.  Good.  I'm wearing ten dresses beneath and they're all too warm.  Shaking myself, running paws over my aching, feverish face.  Pulling at my lips and clawing my gums.  Incisors scraping together.  My tail coils around me, rubbing against my gray fur when it reaches my thighs.  Twenty dresses and I want them all off.

Clawing at my shoes while chittering, trying to fold into myself as I tear out of my extra clothes until I'm free and stretching out my long legs before me, toes stretching straining lengthening, delicate with bulbous flesh beneath all of them, red and fleshy to protect me when I walk.  My feet spasm when the claws dive deep.

Cold metal against my flesh but I'm putting on a new dress and it's warm, so warm so warm.  Gray and thick and full and long, down to my toes as hairs twist and curl from the back of my foot and my beautiful long toes.

Too many eyes.  Staring.  Wondering.  Whispering.  Too bright with the humming, buzzing lights.  Too open.

It's slowing.  Coming to a stop.  I need out.  I need out.  I need to get out of here.  To hide away.  In the corners and the darkness until I feel the walls touching the trembling whiskers sliding through my swelling lips.  Follow the walls, always.  Stay out of sight.

The doors open and I leap, landing on all fours with my shaggy fur waving around me.  People scream.  Someone curses.  More people curse.  More people scream.

My tail streams behind me as I race into the darkness, claws cracking and scraping against the concrete.  Running and running and running.  Sometimes two legs.  Sometimes more.  Until I'm wearing a dress made out of darkness over my gray dress.  More layers.

My face stings and I sneeze and rub my hands against my nose when it's pulled forward.  I stand, two legged, and wait for it to pass.  And then I smell.  And I smell food.  Discarded and wasted.  Fragrant.  I'm hungry.

Days pass in the safety of my nest until a sudden voice startles me awake.  I screech and bite and claw and run.

"Ow, fucking Christ, you fucking bit me!"  a man says while flicking blood from his hand.  He groans and squeezes the bite with his other hand.  "Shit, lady, I'm just- I'm just-"

A policeman.  He drops his flashlight and kicks it away.  Drops forward to one hand.  Moaning.  Rocking back.  Tearing at his shirt, popping buttons.  His claws score the vest he wears beneath and I can see scraggly gray hairs poking out from the edge of it.

He screeches and holds his contorting hand in front of his face before clawing at his belt and pants.  His pant's leg bulges, trapping his tail.

I need to help.  Hesitant.  On four feet.  Moving forward.  A passing train surprises me and ruffles my fur but I move quickly, biting and clawing at his clothes until he's free.  Like me.  Free like me.  Nuzzling his face while he groans in pain.  Stroking his strong back with my claws when he presses his trembling face into my chest.  I can feel his whiskers pricking my breasts and nipples.

"Okay," I say, my voice rough from disuse.  There's other ways to talk.  "You're.  Okay."

I can see the pain in his eyes when they flash to black.  He doesn't understand.  But, it will come.  I will share my secrets.  My knowledge.  My hiding places.  My nest.

Fur to fur, we move.  He limps, still not finished.  Still struggling to understand but he smells me.  His brain conveys the newly elevated connotations of a dialogue system more complex than speech.

"It's.  Too open," he hisses.  "Easy to find you.  We need to go deeper.  Deeper down.  We need to go."

We move, following the walls, as always.  Hiding ourselves away.