i. water

There was a small pond at the end of her street, and every morning she would walk down towards it and feed the vibrant fish that lived within. It was nice to have this reason to get up and feel sunshine and actively do something, and she found these fish to be marvelous companions for when she just needed somebody to listen to her without hesitation or judgment.

That evening, she had a horrible fight with her mother. It wasn't even over a major issue. By the time she was trying to fall asleep, she couldn't even remember what set it off-- and it surprised her, because she'd always believed that she had an incredibly smooth relationship with her mother. She couldn't even remember that last time they'd had a fight.

They had been screaming at each other, both absolutely enraged, both lacking the slightest filter. It was agonizing, the way that you could love somebody so much and cut her so deeply. She cried herself to sleep that night.

When she woke up that morning, the tears were still fresh and sticky on her cheeks. She walked to her closet and grabbed the pail of fish food, so desperately looking forward to today's quiet reverie by the pond. It would be the first moment of peace she'd had in hours. She could even dip her toes in the water and enjoy the fish nibbling on them, like tiny kisses that she needed very badly.

But when she arrived, she found that the pond had dried up overnight. The fish that remained alive were only barely so, and were gasping in the mud, trying to suck out the last remnants of water from the earth. The rest of the pond was littered with plant detritus and the corpses of aquatic life.

Most of them looked like they'd been dead for quite a long time.

-

ii. sweat

He shot awake, heaving and soaked in sweat. The same nightmare kept coming, every single night, without fail. The presence, that horrifying and amorphous presence that followed him, that reached out to him, that made his knees quake and his bones shiver and whispered to him until his skin prickled. He'd seen multiple therapists, but none of them had been able to help.

He tried every suggestion, and the result was always the same-- terror and a slick of sweat. The nightmares were visceral, to the point where he couldn't tell where reality ended and dreams began. Every part of it just felt so horrifically real that sweat was the only thing he could use to signal his return to waking world.

One morning he shot awake, drenched. The clock at his bedside table glowed 5:32 AM in a cold, menacing red. He was breathing heavily, trying to process what had just happened. That creeping feeling, the watching, the whispering. Something in the corner of his eye that he could never get a good look at, but he knew was there. It had to be.

He lay back in his bed, grateful that the nightmare was over-- for tonight, at least.

As he pulled the covers back over his head to try and get some rest, he thought he saw a haze of something by the window.

A cold, clammy finger wiped a drop of sweat from his shaking brow.

-

iii. blood

It was her cheeks he first complimented; how wonderful and soft they looked. "Did you use a special blush?" he asked.

"No," she replied, "It's just my blood."

He paused. "Your blood. That's interesting. What do you mean, 'your blood?'“

"Oh, just my blood. You know. The way my blood looks. My veins. That sort of thing."

"Ha. So do you usually talk about this sort of thing on dates? Your blood?" he joked.

She gave him a blank stare. "What else is there to talk about?"

He was quiet. "I mean, hobbies, work, y'know..." he made a vague gesture with his arms. She didn't respond. He thought he heard the slight sound of his own heartbeat amidst the clinking of glasses and other miscellaneous restaurant chatter, but dismissed the thought.

"You have beautiful cheeks too," she said after a moment.

He smiled. "Thank you."

"Lovely, flushed skin." She put her palm against her own cheek and sighed. "God, I'm so jealous."

He shuffled his feet uncomfortably.  "...Thank you?" he said, with a hush in his voice.

"You're welcome," she replied.  He looked around for a few moments, trying to look for something else to talk about. Her eyes rested lazily on his face. The contact was light, but palpable.
"Are you alright?" he asked, with a slightly concerned inflection, though he wasn't sure towards whom it was directed.
"No, I'm fine. I just can't get over how wonderful your skin looks. You must have so much blood in there."
He stood up. "Would you like to get a drink?"
She smiled. "I would love that."
When they got to the bar, she ordered red wine.  She sloshed it around in her glass, looking him dead in the eyes. "I love red wine," she said. "It has a body."

"I can see that," he murmured. He ordered a beer. She took a sip of wine.
“Wish it was a little thicker, though. A little more viscous. Doesn’t have that sparkle, does it?” she asked.
“Guess not,” he said.
“Guess not,” she said. They both downed their drinks. The red wine trickled over her lips and down the side of her cheeks, slowly dripping onto her fingers and lap.