Eventually the house was going to fall into the sea—just pitch right over and tumble down the bluff. That was why it was cheap. Why they could afford it.
Their realtor said it was nothing to be concerned about. That was years away, he said. It probably wouldn’t happen at all.
Our only child has transformed into a starfish. They called it a compulsion, then a desire. Limb by limb, eye by eye, they replaced the body we gave them. Is this worse than puberty? I can’t ask. Our child speaks starfish now: chemical excretions and spindly touch. I am as ignorant and useless as they swore in their youth I was.
The gourd appeared three days after my miscarriage. Its massive body, swollen and puckered with warty growths, stretched from one end of the butcher’s block to the other. Bulbous and green with a light-yellow underbelly, it sat there in the center of the room unbothered by its own mysterious appearance in the household.
Nothing about the 32-pound gourd made sense.
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