Page 37 of You Weren’t Meant to Be Human

Twenty-Seven

Levi has to call Tammy in early today.

“Breathe,” she says, a hand on Crane’s stomach as he leans against the bathroom sink. “There we go.”

The baby has snuggled itself against Crane’s spine, and swear to god, he can feel its head low in his pelvis—threateningly low, shockingly low. Everyone on the internet who said that Braxton-Hicks contractions aren’t painful can go fuck themselves. It feels like he’s being squeezed with a vise.

“Are they getting stronger?” Tammy asks.

Crane shakes his head.

“And they’re not getting any closer together…”

It sure feels like they are.

“And your water ain’t broke, so.” Tammy straightens up. “Not yet. Just breathe, baby, it’ll go away.”

Not yet? Crane whimpers helplessly. He can’t do another month of this.

The skin of his hips is paper-thin, with no more room to stretch; the dull red marks have taken on the texture of stringy meat and give the distinct impression that they could open up into a dozen wounds at the slightest provocation.

His breasts sport thick, dark nipples that have started leaking, leading him to cramming handfuls of toilet paper and tissues into his bra to keep it from soaking through to his shirt.

His belly reminds him of the hive when it gets excited. When it begins to move and thrum and the swarm starts to shiver.

Tammy says, “I know it’s bad, but you can do it.” She manages a breathy laugh. “Bodies like ours have been doing this for thousands and thousands of years. It’ll manage on its own. All you gotta do is survive it.”

Crane would like to correct her on that, but Tammy wouldn’t be interested in the death-via-childbirth statistics Sophie memorized in high school.

Tammy has to go. She makes no mention of Jess, which could mean nothing.

Levi sees her out, but Crane doesn’t leave the bathroom—he’s too busy measuring his breathing, waiting until his muscles unclench and he can unstick his jaw.

He has to jam fingers in his mouth to pry his teeth apart.

He’s still shaking, and he wraps an arm around his stomach, runs a hand down the too-thin skin, tries to soothe the thing inside so it stops attempting to puncture his organs.

I don’t like that you’re in there, either , he wants to tell it. I want you out too.

Looking in the mirror is a bad idea, though. His hair is disgusting. It’d just be easier to shave his head at this point. The last time he managed to wash it was, what, a week ago? Two? And barely even then—he stuck his head into the sink, and he can’t remember if he used shampoo.

He’s always had hygiene issues. It’s a point of contention, to say the least. There’s a unique shame attached to hygiene issues, because bad hygiene is associated with autism with unbelievable ferocity.

One time, Crane had gone down to Aspen and Birdie’s because he couldn’t get himself clean, and while Birdie sat and talked him through the steps, Aspen explained: there’re a lot of different reasons this might happen.

Did he have trouble with toothpaste growing up, or was the taste strong enough to make him panic, no matter the flavor?

There are so many different parts to it, and if his brain is overwhelmed, it becomes impossible to string into anything useful.

Let alone how difficult it can be to move from one task to another.

The willpower it takes to get up and do any of it—it’s suffocating.

Crane had looked at Aspen curiously— how do you know all this? —and Birdie supplied that Aspen had googled it because they wanted to help.

So yeah. Sophie lied about brushing her teeth until Mom started checking the brush bristles and smelling her breath before bed.

Middle school was spent avoiding showers, until Dad gently informed her that the grease made her hair look wet.

She’d gotten her act together by high school, thanks to them both, but was never able to shower daily like everyone else seemed to.

Every other day was the best she could manage.

It’s been a lot longer than that now.

In the doorway, Stagger watches.

“Alright,” Levi calls from across the apartment. “I’m headed out too. Keep your shit together.”

For some reason, Crane huff-laughs. Another hunt for the hive. As long as Levi doesn’t come back with a bullet wound again, he doesn’t care.

The moment the door closes and the lock clicks into place, Stagger takes Crane’s chin in his hand and lifts it, letting the harsh white light of the bathroom illuminate the healed mess of his face. The too-smooth skin, the melted upper lip. Crane’s eyes slide shut.

Stagger’s thumb slips into Crane’s mouth and works its way between the teeth. He tastes decidedly salty.

Crane finds Stagger attractive the way he found that burned-up fireman attractive at fifteen.

He would hesitate to use the word attractive , because that doesn’t seem right—it’s less aesthetics and more a combination of different desires coalescing into a general sense of wanting to fuck him.

Though maybe that is what the word means.

The bizarre middle ground of you make sense and you’re like me and I want to feel something.

After they had sex in the back of the truck that first time, Levi had leaned down to kiss him. That had been Crane’s first kiss, too.

How different would it be with someone else?

Maybe that’s what he wants.

A tiny click sounds from the sink, and Stagger retracts his thumb from Crane’s mouth. Crane frowns and cracks open an eye.

Stagger is putting toothpaste on Crane’s brush, mimicking the very specific steps he’s seen—wetting the bristles, massaging in the toothpaste so there’s no awful texture when it hits the mouth, and tapping it twice on the sink to shake off any stray drops of water.

“Open.”

Crane opens his mouth.

Stagger brushes Crane’s teeth. His lopsided face scrunches with concentration, a worm in the crook of his neck moving as the muscles tense.

That thumb pushes aside Crane’s lips, tilts Crane’s head to get the best angle for each tooth.

Stagger hums as he works. When he’s done, he steps aside to let Crane spit and rinse his mouth in the sink, and then he walks over to the stained tub and turns on the water.

Stagger attempts to help Crane take off his clothes, but Crane pulls away, so Stagger turns off the bathroom lights and suddenly it’s okay.

Dim sun trickles in through the tiny window high over the tub.

Everything comes off. Levi’s shirt, the sports bra with the leak-stains on the inside, pants, boxers, and all of it goes into the dirty clothes pile.

Crane has no idea when he last managed to change his underwear.

The water in the tub roars. Stagger puts a hand under the stream to check the temperature, lets Crane do the same to double-check, and when it’s half-full, he helps Crane in.

The water is warm and perfect, and Crane wants to cry but doesn’t.

He’s felt disgusting for so long. Fighting to get himself into the shower or wipe himself down whenever he could but never managing it.

Stagger washes Crane’s hair, twice since it doesn’t feel clean after the first go.

A soft cloth rubs down his face and neck, where funnily enough, some amount of facial hair has managed to survive the scalding water and lack of testosterone; moves across the shoulders and back, maneuvers gently around aching breasts.

He lingers on the tattoos, but never for too long.

Eventually, Stagger washes the suds from Crane’s shoulders, reaches into the water to wipe down Crane’s thighs, and signs, Good?

Good , Crane signs back, and the sign is close enough to thank you that he decides it means that too.

Stagger pulls the drain.

And then doesn’t move. As if doing this has taken all the energy out of him—or as if he’d thrown himself into caring for Crane to distract himself from something. When Stagger breathes, lungs operated like billows by all the worms crawling around inside him, he shudders.

“Hurts.”

Crane nods gently. Yes, it hurts. It’s going to hurt until it’s over. It’s going to hurt them both.

That doesn’t seem to be the response Stagger wanted, though. He groans. Gives a jerky shake of the head. Fumbles for a bit, tries to find words, can’t. He keeps starting sounds but finding himself unable to finish them or form them into anything with real meaning.

Crane signs, Okay?

“Want,” he says, then frustrated, “No.”

Crane shows Stagger a big breath, motioning for him to repeat it. Big breath. Start over.

Stagger tries again, concentrating so so hard. “Worms—inside.”

That is also correct, that is in fact where the worms are, but apparently that isn’t right either. With a sound bordering on a whimper, Stagger gets up and leaves the bathroom.

The tub finishes draining. It makes that awful sucking sound it does at the end of every bath. Crane hesitates; is he supposed to follow? Stagger didn’t tell him to follow. The bathroom is freezing in the winter and he’s cold. He slicks his wet hair back from his face and sits up, shivering.

Stagger returns with—what the fuck?

One of Levi’s knives. One of the knives he uses to take apart roadkill and/or people, the nice one he takes on hunts only half the time because he likes it too much.

Crane has always, admittedly, been smitten with it; the slight curve to the black blade, the drab paracord handle distinctly military in a porn-parody sort of way.

The fact that Levi keeps his knives perfectly sharp.

Levi also has managed to keep them in the apartment.

Stagger did not go outside to fetch this.

They’ve been here the whole time. Crane swears he’d searched the place up and down in a fit months ago, looking for a workable blade.

Even inside the couch cushions, and the loose slab of drywall under the sink where the cockroaches come in.

Stagger strips his clothing. All of it.

Crane is too tired to pretend he’s not staring.