#bunnytunnel

[bnnytnnl]

[bnnytnnl]

Skipping Stones

Pete shifted the pebbles he had collected in his left hand. The rounded stones were cold and a few of the larger ones were wet and gritty. He lifted a brown pebble shaped like a molar out and flung it with a whipping motion of his arm. The pebble snapped through the air, slicing and tumbling across the stagnate face of the scummy waterhole.

The pebble sank somewhere about the center of the pond. Pete thought he could hear a clipped splooshing kerplunking sound, as the rock dug beneath the surface of the water and disappeared.

Standing at the edge of the dilapidated pier, Pete sighed, shook the collection of stones in his left hand until they clattered like old bones, and plucked out a rosy quartz jewel with a streak of dirt across its face.

The streak of dirt marred the rosy brilliance of the soft rock. He rubbed at it with his thumb but it wouldn't clear off. The drabness of his life suddenly reflected in that gash of mud. Pete saw it there, his entire fifty years of struggling, all lined out like a mediocre map embedded in the shell of the glittering stone. All about him was the glittering of life, sparkling like fairy dust in the moonlight, a promised wonder of magic he couldn't ever quite grasp no matter how hard he struggled.

A sudden anger filled Pete like spilled coffee. With a small grunt, he chucked the stone with all the strength in his right arm. He watched the stone hop across the pond at high speed, like a spark skating across obsidian. As the stone rocketed towards the center of the pond, a pale forehead breached the surface, followed by a giant pair of dark, dripping eyes. The peachy rock smacked the creature directly center her forehead.

Pete gasped as he heard the crack echo out across the surface of the pond. The head disappeared beneath the water just as quickly as he had seen it appear. Scummy yellow-white ripples radiated out from where the head had been. Pete blinked, watching them dissipate, leaving only sketchy wisps of foam floating atop the surface. The pond went still, returning to the placid brown-black-green mirror from before he had disturbed it.

His mind was still like the pond for an instant before his thoughts crowed in on him like a chain of sinking pebbles. Had he really seen what he thought he had seen? Was someone swimming in this disgusting pond? Did he hurt them? Pete shook his head.

"Nah," Pete said, shaking it off. He stared down into the pile of stones in his hand, "just tired after another long day at work…" He poked through the rocks and found a marbled blue and white stone that was flat with a divot at the center. He plucked it up and flipped it between the thick flesh of his fingers, it felt nice. The flat stone was heavy and textured, but rounded and smoothed overall.

He turned up his eyes and cranked his arm back. A small sound like a marble rolling on the floor interrupted his attention and he glanced down to see dark wet eyes peering up at him from the edge of the pier. She gripped the last plank in the pier; a platinum ring glinted on her index finger. At the center of her pale forehead: a red mark. Pete discovered the rosy quartz stone at his feet: the streak of dirt now absent.

His eyes flickered towards the large wet glare floating on the surface of the pond. A large splash crashed beneath the pier where Pete stood as a silver tail slapped loudly across the top of the water below.

[bnnytnnl]

Sea Turtles

The clinking sound of a hammer tapping metal rang out under the outdoor stage. Tom wiped his brow and gave the wrench another nine taps until the bolt became too stubborn for his light taps.

"Easy, Tom," a man behind him called out, "you'll strip the damn thing like last time."

Tom slipped the hammer in the loop in his tool belt and extracted the wrench from the bolt. The man approached him from behind, Tom could hear his boots crunching on the grass.

"You worry too much, Bob," Tom said, turning and leaning on the metal post, one of a hundred that supported the stage above them.

"You're right about that," Bob said, "but that worrying is what's kept me in business for so long." He lifted a cigarette out of his pocket and offered it to Tom with a raise of his eyebrows.

Tom waved a hand. "No thanks," Tom said, "I don't understand you; you worry about stripping a bolt but not about smoking yourself to death?"

Bob lit his cigarette with a lighter that had a liquid level built into the handle. The bubble in the green liquid sloshed around as he flicked it closed and shoved it in a pocket in his shirt. He blew out a cloud of smoke over his shoulder and shrugged.

"I'm not afraid of death," Bob said.

"Really?" Tom said, "I mean I am and I'm twenty years younger than you."

"You die, you die," Bob took a drag of his cigarette and shrugged.

"Everything we build in this company is temporary," Tom said, "you spent your whole life building something up for a weekend and tearing it down in a couple hours. Is there anything in your life, something uniquely you, that would remain standing when you check out?"

Bob lifted his eyes as he exhaled, "I mean, this is how I make my living." He lowered his eyes, "I have my kids, they'll be here after I'm gone." He grimaced and the cigarette bobbed up and down with his lips.

Tom bent over, shoved a work towel into his tool bag, zipped it up, and hoisted it over his shoulder. He started walking and Bob walked along with him towards the parking lot.

"Your kids aren't you though," Tom said, "they're, at most, only half of you. They'll have kids and those kids will be even less of you. In only two or three generations, your DNA is barely a part of their makeup. I'm talking about something long-lasting."

Bob grunted, "like what?"

Tom ducked his head as he exited the work site and stepped out into the setting sun of the parking lot. Two trucks, white and blue, sat parked three rows apart.

"Some record of you?" Tom said, shrugging the bag on his shoulder.

Bob stopped, put a hand in his pocket, and puffed on his cigarette. "Like a internet search history?"

Tom laughed. Bob smiled.

"I mean sure," Tom said, "that's probably not a bad idea. But you have to make sure it lasts out there somewhere. At least long enough…" Tom hoisted his bag up and flung it over into the bed of his truck.

"Long enough for what?" Bob asked, tossing his cigarette down on the ground. He snuffed it with a twist of his dented boot.

Tom popped the passenger door to his truck open, tore his safety vest and helmet off, tossing them into the cluttered space behind the seats. He undid his tool belt with a jangle.

"Until something smart enough is able to reconstruct your consciousness into something artificial or digital," Tom said, "the more of you left behind, the easier they could reform the core of what you are."

Bob guffawed then went silent, "you mean like some sci-fi tech in the distant future? Even if I did save everything I did, how could it last that far out?"

Tom ran a hand through his hair, stepped out of his boots, and flung his sneakers down onto the pavement. He had trouble stepping into them since they were so bent.

"That's the problem, Bob," Tom said, trying to noodle his big toe into the hole of his shoe, "copies, make as many copies as you can, print it out, copy it to a disc, a thumb drive, write it down, anything you can do. It's like the turtles, man."

"The turtles?" Bob asked, leaning on Tom's open door.

"The sea turtles," Tom said, finally getting his right foot into the sneaker, he tried for the left, "they lay hundreds of eggs because they know most of them won't make it to the sea alive."

"I fucking hate sea turtles, Tom!" Bob said, "was this all some elaborate joke just to piss me off or what?"

Tom laughed.

[bnnytnnl]

Death Trinkets

Leah watched the platinum ring shine brightly as it arced high into the sky like a streak of white glazed across an oil painting. The falling star splashed into the dark waters of the pond with a ploosh-plop sound that was both pleasant and terrifying for Leah to hear.

She watched the ripples spread out and disappear atop the placid surface; a set of three pale green lily pads gently bumped into a rotten log; a frog hopped off, splashing into a pile of murk. Leah wondered how long the ring would sit at the bottom of the pond. Would it ever be found? Or would it slowly sink into the crud at the bottom like a neutron star folding into the fabric of spacetime? What about her? would anyone ever find her? Will she sink just like that ring? Lost forever until she was eventually refolded into the Earth's crust a billion years in the future?

"Probably," she whispered to herself as she glanced down at the checkered velvet square of cobalt blue and white spread before her on the grass. All kinds of glittering trinkets lay there buzzing in the summer sun. Leah adjusted her feet under her to the side so she sat more comfortably on the ground. She leaned over the picnic spread of baubles, her shadow casting across them like a cloud of doom. She fingered a golden necklace with a diamond-studded cross. Leah dug her nails into it. It was her step-mother's. All of the objects on the cloth were her step-mother's.

She threaded a finger into the chain and lifted the necklace up in front of her face. The cross spun round one way, stopped, then spun the opposite way. The motion reminded Leah of her brief time as a ballerina in middle school. Leah sighed, spun the necklace around her finger, and with a cast of her arm, flung it out far into the center of the secluded pond. It hit directly center the three small lily pads, sending them rippling outwards from each other. Leah thought the streak of gold flying through the sunlight was beautiful, like an arc of heavenly flame jumping, like a thought leaping from the skull, like a wish scintillating into reality, like a single pump of the heart disgorging itself into something tangible. The frog croaked.

Leah pondered on the necklace at the bottom of the pond and figured that piece could surface more easily somehow just by the size of it. A fish, she imagined, could find its way digging through the mud below and accidentally shove its nose, snout?, through the loop of the chain. Leah laughed to herself, picturing a catfish swimming about wearing her step-mother's crucifix. She frowned.

Leah returned her gaze back down at the glittering trinkets, her eyes flirting across all the different gemstones until she reached the sharp silver rectangle glinting separately to the side like a fanged grimace. She felt both pleasure and fear staring into that silver rectangle.

There was a flutter and then a caw from just behind her.

Leah jumped, whipping her head around to see a crow standing in the grass looking at her with black buttons of eyes. She swiped hair from her face, plucking out a strand that stuck to her lips.

"Hello," Leah greeted him.

The crow hopped forward once, cocked its head, and hopped forward two more times until it was standing next to the cloth with the trinkets. One of its claws pressed into the very edge of it, forming a wrinkle in the cobalt velvet.

"Did you want to pick something out?" Leah asked, "you can have any one of them. Consider it my parting gift."

The crow stared up at her, hopped counter clockwise around the trinkets, then hopped clockwise back around again. It poked its ebony beak at a sapphire ring twice before pecking an emerald earring. It spun around, its tail feathers sweeping across a silver tennis bracelet. With a cock of its head, it puffed its wings out halfway once, and lifted up the sharp silver rectangle of the razor blade. Holding the razor blade in its beak, it turned to Leah, blinked white, flapped its wings, and took off to the skies with it.

Leah watched the silver rectangle shine brightly as the shadow took it away with him. A sob erupted from her throat and tears swelled, overflowing down the sides of her cheeks.

A frog croaked.

[bnnytnnl]

A Reading

Burt crammed the last of the hot dog into his mouth and licked ketchup from a knuckle. The doughy texture of the cheap bun almost clogged his throat as it went down. He grimaced and swallowed hard.

"Chew, Burt!" his girlfriend yanked on his arm, "my god, you're going to die one of these days inhaling food like that."

Burt grunted with a shrug of his shoulders. He cleared his throat after another swallow. "Alright, let's get out of here, I have to be on the site early tomorrow, your ex keeps making a scene if I'm not there an hour earlier than everyone else." He sighed, crumpled up the oily paper tray, and chucked it at the ground.

A small girl whipped around his legs, crushing it under her bare feet as she streaked by, crying. Her mother chased after her.

"Not yet," his girlfriend said, tugging his arm in the opposite direction to the exit.

She dragged him past a grounded UFO which whizzed and chirped melodically like a cybernetic humming bird, flashing sirens and spinning in place, the lights of other nearby rides streaked across its glittery surface. Wedged somewhere between or behind these glitzy rides, illuminated by a torch flickering in the darkness, stood a striped tent no larger that two porter potties placed side-by-side.

His girlfriend stopped and squealed. "Here it is, Burt. Let's do this then we'll go home, deal?"

Burt knit his brows, the taste of the sugary hotdog bun still sat in his cheeks. He sighed, checked his watch, and groaned. "What is this, one of those lame fortune teller scams?"

"Don't be like that!" his girlfriend pleaded, "have an open mind! Come on, it'll be fun!" She squeezed her fingers through his and pulled herself close to his arm.

The softness of her body against his arm softened his resistance. He kissed her and smiled, "sure, Angela, if it will make you happy."

She smiled and dragged him into the small tent.

The smell of frankincense slapped him in the face. He coughed.

A pair of smooth, wrinkled hands were suddenly on his in the dark, dragging him and Angela over to a circular table that dominated the space.

"Yes, I already see it," an old cracked voice of a woman said.

Burt glanced up from the singular red candle into the glassy cataracts of the old woman. He smirked, noticing the edges of her gray wig slipping back on her head.

"What? What is it you see?" Angel said.

Burt glanced at her, his girlfriend had a wide open look on her face, her eyes reflecting the candle and the darkness.

"Shh!" the old woman hissed like a broken kettle.

Two fingers that looked just like the wrinkled hot dogs he had just eaten, slapped a tall card on the table. Burt looked at it. A man hanging upside down with a bent leg gazed out at him.

"The Hanged Man," the old woman whispered.

She slapped another card down, "The Empress," followed by another, "The Lovers." She adjusted the cards on the table so they were evenly spaced apart before tenderly placing a face card down on the table at the end of the other three cards. "Looks like you're plagued by an ex-lover… no, maybe your lover's ex-lover?" She darted her eyes up sharply at Burt and smiled wide. She nodded once, the wig slipping further back on her head, revealing a black hairnet underneath. "Am I correct?"

Burt held the woman's eyes, watching the candle flicker there. He nodded once.

"I can solve this problem for you," the woman said, tapping at the face down card. "All you have to do is flip this card over."

Burt stared down at the card and swallowed. The blue and white grid stared back up at him and radiated brightly in his mind. He glanced at Angela, glanced at the old woman, glanced at her wig, and glanced back at the card. He shrugged and flipped it over.

Angela gasped.

"Death," the old woman said. She slammed the deck of cards down on top of the revealed card. Bang! The candle hopped.

Burt jumped.

"That was so cliché!" Angela said as she closed the passenger side door.

Burt started the engine. "I just want to get home, that woman gave me the creeps and I'm tired." He sighed.

Angela leaned across and rubbed his shoulder, she pouted as her long nails dug pleasantly into him. "I'm sorry he's making your life so miserable, Hon."

Burt shook his head, and lifted off the brake. "Don't worry about it."

"Get off your ass!"

Burt rolled his eyes, dropped his hot dog in his cooler, and stood.

"It's still lunchtime, sir," Burt called out to where the man stood in the middle of the construction site at the bottom of a pit. Still chewing, Burt pushed up his hardhat with a swipe of his thumb.

"I don't give a fuck!" the man shouted.

Burt rolled his eyes.

The pinging sound of a cable snapping cracked like thunder above. A yell. Half a second later, a concrete slab occupied the place where the man was standing. Burt blinked. Dark brown tendrils radiated out into the gray dust around the stack of cards. A white hardhat spun, skittered, and rolled through the billowing cloud.

The sound of the crashing slab finally hit Burt in the face. Bang! The scene replayed in his mind. The deck of cards came crashing down on top of the grim reaper.

He swallowed his lunch and almost choked.

[bnnytnnl]

Ex BFs

Emma clicked the top of her bunny pen open and closed. Her thumb slipped absentmindedly over the rubber carrot, pushing it down, circling around the top, releasing the spring, and pressing it back down until it popped up into the fleshy pad of her dainty thumb. The rubber ridges gripped the edges of her nails, slowly wearing off her black polish.

Emma's attention lay locked like two lasers cutting across the library. She watched her two ex-boyfriends sitting at a table together, sharing notes on a yellow legal pad. Emma strained, staring at the movement of their lips, trying to piece the content of the conversation together.

The pale pink lips, slightly dry, of the dirty blond on the left opened wide in a smile that drew out his dimples and made his seafoam gems of eyes sparkle. He nodded, ran rosy fingers through the front of his hair, and jotted something down on the legal pad. He shifted his chair over an inch to his left, angling the legal pad so the boy on the right could see it more clearly. The boy on the right scooted his chair further to his right until the two pressed shoulder to shoulder.

Emma swallowed, her eyes flicking to the straight dark haired boy on the right who leaned in over the legal pad, the yellow reflecting off the sharp angles of his pale face. He rested his chin on his hand. Emma thought he was angry at first but a brief laugh brightened up his face and his cold steel eyes slid along his thick black lashes. He laughed again as he locked eyes with the boy on the left. They both shared a smile.

"He never smiled like that with me…" Emma whispered under her breath.

The pen stopped clicking as Emma's attention had utterly left her body, all of it focused two tables away. Both of the boys leaned in now over the legal pad, their fingers pointing at lines that Emma couldn't see. Their fingers touched. There was a brief pause of awkwardness and Emma swore she saw the dark-haired one blush. The blond boy nudged the boy on the right with his shoulder, dropped his head closer, and whispered something that made the other boy smirk. He shook his head. The blond boy leaned his face closer in towards the dark-haired boy's ear. The blond's eyelids lowered as he watched the legal pad. His lips moved, Emma saw the hairs around the other boy's ear move. Emma licked her lips, the blond boy licked his lips, the dark haired boy licked his lips. She watched their fingers collide again, still a bit of awkwardness but Emma thought she spotted a hint of delay before they disconnected. The scene now throbbed in tune with her heart, her vision pulsing with the desire to see a new unexpected wish fulfilled. The dark-haired boy turned his head, the blond boy was still close to his ear. Their cheeks touched, the blond pulled his head back. But not far enough, Emma thought, not as far back as a boy should have when another boy got that close to his face. Emma swallowed, her heart was loud and annoying as she watched the hesitation in their eye contact. Emma bit her lip and crossed her legs; she hunkered down, knowing the moment would come soon.

"Hello!"

Emma jerked, her pen clicked. She turned her head to see the round face of her best friend.

"What?" Emma snapped, turning her attention back across the library.

"What are you doing?" her friend asked.

"Shut up! They're going to kiss," Emma said in a clipped, hushed voice, she could barely breath, anticipation gripped her lungs like a bear trap.

The blond was at the other boy's ear again. Emma saw his hand was away from the desk. Where had it gone? She swallowed again and sat up straight. Was it under the table? The dark haired boy nodded, his eyelids lowering and his mouth rounding slightly as he listened to the blond boy. Emma saw the blond's shoulder moving subtly.

"Who? Wait, aren't those?" her friend asked.

Emma nodded, wishing her friend would disappear.

"Yeah right!" her friend whispered, "you said they were a hundred percent straight."

"Shh!" Emma said, "I'm trying to concentrate."

The blond stood abruptly. The dark haired boy gazed up at him before rising hesitantly. They skulked away together across the rows of tables and slipped down an aisle of bookshelves.

Emma slapped her pen down on her notebook, slung her purse over her shoulder, and stood. Her legs felt wobbly.

"Where are you going?" her friend asked, "you're not following after them, are you?"

"Shut up, Jemma," Emma said in a rushed voice. She could barely talk.

She strode across the room, it felt like she was walking on jelly, and poked her head around the aisle of books. Her eyes widened, she gripped her purse strap.

[bnnytnnl]

Freeze Dry

"You're not supposed to feed them, you know," Kyle's friend said, "there's signs and everything."

Kyle tossed another freeze-dried potato chip like a frisbee at the seagull standing atop the post at the end of the abandoned pier. The chip bounced off the pillar and fell to the deck below. The bird squawked and stared down at the food accumulating at the bottom of the post.

"Or what?" Kyle said, biting into a chip himself and munching away. He looked over at his friend.

His friend leaned back against a post, slammed closed the lid of his handheld, and shoved it in the pockets of his leather jacket. He let out a sigh that turned into mist and swirled into the sky.

"I don't know," his friend said, "don't they like explode or something?"

"No," Kyle said, tossing another chip at the feet of the seagull, "that's dried rice or something or maybe it was those fizzy tablets. I can't remember," he shrugged, "I don't think freeze dried potato chips are going to blow up a seagull. That's a big bird."

His friend turned his head and stared at Kyle's mason jar full of chips.

"What's it taste like?" he asked, "are they better like that?"

Kyle shrugged, "here, try for yourself." Kyle leaned over and his friend leaned towards him, extracting his left arm from his jacket pocket and collecting a chip from the jar.

He stared at it, "looks like an ordinary chip; maybe just a bit lighter?" He bit into it, chewed, and swallowed. "Wow, it tastes like an ordinary chip too." He finished off the rest and shoved his hand back in his coat, "what's the point, dude?"

"You mean, why freeze dry chips?" Kyle asked.

His friend nodded, "why does your dad—"

"Mom," Kyle corrected him.

"I mean, why does your mom do that? Isn't that kind of like a waste of time and energy?" His friend asked.

Kyle shrugged, "parents are weird. At least my parents are weird."

His friend was quiet for a moment, watching the seagull staring down at the offering of chips accumulating at the bottom of the pillar. It sent out a single wing to balance itself as it shuffled around on its big yellow feet.

"I guess my mom does weird things," his friend finally said, casting out a tumbling breath of air, "and my dad too."

"Like what?" Kyle asked, dumping the rest of the chips from the jar out into a gap in the wooden planks of the pier where he sat. He watched the chips floating atop the black waters of the lake below. He wondered if fish ate chips.

His friend drew his jacket in tighter across his chest and sat up straighter, "well for starters, there's a room in my house that my mother keeps bolted shut."

"What?" Kyle turned towards his friend, "you mean like a closet or something?"

His friend shook his head, "no I think it's like a full size bedroom. If you measure from door to door, it is at least as big as my room. And if you look from the outside of the house, you see a blank spot where a window should be."

Kyle studied his friend, "you're joking?"

His friend turned his head and looked at him, "nah, I'm serious. It's been locked for like my whole life."

"You ever see your parents go into it?" Kyle asked, "or have you ever broken into it yourself?"

His friend shrugged, "sometimes I know they both go in there, but I don't ever hear anything. I can tell when they're in there because the rest of the house goes quiet like I'm home alone but I didn't hear them leave the house and the cars are both still in the driveway."

"But you've never seen them go in or come out?" Kyle asked, spinning the lid shut on the mason jar.

His friend shook his head, "back in fifth grade, I waited outside once, waited for them to come out, but I fell asleep in front of the door and woke up in my bed."

Kyle stood, slipping the jar under his armpit. He stared down at his friend.

"That's really weird, man," Kyle said, "like, that's a whole lot weirder than freeze drying potato chips."

"What now?" his friend asked, climbing to his feet and wiping off his back. He sniffed and wiped his nose on his shoulder.

"Did you want to see if Eddy is home from church yet?" Kyle asked.

"Sure," his friend said, "though I think it's probably too early." He sniffed again, "it really sucks we're the only kids in our neighborhood that don't go to church on Sundays," his friend complained.

"Yeah, it sucks for them," Kyle said.

They started back down the pier towards where they parked their bikes.

"Don't you think that's weird too?" his friend asked, "I mean, none of the other neighborhoods go to church like that, just ours."

"Dude," Kyle said, "everything's weird around here."

The seagull squawked, hopping down with two loud beats of his wings. It pecked at a freeze dried potato chip, breaking it in thirds.

[bnnytnnl]

Creeps

Michael crashed face first onto his bed; his nose bent a little forcefully as it slammed into the pillow. He flipped over onto his back and rubbed his face. There was a knock on the bathroom door.

Michael grunted. He sneezed, "enter."

The bathroom door connecting to the neighboring dorm clicked open, "bless you."

"Thanks," Michael said, craning his head to see a tall, skinny blond man his age standing with only a towel wrapped around his waist, "what do you need, Hans?"

"Mandy told me to give this note to you as soon as possible," Hans said.

"Mandy?" Michael sneezed again, he groaned, "what note?"

"Shit, one second," Hans said, "I left it in my jacket."

Michael heard Hans' bare feet slapping on the bathroom tile. The hydraulic arm at the top of the door slowly swept it shut until it closed with a click.

After another round of slapping bare feet, there was a knock on the bathroom door.

Michael waited for Hans to enter. Hans knocked again.

"What are you doing?!" Michael said, "just come in already."

The door opened and Hans entered the room with a folded bundle of loose leaf paper in the shriveled skin of his fingers. Michael sat up, glancing from the tight bundle of white to the blue eyes of Hans as he approached him with the gift. Michael knit his brow.

"What is it?" Michael asked, extending his hand, "that Mandy chick gave this to you?" He bit his lip as he tried to remember her, "she's that quiet skinny girl with the dark bob and glasses? The one who always wears black, right?"

Hans nodded as he deposited the folded note into Michael's open palm, "during lab this morning, she was adamant I hand it directly to you when you got home from classes today."

"Thanks… what could she possible want from me? I don't think we've ever spoken with each other before," Michael said, staring down into the bundle in his hand.

"Whatever," Hans said, "message delivered. Now, I'm going to rest for the rest of the night, do not disturb me nor unrest me, or I'll be distressed, see?"

"Right… right…" Michael said, unfurling the letter as Hans left. The paper had been folded around a small black book like neatly creased wrapping paper. Michael set the familiar book aside.

The door clicked shut just as he smoothed out the paper to see curling rows of purple ink striking through pale blue lines:

Dear Michael,

Hi. I've written and rewritten this letter hundreds of times over the semester. I started writing it on the first day of class when I saw you. Did you see me? Probably not; that's my fault. I know you may be creeped out, but I need you to read this letter. Even if you tear it up and never talk to me, that's fine. The regret of having the whole semester go by and never speaking to you makes me sick. At least now, by actually having you read this letter, I can say I did something. Even if it just ends up with me embarrassing myself. It's worth the risk.

You might not know it, but we actually take the same route after class to our next class, which is in the same building, Seed Hall. I've been walking just behind you for thirteen weeks. Three times I almost called out to you, but I overthought it for too long, missing my opportunity. I think too much; it gets in the way of living naturally sometimes.

Do you believe in dreams, Michael? I mean, do you ever have a dream where you are sitting in a rowboat next to someone? That rowboat is close to a waterfall. It's just you and one other person rowing the boat hard enough to keep it from tumbling over into oblivion. Do you have dreams like that? I'm asking because I do, and I saw you sketching a similar scene in the margins of your notebook once. I know I might sound creepy, but I see you in that dream, next to me, sharing the same rowboat as I.

Six weeks ago, you dropped something on the route to your next class. I picked it up. I was going to chase after you and return it. It was the perfect excuse to talk to you but I overthought it, and before I knew it, two weeks had passed. If I returned it after that, I thought you might find it strange and think I was creepy. And if I waited even longer, you might find it even more creepy.

I'm sure you're realizing now what it was that you had lost. It was your little book of passwords. I'm sorry to admit this, but I went through all of them, how could I not? I discovered that we have so much in common, all the same interests, all the same tastes. It's kind of scary actually. Which is one of the reasons why I took so long to send this note to you. I'm scared of how much we have in common. I'm sure you'll think me creepy for going through all your internet activity, emails, photos, and private preferences like that. Actually, I know you will absolutely think I'm a creep. But thank god, I now know how much you like creeps, you little creep.

Let's see how scary IT can get, M.

Mike opened his lost black book and found numerous new entries, usernames, passwords, pin numbers, and secret answers; all of it written out in the same purple pen and handwriting as the letter.