Waking up is hard.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
You&& (working title) is a queer novella about when home is other people, including the monsters lurking in the woods. Check out the about page here. You&& is a sequel to Sometimes The Mountain Buries You.
You’re pretty much dead when they find you. Pretty much dead is survivable, in your experience. You've had worse and still woken up no small stretch of time later, your wounds just barely knit back together. It feels horrendous, rousing from baking in the sun like a desiccated rat swarmed with flies and laid out on that service road you do try avoiding.
This feels different. Easier. All the various gashes are held together without the itch of misaligned spines, mending at speed without having to close themselves in the process. Not nearly so much energy spent. Not nearly so much time lying open like a desiccated rat swarmed with flies and laid out on that service road.
You feel that you are not laid out on that service road.
links and search terms from writing 'You’re pretty much dead when they find you'.
- "elk sounds"
- "hero shrew spine"
Hero shrew spines are fuckin' rad.
I'm really pleased with implementing perspective shift like this. After Sometimes The Mountain Buries You starting and keeping with You, getting to chapter 6 before You show up here is soooo delicious to me.