A new species emerged in the animal kingdom recently. I saw one slink out of my mother. It  started in the arms, a convulsion amongst the bones. Her skin rippled with sharp bumps, twisting and bulging as if a caged animal thrashed beneath it. Each motion was accompanied by a series of sickening cracks and squelches. Mom’s neck stiffened. Her head arched back with gargled  screams. Gnarled digits curled out of her mouth, grasping her cheeks. All the while, her eyes  begged for my help. I was too shaken to move or speak. With a single heave, her eyes turned into  empty, black sockets as the creature’s bulbous head squeezed out of her maw. A single bulbous eye – veined and wet – pushed through her lips. It was ringed by a ridged mass of fleshy pink  cartilage that glistened like exposed muscle. Cone-shaped receptors pulsated on the sides of its head in the place of ears. Its amorphous pupil stared me down as it undressed, shackling off my mother’s skin.  

     Flesh fabric hit the floor. The eye sockets were empty and dark. I reached for Mom’s corpse. Her black hair was lying at the skinny creature’s feet. The putrid smell of blood wafted  from the remains. 

     Before my hand could reach it, the creature clenched my face and dragged me from the  living room. I could only gasp, my heart racing too quickly to create words. As I was dragged up the stairs, I glimpsed the discarded bag that Mom had become. I had just arrived home from my  graphic design job, when… she suddenly began to convulse. I had only wanted to stop by since  Dad was away on a business trip, yet a soft, fleshy creature was dragging me to my old, dusty  bedroom. It slammed through the bedroom door, separating the wood from the hinges. Crack! The door clattered to the floor. 

     With a single swing of the shoulder, I was plopped onto a chair in front of a desk. Old  paint bottles were sprawled across it, half-used and empty. I raised my head to find a clean, white  canvas. “Get away from me!” I shrieked, a crack in my tone. A thin brush poked into view, two  sharp digits holding it tightly. I peered over to see the cyclopean creature watching me. “You…  You want me to paint?” I hollered, a melancholic cackle escaping from my throat.  

     Faced with the creature and its asinine request, I could only think of my mother. The first  time I held a brush, it was she who handed it to me. I had come home from elementary school, blabbering about how we painted with our hands in art class. I wouldn’t shut up about it. So, she  drove us to Walmart, went to the arts and crafts aisle, and helped me pick out the acrylics I  wanted. We also found brushes and canvases for me to use. When we got back home, she helped  me set up my first canvas and prepare the acrylics. Once everything was ready, she placed a brush in my little hand. The brush was white, rough on my fingertips. I began painting messy  strokes on the canvas, just doing whatever I wanted. All the while, Mom lovingly smiled behind  me. 

     That was our memory together, the feeling we shared. It was something that the creature  probably couldn’t comprehend. “I’m not painting for you!” I shrieked. I reached for my  smartphone and tried to call the police but it was snatched from my hand. The creature stood tall,  looking down at me with its singular eye. “I’m not painting for you!” I repeated. Then, it curled  into a ball and backed away. “You’re not going to hurt me? Not going to get angry and rip me  apart? Eat me?” I badgered anxiously.

     I waited, expecting all of the worst things to happen to me, but the creature did not move. So, I left, returning to the living room. My mother’s skin was still on the carpet. I dared not touch  it. I could leave the house… I could, I thought. I rushed toward the door, making heavy steps on  the floor. Suddenly, the creature’s steps pounded above. It stomped down the steps and crawled  across the floor quickly. Its chest rose and fell rapidly as it stood before me, blocking the door. It  had no mouth, but I could tell its breathing was heavy. It was desperate, just as desperate as me,  I noticed. Leaving was the last thing it wanted me to do. 

     I didn’t want to give it a reason to hurt me, so I turned on the tv and checked the news.  My phone was far out my reach. I couldn’t check the Internet nor see notifications. “This can’t  just be happening to me,” I hoped. The tv flickered on with breaking news flashing on the screen,  running for the last hour. Every channel was interrupted with the same report, even international  ones: ‘Loved Ones Turned Inside Out’. I frantically watched, sweat slicking my fingers. There  was a case where a woman’s boyfriend turned into a one-eyed creature, forcing her to sing hours  and hours upon end. In a similar case, a granddad turned monster made his grandson write short  stories for him over and over again. A creature spawned from a woman’s husband asked her to  dance forever and a malformed instructor compelled his students to play the guitar for hours  without stopping. Some creatures sat on the couch watching TV incessantly, while others perused  the Internet. But mine wanted me to paint. 

     They weren’t violent, police observed. They wanted to see someone dance, hear someone  sing, watch television, and eat. Many people reported that their loved ones returned after  fulfilling the creature’s request. However, none of that was hard evidence, only speculation. The  monsters had only existed for an hour after all. The common observation was that they just  wanted to do what they found enjoyable without end. “Enjoyable? It finds my art enjoyable… Like Mom did,” I gleamed, sitting on the couch in the living room. People were saying the  creatures were harmless, even fascinating. But how could they be? How could anyone say that  when they’d watched their own loved ones being turned inside out?  

     My eyes shifted back to the creature in front of the door. It was motionless, allowing me  to watch the news. It stared at me, its eye glancing at the stairs, at me, and back again like a  nervous child. “You want me to paint?” I whimpered. It was silent. I inched toward the stairs.  The creature followed me back to the bedroom. “I’ll paint,” I sighed, taking the brush. I had no  other choice. The news said loved ones could return. Mom could come back. 

     I painted, making messy strokes like I was that child who just got her first canvas. The  lanky, cyclopean creature stood by and watched. As I gripped the brush, memories of Mom flooded back—her smile, the way she’d encourage everything I made as if it were a masterpiece.  Was this what she’d want? Me creating for this… thing? Yet, a part of me longed to believe that  this painting could revive her. So I kept going even though I didn’t quite know what I was  creating. A broad stroke of green laid the foundation for a pasture. My brush then gravitated  toward a splotch of gray, laying the foundation for a dour sky on the canvas. A few strokes of  brown manifested trees and finally green crescents plotted the leaves.  

     An hour later, I rose from the desk and presented the canvas to the grotesque creature. Its  eyeball widened, wrinkling pink cartilage. It held the canvas tightly, cracking the thin wood.  Startled, it loosened its grip. “I can make more,” I muttered, grabbing another canvas. Each  brushstroke felt like a betrayal, a tribute, and an unspoken plea. I was obeying the thing that  emerged from Mom’s remains, but somehow, it was as if I were painting for her, trying to show  her that I still remembered the joy we once shared. I wanted to pull her from the depths of hell 

she was in and revitalize the person I loved. So, I painted. I slashed the canvas with the brush  countless times. 

     Around midnight, I got up from the desk, exhausted. The creature took the five paintings  I made and holed itself up in Mom’s bedroom. It sat in the middle of a gallery of my own  creation, taking the time to examine each painting. The creature sat, focused on a canvas where a  messy green pasture stood out. It shifted its position slightly, raising one gnarled limb to rest on  its cheek—just like Mom used to do when admiring my work.  

     “Mom?” I whispered, voice cracking. The creature’s pupil constricted, almost as if it  recognized my voice. It slithered past me and went down the stairs. From the doorway of my  parents’ bedroom, I could hear bones cracking, terrible screams, and disgusting gushing from the  living room below. I moved to the top of the steps as the clamor ceased. 

     “Danielle?” Mom’s loving voice came from the living room.