Rotting and Broken {Clara/Zagreus}

Today has been a good day I think. Momma let me wander alone outside today because she's been busy with something. I think she might be trying to find a new thumb. I don't actually know though because I darted out the door as soon as Momma said I could play outside. I really like it outside.

Right now I'm walking around where the abandoned houses are and thinking about life and death and also kittens. They're all so fuzzy. And sometimes I jump around to watch my hair bounce, as I do, because it's fun and my hair is so bouncy and I like it. I wonder if any of these houses have dead bodies in them. That'd be neat.

As I'm wondering, I see a really tall guy with interesting eyebrows in front of one of the houses. There's dust on his shoes.He sees me and says, "Alright, kid. You just gonna stand there or are ya gonna help me raid this place?"

Should I help him raid it? Maybe there will be a dead body in there. Maybe he'll let me touch it. I really want to touch it. I don't know if Momma would approve, but the guy seems nice enough and I'm pretty sure breaking into houses is only a little bit illegal. Rules are stupid anyway. We all die eventually ha ha.

Maybe we can all be friends! The eyebrow guy, the dead body and me. The idea makes me happy. I've never had friends before! Suddenly I decide that I will raid the house with this man. I jump up and down while grinning and nodding my head.

"I can help by kicking things!", I exclaim.

I was just standing there and being a person and hoping tall eyebrows guy would let me kick things. He smiled at me kinda funny like he thinks he's smarter than me and that makes me a little bit sad because I have depression and think sometimes

"Okay, sure," The boy with strange eyebrows said while doing the same face thing he did before ,"How about you come here, then. There are some cabinets low to the floor that need to be opened, and kicking them would be more fun. You can have whatever you find in them,"

I looked at the cabinets and they seemed like they might be big enough to hide at least a smaller dead body or maybe some moths. I like moths because they're like butterflies but uglier and that makes me happy because they fly also.

I started kicking the cabinets really hard with my strongest foot and leg parts. I made myself more excited by thinking about dead moths. Dead moths are the best because they're like dead bodies and they're moths. As I was kicking and thinkin' about about dead moths and if I could make tiny clothes to put on the moths so they could be like dead moth babies, another thing happened that I can't remember.

Oh yeah, the tall guy with the eyebrows started talking to me he said,"I'm Zagreus, by the way. What do they call you?"

I thought his name was funny and I giggled a little. I hoped he wouldn't murder me for my gigglage because I really wanted to be friends and most people don't like dead bodies for some reason. I wanted to think of him as Zaggy. So I did. In my mind he is Zaggy.

Oh right, I was supposed to answer questions, that's what questions are la la la.


"My name is CLARA! My mom only has one thumb! How many thumbs do YOU have, Zaggy??!?!?", I announce, while jumping again because wow does my hair bounce haha.

I'm thinking that maybe Zaggy is actually a little scary and might turn me and my moths into little dead bodies, when the tall eyebrows monster man says, "I know, I have a strange name. Obviously my parents picked it out, not me."

Well yeah that's how I think names work but I don't say that because guy is still kinda scary. He'd be less scary if he were dead body but then he wouldn't talk to me and that would be weird haha.

I'm still wondering about the thumbs when Zaggy holds out his two thumbs which is weird for me to see because my momma doesn't have that.

As he's doing that he says,"Well, I personally have two. I see that you do, too, Clara."

I look down at my hands and he's right! I do have two thumbs! I decide I will use the mm for dead body collecting and curl pulling because those are my favorite things haha.

I go back to kicking the cabinet things again for a little bit, trying real hard to get them to open so I can eat a dead moth. I wonder if momma has ever eaten a dead moth before. Or maybe bread. I've heard of bread but I don't know if I've ever had it before I wonder if it's purple. I remember the first time I had an orange I thought it was going to be blue but it wasn't and when I told my mama that I was confused she looked at me funny. I don't know why I'm really smart and sometimes look at pictures of things.

My mind is spitting these thoughts at me like a saw a saw a girl spit at a frog once and it's weird. My thoughts are interrupted when my new friend starts talking again.

"Since you gave me a nickname, it would only be fair for me to give you one," he laughed after he said that part and I thought his laugh was kinda neat like the sound mamas thumb made when it was cut off by a sewing machine but also different, "What do you think of me calling ya Curls?"

I thought about this for a second before I giggled a little bit. My hair IS curly! And I'd never had a nickname before!

"I like it a lot!", I giggle-screamed,"I like it more than I like my right toenail!"

I like that toenail a lot it's nice but not as much as my new nickname like I just said! I was happy so I used my happy to kick open the cabinet finally and I thought there would be a moth but there was just a dead bee and I cried because bees aren't moths and also I don't like yellow.

I was still so sad. I just wanted to eat a dead body! A moth dead body! But noooo there had to be a dead BEE in the cabinet I'd kicked open. As I was licking tears that kept falling on face because salt is yummy I tried not to think about the color yellow and instead focus on the color blue. Blue like the color I pretend toilet water is.

Thinking about that made me cry harder because I don't like toilets. They always seem like they're angry at me. Zaggy seemed confused at my wet face and my leaking eyeballs so I stopped licking my tears so he could see that I wasn't just crying because I was thirsty.

His face makes these words happen then, "Hey Curls, I've got an idea. Let's go back outside and I can give you a piggyback ride. How's that sound? Fun? Will that make you feel better, do you think?"

I wasn't one hundred percent sure what a piggy back was but If it meant I got to touch a pig I wanted to do it. But I didn't stop crying until he leaned down outside the house. At first I stayed where I was and crying because wow tears taste so good yes and also I wasn't sure why he was kneel/ leaning and I thought maybe he was sick and gonna die and that almost made me kinda happy because if he throws up I can put it in a bags and throw it at people which I do sometimes. Or maybe I'd tell them it's trail mix I don't know. But then I realized that he wanted me to jump in him so I did.

I was still sad so I kept crying and licking my tears while screaming,"I DONT LIKE YEELLLOOOW" and "CARRY ME ZAGGY" at the same time.

And I think about how maybe we're friends and I like that haha.