STORY
James Hoggard
A GIFT FROM THE SCORCHED MOON
When I woke up, my wife was hanging upside down
from the ceiling like a bat.
In
the dimness her buttocks looked
huge until, still waking up, I realized that what I was seeing as
the gigantic curve of her rump was really the mounded mass of
her back. I relaxed.
I wondered, however, what Marshelaine was doing up there.
The sag of her nightgown resembled old skin about to peel off,
but I knew this was winter and we hadn't gone out; besides, we
owned no sunlamp. What puzzled me most, though, was how
she was holding onto the rafter. Even if she had had some grips
to grasp, she shouldn't have been able to stay up there for more
than a few seconds because her arms are so weak she can't even
do pushups and has trouble with situps. Her pectoral growths,
nonetheless, are nothing short of magnificent. Sculptured fins,
gracefully globular.
Her lack of movement began to intrigue me. There was no
tremble of strain, no swaying except now and then a ripple in
her gownskin, and that was caused, I supposed, by convection
currents in the upper part of our room.
I was getting lonely. I asked her what she was doing up
there, but she didn't answer, so I asked her again-softly; I didn't
want to alarm her. Her gown, as if answering, began fluttering.
She was awake, but I still couldn't hear her. Suddenly a sharp
pain pricked long through my ears.
It
wouldn't stop. The pain
turned shrill. I went dizzy. Vertiginous, I asked her desperately
what she was doing up there. Shrillness; I yelled, "Shut up!"
The pain stopped. The piercing shriek had become my drum–
ming pulse.
''I'm sorry," she blandly replied.
