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c}{imps 8 my ears

A few years into the rift and I found myself walking on train tracks. I liked the peace. The only thing that ever came to interrupt my solitude was the train. I couldn’t stay. I bounced back and forth between the end of the world, Cape Cod, and a derelict vehicle in a suburban backyard. But the train tracks held a magic I often took refuge in. There was a growing tension between what labelled itself the sane world and what I felt inside. I pushed it off with drugs as much as I could, but every time I closed my eyes the world was ending.

It’s absurd, but I used to steal the mechanical air fresheners from gas station bathrooms. I would disassemble the electric eyes of toilets as well, but my real talent was ridding the world of artificial shit cover. Or rather, of moving it to places where the scents would be out of place.

Sara introduced Pepper and I. He was a Leo. I hadn’t known too many Leos. My whole life I’ve been surrounded by Taurus, Capricorn, Scorpio, and Sagittarius. After Sara and I broke up, I left Hyannis. I came back about a year later. I hadn’t stopped moving since and had been to jail once for five days, which felt like a year and didn’t feel like a place I wanted to spend my apocalypse. Pepper was waiting when I got back to Hyannis. I stayed with the Humphreys and worked for Blair.

I hadn’t held a job since dropping out of college with some finality. I had been homeless and sleeping where people took pity on me. My family still looked at it as a phase, like my hot-