AFTER THE WHITE PILLS FILL MY MOUTH, I climb down into the earth, my hole, the scent of soil all around me, face up to the night above me, navy, dark, stars stationed and shimmering.

I can feel my father beside me, my mother and brother in the distance. I lie in the dirt and wait.

VISION

We are eating dinner around the table in the white house on The Acres. We are selling the meat in town. We are riding in the truck to the river. We are shouting out the years from the tombstones in the cemetery. We are walking in the cold light of the full moon. We are singing happy birthday to my brother. We are harvesting the meat from the quarry. We are eating Circus Peanuts. We are laughing at my father’s joke. We are gathered around my daughter’s crib where she is dreaming. We have no knot among us. We are laughing from deep in our bellies. We know joy.

THE SKY OPENS UP AND SWIRLS ABOVE me, a blur of stars streaking out from a pure white pinprick in the center.

I blink to clear my vision. When I open my eyes, the light is only stronger and more luminous. The sky throbs and streams with color, rivers of shimmering green and blue and white against the dark night.

The beauty of the brightness makes tears flow down my cheeks. I know now that I was wrong: The maw of the world was never metal. It was always light.

The brilliance illuminates each black cavern inside of me, smoothing the deep craters in my heart. My ears fail and my eyes widen, all pain finally gone, offering myself up to the wide, bright mouth of death.

A NOTE ON FACTS

The facts in this book were compiled and edited from a variety of sources online, with special thanks to: Wikipedia, WebMD, Smithsonian Magazine, The New York Times, The New Yorker, National Geographic, The March of Dimes, Healthline, LiveScience, and countless others.

A NOTE ON PREVIOUS PUBLICATIONS

Early pieces of this novel were first published in Salt Hill Journal, Triangle House, The Fiddleback, Everyday Genius, New York Tyrant, littletell, and darkfuckingwizard. Thank you to the editors for their support.

Acknowledgements

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

For my family, first and forever. Love you big.

For being my first readers, and being kind at the right time: Jaime Fountaine, Maria Flaccavento, Ginger Rudolph, and Blake Butler. For their artistic support: Alda Sigurðardóttir & Kristveig Halldórsdóttir of the Gullkistan Residency in Iceland, where the first draft was written. For their hard work: Eric & Elizajane Obenauf, and everyone at Two Dollar Radio who made it real.