Sweet Stuff AKA The "M" Word

I have been in a total ditch. What's worse than having your brother and fiance taken away? How about a metallic plasma that sticks to anything it comes in contact with? Smells strongly of iron, is a dark red, leaves scarlet stains on anything it touches.

I have several jars full of it, though. Hidden under loose floorboards. I will see this stuff through a microscope when the opportunity presents itself. I don't know what I will see, nor can I guess. I find my own lack of standards to be my best trait. I'll try anything as is needed so long as it will not knowingly compromise my health.

I am holding one of these right now, and I cannot tell whether the stuff has gotten darker or lighter. Has it clot? The smell hasn't gotten any less like a cooled foundry.

Steps can be heard up the stairs. "Who's there".

A young mare named Angela. Angela Balsam. Switching it and stuffing it beneath the boards, I asked what she wants.

"Your happiness. You have been dull and down in the dumps for the past few days."

"Please don't say 'dumps'. It will further mess with my head."

"There is an old movie I am quite a fan of. In it a chief character says at one point, 'If you don't have a good sense of humor, you may as well be in your grave. Or in the army.' Take it to heart."

I gave it brief consideration. Then shook my head. "I'd be better off dead."

She shrugged, then said, "It's your call. Just be warned you only get one chance to live. Throw it away, and you shall not get another. Think it over."

An hour or two later...

I come down the stairs to see her on the sofa rubbing away at Joanna's head. Young pekingese jerks her head up at me and glares at me. I glare right back. She jumps to the floor and run off outside. My closest thing to a mare friend I have got gets up and approaches me with a devilish grin. There she goes with her smile again. How can she smile that much?

"How can you be so cheerful all of the time? What are you? A human? A horse? A ghost with no definitive form? Are you a robot, made of steel.?" She only stands there, coming ever closer, trying ever so hard to get nearer me, not only in body. She does the most unexpected thing: She plants a kiss on my cheek. Then she makes a silly noise, indistinguishable. I mind not. She makes another. Then another. I finally crack.

Perhaps I'll see them again. I hope Henry and Herbert won't be ashamed of me when they find out I have---

When they show up, not if, they'll get something similar to what I did. They'll be without hands most likely, and possibly suffer depression. Think like that. It'll make things better... for me. I will be set free by death, and that is a relief. But not today I won't I'll have to trudge through it, and suffer bunches and bunches. I'll find my way.

That glance in the mirror did me more favors than I liked to admit it did. The surprise would have been much worse later when I began to suspect this happened to me, but hadn't properly confirmed it. Get it all out of the way at once and be done with it.

I come back into the room and get a nice pair of pliers. Yank a hair or two. Maybe I'll even get a nice wax. Or a good razor, and tell clotfriend Alex to do the job. That is a nice... no. I must not think that. Herbert can be the only one. And only Henry should I tell this to. I should wait for them.

I give myself a nice feel. In spite of these rigid things, they have a sensitive point, and that lets me touch and feel things both external and internal. Animate and inanimate. I won't let this mare thing knock me down.

Mr Hadley has no doubt been thinking about me and my mental health. I can't worry myself to the point I need a shrink, especially when there's no therapists around to listen to me. I drink and go to sleep. I'll be better in the morning. And see what these fluids and plasma I been dealing out and tackling look like up close.