I know only of survival. I don’t know who I am; I don’t know what I am, or why I exist, save for the fulfillment of a set of instincts and impulses that I do not consciously control.
Eat.
Grow.
Be.
The vessel in which I am encased hungers, insatiably. For what, I do not know. But the craving is unbearable.
The universe is small; black. I’ve explored all of it. I’ve tried kicking my way beyond its boundaries, but to no avail. I’m trapped. Just it and I.
You see, I share the universe with another; one who is like me. It hungers as well, but neither one of us ever feels satiated.
If there was only one of us, though…
I touch it. It’s soft; succulent. I wish to absorb it, but it will resist.
Perhaps if I take its nourishment tube for myself, the hunger will finally cease.
It takes me a long time to work the tube loose, and there is much struggle, as was expected, but I win. I am the strongest.
Its flailing and kicks slow to nothing, and it ceases to move even as the universe begins to quake.
What belonged to it is now mine. It is mine. I wrap my body around it and begin to feed.
Patrick Walts 
Reblogged this on Patrick Walts: The short fiction collection.
Holy Shit!!! Wow. Totally got sucked in from the very start and damn what a finish. Yikes. Incredible writing.
Well thank you. I was half asleep and came across this public domain painting and thought the child looked really pleased with him or herself. Then I started thinking about how when I located my biological relatives(I was adopted)a few years ago one of them told me I’d had a twin with me in the womb, or doctors thought I had, but nothing ever came of it so I guess I absorbed it after it died? Idk, “vanishing twin syndrome” it’s called, where a girl starts out out pregnant with twins, and one dies early on and the other absorbs the tissue into itself. Nothing sinister of course, but I got to thinking “what if I murdered him?”
You know, the kind of fun stuff I go to sleep thinking about.😂
The weird thing is, growing up I didn’t know anything about that but I always had this intense wish/fantasy about having a twin, to the point it made me feel unfulfilled in some way that I didn’t. Was very subtle but I thought about it a lot. So it made sense
Wow. That’s intense Patrick. It’s interesting to me how much we actually “know” from our life in the womb. I have a very good friend who swears he remembers being born and can recall things that happened from when he was only a few weeks old. Of course… your title begs the question: first murder? Ha! But no, I actually found this quite thought-provoking and your background just lent even more to the story. Thank you. I really like your work.
It could just be that I wanted a twin because I loved TV shows and movies about twins fooling grownups.
Oh like ummm oh yeah, the parent trap?
Definitely the 80s sequel
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You are amazing! Thank you!