The smell of manure is unmistakable, pungent and acrid in the air. It seemed to permeate every aspect of Kass’ life — the stink of shit and the mud tracked through the halls of everywhere they went.
Their aunt sat on the stoop, shelling peanuts and smoking, Jakey laying at her feet, panting in the heat. Kass readjusted their backpack and held their head high against the blazing sun. Their sneakers scraped against the dust as they closed the gap between the road and where Aunt Suzie sat. She hadn't looked up.

A bird landed in the drive next to Suzie's truck. Jakey lifted his head slowly, tongue lolling out as he considered barking at it--then back down again. Aunt Suzie didn't move.

Kass moved on. They hadn't wanted to speak to her, anyways.

By the time they made it back to the house, the sun was sinking low, casting long shadows across the porch. The door creaked as they pushed it open, the familiar, musty scent of the kitchen washing over them. There was nothing particularly wrong with it: it smelled like dinner, the clink of silverware on plates, the soft hum of the refrigerator in the corner. Mom at the stove, stirring something in a pot, her back to them, Dad reading the paper, his glasses perched at the end of his nose, half-glancing over the rim at Kass, like a smudge in the corner of his eye.

Kass slid into the chair at the table, their hands cold against the worn wood.

“How was your day?” Mom asked without turning, her voice flat, mechanical.

“Fine,” Kass muttered.

Across the table, Dad cleared his throat, eyes lingering on Kass for a moment too long, then dropping back to the paper. His hands trembled slightly as he folded it. The air felt thicker than it should’ve been, suffocating in the way it settled on their skin. The flicker of the ceiling fan overhead barely made a difference.

"Where's Aunt Suzie?" Dad asked, not looking up from the paper.

"Outside," Kass said, their throat dry, reaching for their glass of water, fingers brushing the edge of it with just the slightest hesitation. They knocked it over, and as the glass teetered, the water stayed perfectly still. Level. Kass couldn’t help but wonder if the house was holding its breath, too.

The glass hit the table with a soft clink, but it didn’t fall. It hung there, tilted at an impossible angle, water trembling inside it like it was waiting for permission. Kass blinked. The glass toppled, water spilling across the table in a thin, silvery sheet. Mom finally turned, wooden spoon dripping stew onto the floor. Her eyes flicked to the puddle, then to Kass, then away again, like she’d seen something she wished she hadn’t.

“Careful,” she murmured. Not scolding. Not surprised. Just… resigned.

Dad rose from his chair with a grunt, but his gaze wasn’t on the mess. It was fixed on the window behind Kass, where the last of the daylight bled out across the fields. The horizon glowed a strange, bruised purple.

“She’s been out there too long,” he muttered.

“Who?” Kass asked.

Neither of them answered.

A low hum vibrated through the floorboards, so faint Kass thought at first it was the refrigerator. But when sound grew, it deepened into something that felt alive, like a throat clearing beneath the house. The spoons in the drawer rattled. Jakey barked once outside, sharp and startled, then went silent. Mom set the pot down too quickly. The lid clattered. Her hands shook as she wiped them on her apron.

“Kass,” she said, voice thin, “go get your aunt.”

Kass hesitated. “She was on the stoop when I came in.”

Mom’s eyes snapped to theirs, wide and wet. “Then she’s not anymore.”

Dad moved to the door, but stopped short of touching the knob. He pressed his ear to the wood.

“Kass,” he said, “don’t go past the truck. If you don’t see her, you come right back.”

Kass swallowed hard, heart thudding against their ribs as they pushed open the door. The porch groaned under their weight, boards bending as though something beneath them shifted in response. The sky had gone fully purple now, the kind of color that didn’t belong to any sky Kass had ever seen. Aunt Suzie’s truck sat in the drive, but the stoop was empty. The peanut shells she’d been cracking were scattered across the steps, crushed into the wood as though someone had stepped on them in a hurry.

Jakey was nowhere.

But the bird was still there. Only now it stood perfectly still in the dirt, head tilted, watching Kass with one unblinking eye. Its shadow stretched far too long behind it, reaching toward the barn like a dark finger pointing the way.

“Kass.”

The voice drifted from the field.

Aunt Suzie’s voice. “Kass, honey. Come help me.”

Kass took one step off the porch.

The dirt shifted under Kass’ shoe like something alive. They froze. The air had gone wrong again, thick and syrupy, clinging to their skin. The purple sky pulsed faintly, as if it were breathing in time with the low hum rising from the earth. The bird in the driveway didn’t move, didn’t blink, didn’t even sway in the breeze that should’ve been there but wasn’t.

“Kass,” Aunt Suzie called again.

But it wasn’t right. Her voice was stretched thin, pulled like taffy, the vowels too long, the consonants too soft. It came from the field, but it also came from everywhere: behind the barn, under the porch, inside the house. Kass felt it in their teeth.

They stepped off the porch. The boards behind them creaked as if something heavy had just stepped onto them, following. The truck loomed ahead, its metal skin reflecting the sickly sky. The bird’s shadow still pointed toward the barn, impossibly long, impossibly straight. Kass skirted around it, careful not to get too close. Its eye tracked them, slow and deliberate.

“Aunt Suzie?” Kass called, voice cracking.

A rustle answered from the tall grass at the edge of the field.

“Kass, honey,” the voice crooned again. “I’m stuck. Come help me.”

The grass parted.

Aunt Suzie stood there, or something wearing her skin. Her clothes were the same, faded tank top, denim shorts, but her skin was too pale, stretched too tight over her bones. Her hair hung limp, dripping with something dark that wasn’t water. Her eyes were wide, pupils blown so large they swallowed the color.

She smiled. “Knew you’d come,” she whispered.

Kass took a step back.

Aunt Suzie took a step forward and the ground beneath her rippled like water. The soil bulged around her ankles, clinging, pulling, as if the earth itself was trying to swallow her whole. She didn’t seem to notice.

“Kass,” she said again, but her mouth didn’t move this time.

Kass stumbled, heart hammering. The sky pulsed brighter, the purple deepening into something bruised and rotten.

Behind them, the porch groaned “Kass.” Mom’s voice.

Except Mom was inside.

Kass turned. Mom stood on the porch, but her silhouette was wrong, too tall, too thin, her limbs bending at angles that made Kass’s vision blur. Her head tilted, slow and creaking, like a puppet on a string.

“Come back inside,” she said, but her lips didn’t move either.

Aunt Suzie reached out a hand. Her fingers were too long. Too many joints. “Help me, Kass,” she whispered, and this time her voice came from the sky.

Kass ran. They didn’t think, didn’t breathe, didn’t look back. The field blurred around them, the grass whipping at their legs. The hum in the air rose to a roar, the earth buckling under their feet like something massive was turning over beneath the soil. Behind them, something screamed. Kass didn’t stop until they reached the barn. They grabbed the door, yanked it open, and slipped inside, slamming it shut behind them.

Darkness swallowed them whole. And something inside the barn exhaled.