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the people who drifted through his life were often riddled with the inky dollops, sometimes dripping from sores on their faces or arms, all the while oblivious to the creatures feeding on them.
    Kismet still checked his own body when he was sober enough to see, looking for the telltale divots of forming tails over his crotch or heart. He hated the things. More than hating the touch of them on his skin, he hated the stink they left behind when he pulled them off someone, their wriggling and screaming shapes twisting between his pinches.
    Steeling himself, Kismet plucked at the one fixed under Lucy’s eye, peeling it free from her lashes. As he pulled it off, he crushed it between his fingers, its high-pitched squeal cut off in midscream. Gagging at the rank odor, he worked carefully over the woman’s face and shoulders, removing what he could see. Fighting an overwhelming urge to puke, he dug through the matted, greasy locks around her neck, unwinding a long, serpentine trail from behind her ear.
    With a final inspection, Kismet dug through Lucy’s belongings, a faded crocheted knapsack run brown with dirt. She protested the intrusion, silenced only when Kismet passed over the bottle, muttering under his breath for her to keep it. The woman squirmed about, her legs hooking around Kismet’s ankles, nearly toppling him into her wastes. A brown plastic container rattled when he grabbed at it, the pills inside dusty from being tossed around during her daily travels.
    “Here, take one.” Kismet steadied himself, resting a kneecap on the wall next to Lucy’s head.
    He shook out a dose, then held it for Lucy to take.
    “I only have the stuff here.” Lucy held up the bottle, her trembling hand shaking the container. “Doctors said I shouldn’t drink as much.”
    “Yeah, well, chances are I won’t tell the doctor that you’ve taken a hit with your drugs.” Kismet stroked at the woman’s temple, weary to his bones. She slurped at the bottle, cradling the wine to her chest and burping delicately behind her free hand. “You doing okay, Lucy?”
    It wasn’t hard to reconcile the beaten, sparse woman sitting in cast-off clothes and runoff fluids with the brassy, come-hither flirt who ran around with his mother. He’d seen others decline, a well - traveled path they all seemed to take. Kismet figured Lucy was merely keeping his own place warm in the meantime, the alleyway sheltered from the wind, although the flat side of the building offered no protection from the harsh San Diego sun. One day she would drop out of sight, a rumor of a person leaving nothing behind but a drying stain.
    “You tell your mom I said hi. And tell her not to be a stranger.” Lucy’s faded brown eyes peered up at him, a flicker of something in their depths. It was funny how often she’d spoken of the woman they both barely knew, never seeming to remember his mother died years before. “You take care of her.”
    “Sure, Lucy.” Kismet forced himself to kiss her forehead, tasting the smear of rank shadow on her skin. It crept into his tongue, burning bitter and spreading thin in his spit. Taking only the cloves, he left her with the Buckfast and chocolate.
    The side gate let him into the cracked paved courtyard a few doors down from his room. At some point in the motel’s history, someone optimistic tiled the edge of the sidewalk with festive turquoise tiles. Time had faded most of the colors, but a glimmer of sand-frozen sky remained in the traces along the wall.
    Closing the wrought iron gate behind him, Kismet stood in the cold, the sky nearly burned free of the day.
    Opening the door, Kismet reached for the light switch, driving back the dimness in the room. The stench of the wraiths clung to his hands, foul and greasy when he rubbed his palms together, hoping to get a hint of warmth under his skin. A quick washing in the tiny bathroom took most of the stink off. Just a lingering moldy smell caught under his nails, the shadows’ rank