Nari

a futuristic story by Jeremy Morris

This is a story of a girl and her father. This is a story about what makes us, us. This is a story about robots and scientific advancement. This is a story about what a father will do for his daughter. This is a story about the future, but it feels relevant now.

This story is almost as long as the last one, but the underside isn’t as worried about length the way much of the internet is. Sometimes, it takes a little longer to develop, more time for the pay-off. But it’s there.

This story also varies in setting and tone, and that’s the beauty of the underside. One week, it’s historical fiction; the next week, science fiction. They have the underside in common. This isn’t some mainstream tale for the masses. This is for those who want to look deeper, peer under the rug, lift up the veil.

I think that’s you. Scroll through for the story!

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AI thinks she looks like this

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Nari

by Jeremy Morris

She was a cat. It was a game. A lark. The three teens were in the basement sitting in a circle. Eyes closed. Toes curled. Then, she yawned. She stretched. She purred.

The headsets had come a long way since version 2.0 debuted at CES in 2028. The commercial offshoot of a Carnegie Mellon haptic lab. The first iteration, no better than a tiny humanoid robot, was an expensive, glitchy version of Rock’em Sock’em. It took real vision to see the potential in the technology.

But, eventually, the Chinese leisure goods sector worked its magic, and the moment the machines acquired synthetic fur, a whole menagerie of immersion animals came to market. A “veritable bestiary” in the words of the trade literature. Now, who wouldn’t want to be a mongoose for an hour or two?

There were animals that crawled, that swam, that bounced. For several years, a black lab named Gulliver was the industry leader. He was friendly, easy to pilot, and could dance on his hind legs. Then, in the third quarter of 2034, a gecko named Stu took the crown (once teenage boys figured out that his chameleon scales could flash the word “penis”). Stu is currently banned in schools in 42 states. Texas maintains a total ban on all immersion practices.

But, wasn’t that the whole point? Something silly. Something escapist. Something that could be assembled (parts and labor included) for 26.4 Yuan per unit. Yes, the robots would end up in a landfill. But, the iAnimals became a cultural touchstone. Years later, in their college dorm rooms, an entire generation would ask each other a loaded question: what animal did you become?

The cat hopped up on the edge of Liz’s couch, and cocked her head. Then, Nari made an awful caterwauling noise. Upstairs, in the office, Liz’s mom, Claire, mid-spreadsheet, flinched.

“Kids, these days,” she cursed.

Downstairs, the cat upset a basset hound named Pringles who howled. And then, Oscar, a golden lion tamarin, got so spooked that she clambered up the curtains. The Tamarin squeaked her fury at her noisy friends.

Claire yelled over the cacophony, “15 minutes, girls.”

During this immersion session, Nari had already been a ferret and a parrot. The Parrot sounded cool, but they hadn’t properly figured out the flight controls. One of those twenty year problems. She mostly hopped. On the bright side, the bird could say “Minge” in a Cockney accent. But the joke got old after about five minutes.

“I don’t know, the ferret feels kinda basic,” Nari complained.

“But, it’s soooo cute,” Liz replied.

“What do you really know about ferrets?” Akama shrugged. “The designers just binged a bunch of episodes of Ai Yori Aoshi.”

Nari took off her headset. She was human again. “I gotta go home,” she said.

“How’s your new place?” Liz asked.

“It’s got a lot of gizmos,” she said, rolling her eyes.

“Your dad thinks he’s Ironman,” Akama said.

Nari was hungry. She always felt hungry after a Dobu-tanto session.

“Liz, do you have any snacks?” Nari asked.

Liz shouted upstairs, “Mom, do we have any more chips?”

Ms. Shakti was no fan of junk food. “I have apple slices,” she shouted back.

Slices. Lame.

Nari jammed her headset into its case. “It’s all good. Say thanks to your mom,” she said.

She threw on her backpack.

“See you tomorrow after class?” Liz asked.

The girls hugged.

Nari slipped on her shoes, and she left through the front door.

#

Haneul sat next to his sleeping daughter. She looked peaceful. Like when she was a newborn. Like that first night after the hospital. It had been a difficult birth. But now she looked like a young woman. The more he stared at his sleeping daughter, the more he tried to recall this early memory, and the blurrier it all got. Like trying to reconstruct a whole songbird from a handful of feathers. He sat there helpless.

He unzipped the medicine case and pulled out an ampule. He drained the vial with a syringe, then tapped the needle, before he injected the IV line.

“You’ll have to administer the Methylphenidate,” the neurologist had said.

It would prevent brain damage. Three times a day. It became their new routine.

She would sleep. He would move her every few hours. She would sleep. He would change her diapers. She would sleep. He would pick up her small frail body and move her to the window. She would sleep. He would look over old photos on his phone. She would sleep. He would feed her. She would sleep. Would it be forever? It was horrible. It was boring.

He downloaded all her digital breadcrumbs. School work. Swimming medals. Spelling awards. A scrapbook of her life. He was very good at bedazzling. Like a magpie. Or a crow.

Whenever someone told him how sorry they were, he would ask them for a story about Nari. That was a fair trade. Sympathy for a nugget. A morsel for the shrine. Mostly they smiled. And offered him sorrys. Sometimes, later, they sent him an email. Those were nice. He tried to find some joy in their awkward smiles. But, staying home was easier.

How did her body get so heavy? He was tired most of the time. The rest of the time, he was too tired to notice. He tried not to drink. That he could control. Before the accident, he drank too much. Work obligations. Pleasure. Sadness. Boredom. But now alcohol had become an indulgence. Something selfish. Base. He was already tired enough without the liquid helper.

#

Their house was filthy. Dirty dishes. Piled up laundry. It wasn’t that he couldn’t do it. He’d just developed a specific form of blindness for inanimate objects. And stuff simply faded into the procedural haze of a 90s video game. He was burned out. He hated his stuff. His stupid obsessions. What was the worth of anything if it couldn’t keep his daughter safe? His brother finally had enough and called a cleaning service.

Jacinda came early. She needed to get the job wrapped in an hour. Matter of fact. He told her about his daughter’s condition. All business.

“Me papi was al garete después,” she said.

Haneul liked her. She listened to Bad Bunny on her wireless speaker. She hummed along to the music, and she didn’t judge their space. The house became livable again.

Jacinda found the headset and the small cat robot buried at the bottom of a closet. It was something that the hospital had returned to Haneul in a plastic bag. Like takeout. Or evidence. The bag crinkled, as he pulled out the small, lifeless robot.

“She’d brought her Dobu-tanto that day,” he said. He sounded so worn, but it was meant as a kindness.

Jacinda packed her kit. “Un gato tiene que estirar las piernas,” she said as she gestured for him to boot the creature up.

The iAnimal reminded him of an Aibo that had repeatedly bumped into his leg. Did that happen with his parents? When he was thirteen? Was it on that Christmas trip to Columbus?

Jacinda left for her next gig. And the house was quiet again. There was no music. No Bad Bunny. No conversation. Inevitably the dust would return. Haneul felt himself spiral. He needed to shout. To fill the space. He coughed. He had a panic attack.

The tiny cat stared back at him. It seemed to say, “Press play.” Jacinda was right. It needed to stretch its legs.

He checked its power levels. It still had a half charge. The internal diagnostics reported no issues. Who cared if it was an act of nostalgia. It was the last thing that she had used before the accident. A piece of her life. Another memory to catalog. A tchotchke to add to the book.

Her body spasmed. Haneul held Nari’s hand. He couldn’t bear to see her grow old like Snow White. Would he bury her after she spent her life sleeping. He wanted a drink. He needed to scream. He prayed for someone, anyone to talk to.

He placed the Dobu-tanto headset on Nari’s head. And turned it on.

Lights flashed. A soft hum. The headset sang its K-Pop greeting.

#

Nari woke up. And she was a cat.

Which was somehow perfect. She always liked being a cat.

She yawned. She stretched. She purred.

Her father stared down at her. Haneul was sitting on her bed. He bit his knuckle. Had he been crying? He looked goofy when he cried. She wanted him to feel better. She wanted to hear his laugh. She remembered the accident. She saw her human body on the bed. It didn’t move.

She didn’t want to think about the accident. The accident was boring.

She could miaow.

He laughed. A choking thing. More like a wild animal than a human.

She rubbed against his hand. She had some practice being a cat. She knew that this was how they communicated. He picked her up. And looked her in the eye. Like he was searching for her. She forgot how dark and serious his eyes could be.

But she didn’t want to be serious. She was a cat. That in itself was pretty funny.

She looked around the room.

“Are you already bored?” Haneul asked.

More, like, curious. She wanted to explore. She wanted to move. She miaowed. He put her down. He was covered in tears. He was an ugly crier.

“You’ve been all cooped up,” he mumbled.

He followed her out into the hall.

There were many smells. The programmers had done an excellent job on the sense of smell. How do you code for chicken? Even with all the house cleaner; she could smell food. She could smell his shaving cream. The fabric softener on the sheets. The fish he’d made last night.

Oh yes… the fish.

That was the best smell of all. That smell that had to be experienced. She wanted to luxuriate in it. To consume it. She was starving. Miaow. Miaow. Miaow.

He stared at her. She was full of noises. High pitched ones. Lower sounds that indicated displeasure. Curiosity. Happiness. What did she want?

“Are you hungry?” he asked. She had to be patient with him.

“Food?” he said. That seemed to provoke a response.

How in the hell did they code for food? The mechanics of simulating the digestive process in itself were mindboggling. Where did it all go?

And yet it was always food with a cat. It was the core of their being. She wouldn’t stop circling him. He was afraid to step on her. She followed him around the kitchen.

“Nari, slow down, I’m looking for it,” he said. He had no idea what she liked.

“What do cats eat?” he said. Truthfully, he thought of a kid’s cartoon from when he was eight. Cartoon fish with X’s for eyes.

“Miaow, Miaow,” he replied. He opened the fridge.

He scooped some leftover tuna onto a plastic plate that he placed in front of her. She devoured it. Cats have a narrower sense of taste than humans. They like simple, bold tastes. But she was famished. She made awful smacking sounds. She didn’t care. She was a cat.

Later, she would miss the taste of fresh oranges, seared asparagus and plums. But, steak still tasted amazing. Turkey. Chicken. Meat. Cats are pure carnivores.

#

He placed a water bowl next to her meal. She dipped her paw in the bowl and licked the water off her fur. His daughter was now a cat. It was weird.

Haneul watched her drink. He only left when she began to clean her fur. To give her privacy. But she was a cat. Completely without shame. Or guile. “Except if she had to murder something small,” he guessed. He tried not to think of his daughter eating a mouse. Or, a rat.

When she finished, she lay down and took a nap. Completely natural.

Haneul was fascinated. Being a cat was intuitive for her. Like how his generation was good with computers. A cohort of native-born digital citizens who gladly took to touchscreens and, later, feedback devices. The kids had just taken the next leap. Living their lives inside the constructs of their own choosing. Why not choose a cat?

He wanted to give her the best possible experience. That’s what his UX designer brain told him to do. If she was going to be an animal, then she deserved the best possible life. So, while she slept, he scoured the Dobu-tanto forums. He subscribed to Beast Threads on TikTok. He journeyed deep into the far corners of the web. He found some Estonian Strange Loop software that promised to increase her sense receptors. 4.7 stars. He downloaded it.

#

She was sleek. Fast and nimble. She could jump. She could chase her tail. Squeeze through any crack or hole. Being a cat made her feel like she was a viscous liquid. But covered in fur. She had razor sharp teeth and claws. She had a tail. The best. It was the most expressive part of her body. Again, she miaowed. And it was glorious.

Oh.

She brushed the couch with her whiskers. This was new. There were no human words for how this felt. Like it was radio receivers, or lightning rods jutting out of her face to take in the whole wide world. Every breeze rippled through her cheeks. Space was tactile. Too tight. Too wide. Or not tight enough. She gained a new sense of hot. Of cold. Of just existing in the world.

#

Haneul couldn’t understand what his daughter was saying. Nari didn’t sound like she was in pain. She was talkative. Very talkative.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what…” Haneul said.

Nari wouldn’t stop miaowing.

“Like… like you want to play?” he said.

She rubbed against his leg. So, he found a bit of string. He laid it down in front of her. And she stopped miaowing.

This was new. She cocked her head. He jiggled the string. Nari stared at it perplexed. Haneul pulled the string out the door. An urge filled her belly, but still she did nothing.

He pulled the string a little more. She looked bored.

Then, as he left the room, Haneul dragged the string behind him. With a rush, the cat bit down the rope, and yanked it clear down the hall. He gave chase, and the game was on.

They went back and forth. He hid behind the couch. She pulled the string under the kitchen table. He made it fly through the air. She hunted it through the chairs. She jumped. She caught it. For a second, she could fly. It was silly. It was unforgiving. The game only stopped when Haneul ran out of breath.

He laughed so hard that he gasped. Magic hour had creeped in through the window.

She curled up next to him, and he scratched her behind her ears. She purred.

“I guess this is how we talk now,” he said.

She closed her eyes. And fell asleep.

#

She missed words. Burrata. Persephone. And Robespierre. Three of her favorites. Impossible to say with a cat tongue. She hated how her dad couldn’t always understand her. How, she had to constantly repeat herself. But, they figured out a language that they both could share. Every miaow had a sense. Had a meaning. He figured it out. Eventually. Mostly.

But it was her tail. Her gait was her true language. He knew when she was happy. When she was sad. Especially when she was hungry. When she needed to hunt the string.

Language may have been overrated. What did we lose when we had to give everything a name? What was it really like to be a cat?

Her human name was Nari. But, now she would have a secret cat name. That she would only share with the other cats. To Haneul, parts of his daughter became a mystery. She became her own creature.

He fell asleep in his chair.

Photo by Sara Gault on Unsplash

Nari knew it was night. The temperature drop told her as much. She could feel the darkness on her whiskers. So defined. So crisp. Nighttime had been so limiting for a human. People were only 400 generations away from huddling around fire afraid of the dark.

As a cat, she could see shades of dark that were once impossible. And how they moved around her. How she could use these shades to hunt. Slinky. Sneaky. Cool. She needed new words for her new body. But words that could only be conveyed through the bend of a tail.

She loved being a cat. She loved how it felt. She was no longer apart from the world. She felt it intimately with her whiskers. Why would anyone want to be human ever again?

She smelt the mouse before she saw it. She watched the creature skitter across the kitchen floor. Then, she slunk around the potted plant. Lilies. Deadly for cats. Did the programmers leave that allergy in? Why did her father leave them out around the house?

She focused on her prey. She slowed down and tip-toed around the beam of a car light shining through the window. She waited.

Humans got distracted so easily. Their world a cascade of push notifications and mental spam. Why did they overwhelm themselves with so much language? Losing sight of their place in a wider world.

She stood still for a quarter of an hour. In silence. If she ever broke concentration, her prey would escape. Instincts long buried under a mountain of stuff. Clothes. Culture. Customs. Gone. She studied the tiny animal. It was a brown mouse. Looking for food. Hungry.

The smell of the lilies masked her presence. The mouse wasn’t afraid. It was hungry and preoccupied. For the creature, it was just another night. When it looked up, all it saw was sharp claws pinning it to the floor. And then the teeth coming down to break its neck.

#

Haneul woke up the next morning. He yawned. He stretched. The air was cold. He changed into his housecoat. Nari had left him a gift by his slippers. A tiny brown mouse. Its head was decapitated. There was a lot of blood for such a small creature. He retched.

With a Kleenex, he picked up the dead mouse and put its mangled body in the trash. He washed his hands under polished metal taps. Should he be angry? She was just being a cat.

He made coffee with his AeroPress. He needed the caffeine. In the fridge, he found a piece of Dalgona Cake. An impulse purchase. It was her favorite. He removed the saran wrap.

He found Nari’s two selves sleeping side by side. Did the cat dream of the human? The cat woke up. It stretched. It purred.

Haneul crossed his arms. Nari looked up at him. What, she seemed to say. It was a gift.

“Nari…” he began.

Sometimes she had an urge to kill. An instinctual need for murder. But Haneul still had to clean up the mess.

#

She tried to control her urges by zooming around. Working off that primal energy through motion. Or if it got really bad, she’d find Haneul’s hand, and just bite the ever-loving out of it. Using her hind legs to kick for extra sport.

But, he’d pull his hands away. “Nari, no! Stop it!” he’d shout.

If she tore up the couch, Haneul got out the spray bottle. And swear. And she’d give him the saddest look.

“Come on dad,” her look said.

This is who she was now. She had different needs.

Like the uneaten piece of Dalgona cake.

Like how she could see in the dark.

And, how laser pointers fascinated her.

Haneul tossed the cake out alongside the mouse corpse.

Everything was new. Everything was curious. Everything could be climbed on.

And the hunt… The hunt was the best.

Gradually, she forgot about her other self. The broken girl who always slept in the bed.

#

Haneul would talk to her. He’d have entire one-sided conversations with Nari. The weather. What he was up to. Things that annoyed him about the government. The economy. The LA Clippers.

She never replied. Sometimes she’d give him the sweetest look. Or if he was lucky, she would sleep on his office couch, as he worked, and he rapped old Nas songs out of tune.

A few months after Nari became a cat, Haneul spoke to the other parents, and invited her friends over for a hangout after school.

It was raining. Akama and Liz sank into the couch. Uneaten Peperos on the table. Capri Sun in pouches. Apple slices. What can you possibly say to your best friend’s dad after she gets stuck in a coma?

Akama fidgeted. Liz wanted to cry.

Haneul was friendly. Which only made it worse.

“Do you take sugar in your tea?” he asked from the kitchen.

He brought out more Dalgona cakes and oolong tea.

Real Serial Killer Energy–was the look that Akama shot Liz.

Can we just go–was the look Liz flashed back.

Haneul placed the tray down on the glass table.

“I know it’s been weird after the accident, but I wanted to thank you for visiting,” he said.

“No problem, Mr. K,” Akama said.

Haneul tried to smile. But, the girls only looked at their feet.

“There’s someone I think you should meet,” Haneul finally said.

Let’s go now–Liz flashed to Akama.

A Dobu-tanto robot stepped into the living room. It was a small calico model with dichromatic eyes. The cat cocked its head at the two teenage girls.

“Nari?” asked Liz.

The cat miaowed.

Akama and Liz hugged the animal. It wasn’t sad. It wasn’t awkward. Nari was alive. She was happy. Of course she was happy, Nari was a cat.

Haneul left the girls alone.

In their backyard, he sat on his Italian metal bench, and stared at his boxy concrete house. He could hear a Basset Hound howling and a Tamarin chittering. They made a lot of noise.

Haneul examined his backyard. He hadn’t been back here in months. Spring had come and gone. His yard was overrun with weeds.

“I should do something about this mess,” he said.

#

Back in college, Haneul had studied design. But, it had been forever since he had used his own hands to turn a draft into reality. In his 20s, his work had gotten more and more abstracted by his clients till one day he just decided to leave the field. Consulting paid better.

It felt nice again to get into the guts of a project. First, he made Nari a cat bed. He took cues from Japanese cube hotels. Then, he built her a scratching post. Shaped like a Nintendo mushroom. And some toys to chase. Functional, fun things with a West Coast surfer vibe.

And then, he really got expressive. He built a series of passageways up and above the halls of their home. “Cat-tilevered” was his favorite dad joke. They crisscrossed and spanned. Dipped and sprawled. He loved the old Bradbury building, and he drew upon it for inspiration.

But Nari had trouble with her rear legs, and he had to help her up into the passageways.

Before long, the cat began to look like an engineering problem to him. He ran diagnostics. He reviewed her schematics. He wasn’t content for her to live in a construct that was assembled by the Foxconn Corporation with a minimum of care. He found a body shop in Culver run by a savant with coke-bottle glasses.

“That’s an interesting problem you got there,” the mechanic said as he chewed gum.

The genius built her new legs that allowed Nari to jump off their roof.

But it also gave her depth of field issues.

So, a friend recommended an optician in Chinatown to rebuild her eyes from scratch.

“You are going to need real genetic tissue to prevent rejection,” James said.

Haneul donated part of his own cornea. He didn’t think twice about it. Nari’s eyes were now better than a cat’s. Much better than a human’s. Zero blur or lag. In the daytime or night.

But she developed trouble with her balance. A bad fall gave her a limp.

Haneul then hired a French programmer to reconfigure her inner guidance.

“D’here is a coding error in ‘er legs. ‘er original tendons were sheet,” the Frenchman said.

A combination of cheap polymers and reductive code apparently. Jean-Paul was proud of his fixes. Nari could now move with refined beauty and grace.

Eventually, Nari spent less and less time with Haneul. A cat chooses her companions. She didn’t like her father’s intensity. As such, she got lost for hours exploring the nooks of their house. Sometimes, she’d pop out of his bookcase with a look that said, Look what I’ve found.

Haneul now redesigned their home to accommodate her. What does a cat need? He wanted the house to flow seamlessly from the inside out. So that she wouldn’t feel trapped. He decided that she needed nature as much as she needed technology. He opened all the windows and installed sliding glass doors.

He filled her bedroom with plants. And vines. He got carried away when he planted raspberry bushes in the hallway. He was stuck remembering another memory. His grandmother had grown raspberries in her garden. He’d hold the berries in his palms. With a flick of her tail, Nari convinced him to move them to the sunny side of the yard. They deserved more sunlight.

He tore out the backyard’s concrete. He planted trees. He needed to hear the rustle of a creek. He built a small pond. Stocked it with carp, which Nari swatted at. He wanted to smell lavender. Nari would lie in the grass, and then disappear into the woods. Sometimes she returned with a mouse or a vole. Nari would lay the vanquished corpses at his feet.

“No birds,” he said.

#

Nari lived her life like it was electric. The possibilities of an ear scratch. Of pawing fabric. Of rubbing her face on tree bark. She could sleep for hours at a time. And she dreamed less and less of being a human. She dreamed of the hunt. She dreamed of stalking and killing a bird. The true test of a hunter.

It was the same with her friends. The girls pulled further and further away from their human selves. And used words less and less. At first, it was novel, then joyful, then routine. They discovered comfort in their new bodies. A young generation finding its way.

The reaction from the old folks was awful. Podcasters made a lot of money on the outrage. Laws were written. And then, it became violent. In Oklahoma, they burned a town square’s worth of Dobu-tantos. The children cried at losing a part of themselves.

#

Nari killed a bird. It was a sparrow. And she laid it down in front of Haneul.

He crossed his arms. “No, Nari! No!” he said.

But.

But this was who she was. A hunter. It was proof of her prowess. Of what she could do. She’d stalked and killed something that could fly.

“Bad cat,” Haneul shouted. And he tried to grab her by the scruff.

She bolted. And disappeared into the woods.

He stormed back inside. The sliding doors swung closed.

He didn’t understand why this made him so angry.

“What is wrong with them?” He said, “The immersion has gone too far. The government is going to do something stupid. Their whole generation is turning into freaks!”

Cats killed birds.

“I told her no birds,” he said, “But she wouldn’t listen.”

Maybe it was the act of killing something that could sing.

“I just want her to be human,” he shouted to no one. “Why does she have to be a cat?”

The wind came in through the window. He saw his sleeping daughter’s body on her bed.

He took her hand. He squeezed hard. “Okay,” he finally said.

Then, he smelled the rain. And it started to pour.

He put on a raincoat and grabbed a flashlight. He entered the woods out back.

#

“Nari,” he shouted. “Nari!”

He was frantic. He tore through the tall grasses. The shrubs. The hollows.

He slipped. He fell. He was soaked.

“Oh God. Please, no.” He checked the country road. She wasn’t there.

The rain dripped down his brow. He swallowed the water before it dribbled onto his shirt.

“Nari, please…” he mumbled.

Haneul returned to the backyard. He looked under the shed. Around the pond. Past the trees. He couldn’t find her. Near the mower and the hedge trimmers, he heard a faint miaow.

She was hiding under the raspberry bushes. Shivering. He took off his slick, and picked her up. He wrapped her body in yellow plastic.

“Let’s get you dry,” he said.

Her battery was almost exhausted. She could barely shiver. He carried her inside.

#

Nari slept. She slept for hours. She dreamed of her mother. She could see her face. But she could not, for the life of her, remember her name. That was the worst feeling in the world. Worse than sleeping forever.

When Nari woke up, her cat form was lying on top of her human body.

Haneul was in the kitchen frying fish. “I put some food in your bowl,” he said.

And Nari knew then that her father did not understand. That she was becoming something new. And more than anything that she needed to be the one who decided how she was going to change. He needed to understand. So, she bit him on the ankle.

Haneul screamed. “What the hell, Nari!”

Haneul lifted her, and the cat stared back at him. Then, it squawked. Ugly and inelegant.

“Dad. I. Want. To talk,” Nari said.

Five words. The first ever recorded from a cat.

Haneul cried. It was inelegant. There are some ways that humans can communicate that are better than words.

#

Years passed. And people changed. They grew up. They got old. It was Easter. And Haneul brought over a pie. He used raspberries from his garden.

He rang the doorbell.

An older woman opened the door. She wiped her hands on her apron and offered a hello. “You must be Haneul? I’m Gemma, Iris’s mom.”

“I brought dessert.” Haneul replied.

“Just put it down in the kitchen,” she said. “The lamb’s in the oven.” Hanuel entered the house. It looked like an English cottage. The smell of cranberries and mint and baked bread. The place was full of friends. Laughing and shouting. A young woman took the pie from him.

“How are you, Nari?” he said.

She gave him a hug.

“I’m good, Dad… But you wouldn’t believe what the government just did!” She rolled her eyes.

“Tell me all about it,” he said.

“Well, first there’s this major court battle in Iowa…” she began.

As he followed his daughter into the kitchen, he marveled at her translucent scales. Her cat’s tail. Her deer hoofs. And her wings. How bright and delicate they all were. But it was upon Nari’s words which he fixated. He thought to himself, What an interesting woman she has become.

Photo by Ayma on Unsplash

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About the author:

Jeremy is a writer whose work has been featured in print, film and documentaries. He has won a Sloan Fellowship, and is a graduate of McGill University and USC’s Peter Stark Producing program. For five years, Jeremy worked for Robert Downey Jr.’s production company as his head of research. As a storyteller, he is drawn to stories at the intersection of folk tales, high technology and human mortality.

Underside bit:

Last summer, I journeyed deep inside an abandoned mineshaft, and saw how the miners cut out a copper vein as big as a cathedral. This ore was then used to build skyscrapers. It was brutal work that we take for granted every time that we turn on a lightbulb.

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