I was grateful I didn’t follow my instincts in anger.

  I found a smattering of close together trees earlier and pitched my new tent rather than a fit. I stared at my new creation. Somewhere along the line I’d gotten a few pegs mixed up, the instructions were IKEA-tier confusing, but I did it! I made shelter. And it even had a little mage light lantern and bedroll! How neat? Look at me go. I had food, I had a stable light that wasn’t my pants. I had shelter–now all I needed was water and fire. I checked the tin the tent came in.

  It was roughly the size of a tea box and a beautiful jade green with the word “Tent” embossed in gold. I focused on the text, and a small notification blurb popped up.

  Tyrell’s Fancy Tent

  [[B Rank Item]]

  [[While deployed, Tyrell’s Fancy Tent allows the user to reduce sleep time by 25%. If a user typically requires 8 hours of rest, they will now need 6 hours to achieve the same result. Now includes an alarm bell for surefire wake up, a magelight, a bedroll, and an alarm system that will activate if a hostile living entity is within 10 yards.]]

  The last part concerns me. The devil’s always in the details. But this…this really is a godsend. I send a silent thank you to Baby Gus for his sacrifice–and thoughts and prayers for the lobotomy.

  The forest around me is dense, but not overly so. Seasons change here to reflect the seasons in the real world, so it was still early autumn. I won’t have to worry about freezing just yet. Though hopefully we’ll all make it out before the frost sets in. Here I was, thinking about making it out when it hasn’t even set in that this…this is my reality now. I’ll wake up tomorrow, and I’ll still be in the game. It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve accidentally fallen asleep in my rig, but typically Goose triggers the rig’s alarm and–

  Oh my god.

  Oh my god, no.

  I live alone. I live ALONE. Who will feed Goose while I’m trapped in this hellscape? I can’t remember if I refilled his water bowl today. There’s a leak in the bathroom tub and the toilet is right there. He’ll be okay on water.

  My breathing hitches. I can feel panic crawling up my throat like a split sack of angry spiders.

  No no no no no no no–

  I immediately flip my rig camera on. It is dark, of course, so I cannot see anything. Especially not the black cat. Idiot. Idiot move. I turn the camera off. Then turn it back on. Still nothing.

  I am hyperventilating. My body is frozen, but my mind and breathing are going a mile a minute.

  What if Goose starves to death because I am here? What if he dies? I do not have roommates. I do not know my neighbors. The only person in the city that can access my apartment and might notice I have gone missing is my dad. Goose is going to die. I get front row seats to watching my best friend and emotional lifeline for the last five years die in front of me. When I AM RIGHT. HERE. Not even out of reach.

  Would he lay on my chest like he always did? Would he purr because he assumed his mom was suffering from some unseen self-inflicted hurt again? Would he understand that if I could help him, I would, but I can’t. Because I’m here, I’m right. here. But I can’t.

  To even try would mean I would die, and then we’d BOTH be dead. And I cannot move because I messed up, and I messed up because I couldn’t put the pieces back together. Because time and time again I chose self medication over a therapist session. Because I was, what, too proud? Too scared? Too worried that the grief had metastasized so much that it was an integral part of who I am, and that cutting that part off would leave me a naked mess of something no longer human?

  I’m in tears at this point. I think that goes without saying. The panic consumes me. I’m drowning in a sea of very possible outcomes and futures that haven’t happened yet. I was a gifted painter when I was younger, or at least my teacher said so, and I can see in broad strokes a small motionless black smudge on my chest in a certifiable kind of blue.

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  And then…the colors fade. They dull and smear until only a Rorschach of unidentifiable hues remain.

  I know what it is. I know this feeling very well.

  I’m dissociating.

  I like to think of it as velcro separating. Sometimes, when I get…like this…it’s because my brain is so stressed out that I can’t handle it anymore. So it splits. Like velcro. It’s still velcro. It can still kind of function and do things–though not nearly as well as if it were together. Or like half of your body being unresponsive. It still exists even if it doesn’t function like the manual says it should. The bottom line is that my brain understands this scenario as real. How can I not? I saw and felt things tonight that broke the rules and defied the logic of sensation. And if that is real, then everything else about this insane situation must be true too.

  I can’t handle that and deal with the consequences at the same time. I am just one person. So the velcro ripped. It came undone.

  I can feel the ache like a pewter grapefruit sitting just behind my sternum. My eyes are heavy. My throat is torn to shreds. There’s an opossum in my tent. My face is hot with emotion. That headache is back in full force, though it’s now migrated to the front of my head and–I walk my thoughts back. I look to my left.

  Two button eyes and a pink rodent nose sniffle at me in response.

  There is, indeed, what can only be described as an opossum in my tent.

  I scream.

  It screams.

  We both skitter to opposite sides of the tent, eyeing each other warily. We’re both breathing heavily. It feels like hours before either of us moves. I’m in a crab walk position, and I have never had an arm day, let alone skipped one. These arms are nothing but twigs, and they’re shaking from holding myself aloft. My body is going to fall with or without my consent. I’m already prepping to pull out the candelabra to defend myself.

  Why I thought about the candelabra before the butcher’s block full of knives, I can’t tell you. Panic is weird.

  I fall on my butt. The candelabra, still attached to the pantyhose, is in my hands. The pantyhose flops lifelessly between us. It is the world’s most confusing white flag. The opossum takes it. Instinct kicks in, and the little guy pounces on the toe of the stocking in a show of “great” force. It immediately realizes that it pounced on something lifeless and begins to back up. Unfortunately, its front toes are sharp enough to puncture one side of the fabric but not the other; it’s stuck. The opossum falls back and rolls around. The stockings are pulled taut between us.

  I’m worried for two reasons. One: I don’t want to put the candelabra down, because I think it’ll end up flying toward the poor thing. Two: my next instinct is to put the candelabra back in my inventory, but I don’t know if it’s going to take the opossum’s toe with it. Real opossums seldom get rabies, but fantasy opossums very well might have fantasy rabies. I am hyper aware that I know so much and also so little.

  I go with my gut.

  My other hand is empty, so I summon some squid goop from my inventory and toss it between us. I’m not wild about leaving a stain, but desperate times…

  The thing is wary of me. Understandably so. But its nose is twitching again, and out of habit, it’s inching closer to the goop. That’s probably why it came here in the first place. I didn’t wash up before I left the ocean. The thing probably smelled me from a mile away.

  I pull open my equipment screen and hover over my clothes to confirm my theory.

  [[Red Clothes Set (F)

  Durability: 47/50

  Cleanliness: 1/10

  You are stinky! Go take a bath!

  -1 to all stealth related skills while equipped.

  Odor is detectable to creatures with the [Olfactory] skill.]]

  If this thing could smell me…then so could everything else. A mountain lion or a bear. Something fierce and hungry. I have to go wash up immediately.

  As I slowly stand to my feet, I slide the candelabra close enough to it that the stockings are no longer taut. It’s snacking on the goop, but it’s also growling low and keeping one eye on me. Cautiously I walk out of the tent. It continues snacking. Now with more gusto, and I assume it’s because I am out of sight. Something about that makes me smile. What a silly little guy.

  I’m a mile inland. Enough to help me feel safe from Lorelei. Part of me is still worried that she’ll get me. I can’t give in to panic again. There’s too much at stake. So I wash up as fast as possible. I take my clothes off and wring those out too. Then I take them and rub them in the grass.

  [[Red Clothes Set (F)

  Durability: 47/50

  Cleanliness:6/10

  You are dirty! Get some new clothes!

  -1 to speech skills while equipped.]]

  Everyone’s a critic.

  When I get back the opossum is gone. Every iota of goop down to, what I thought, was an inevitable stain were gone. Like it had never existed at all. What a lovely house guest. I hang my damp clothes from one of the pegs that should be holding up the tent–though I can’t figure out for the life of me where it goes. There’s no wind tonight, so it should be fine. I roll out my bedroll, find the notification screen for an alarm, and set it to 6 hours from now. If anything happens, it’ll wake me, and I have to get some sleep. It’s worth the risk…but I still keep the candelabra under my pillow.