July

A man fell over, in the park, behind the bus station. A woman screamed and the sound set off a flock of pigeons that flew in ever decreasing circles around her until her scream became a muttered flurry. Her body picked clean by the rats of the air before they rose. She never rose. A man fell over.

The bus station contained thirty buses, thirty one people, two dogs and a snack machine. The snack machine was faulty and dished out all its crisps and bars. The dogs ate these when the thirty one bodies had decomposed too far. Then they ate each other.

The trees on the boulevard rustled their full green Summer canopies and spread full wide in the Summer sun. The bears that entered the city streets were happy in their shade. One bear sat upon a kerbside and licked his paws. Another drank from the pool of rain on the roof of a Saab 9 series Executive model. Both bears scratched and yawned, then moved on.

Fungus grew like rubber sheeting on the glistening tower of the television studio. No news was broadcast through the sheeting just antennae of a hardy honeysuckle transmitting its gametes to the wind. Around the whole of the downtown block a circle of leaves would one day turn to mulch, would turn to soil, would turn to rich and fertile land. Then the bears would be back. And with them wolves and stoat and cougar. The drains and sewers beneath the streets feeding roots to send a forest high.

A man fell over is how it began. A woman screamed and was attacked is how it began. A bus station employee tried to lock out the dangers is how it began. The dangers came and went. The Earth breathed.