Bug on the Inside 

Max Hunt 

     I was sitting in a very nice suit, in a very nice chair, in front of a coffee table that was very nice by virtue of its presenting a small bowl containing that maybe-two-days-old-maybe-ten-years-old type of hard candy, waiting on Mr. Bancroft to call me back for my interview, when she barged into the foyer with a force that might’ve been more appropriate for a semi-truck with cut brakes. 
     The door slammed open and bounced hard against the wall. Above me, a heavily framed painting (“Afremov,” Mrs. Bancroft had said, and I had replied, “Oh wow,” because who the fuck was Afremov?) shuddered. I startled forward in my seat—just in case Afremov was in the mood for manslaughter—but when the nervous rattling stopped and I had failed to sustain any amount of blunt force trauma to the skull, I turned my attention to the small figure in the doorway. 
     She couldn’t have been older than five. Her hair looked like an old woman’s, though—so blonde it was almost white, wisping back from her forehead like something had frightened it. Mud crumbled into the hem of her shorts and the creases on the undersides of her knees. 
     She also clutched a screwdriver. 
     It sat bulky and awkward in her small hand, looking embarrassed by its own yellowed plastic handle and rusted metal tip. Like she’d interrupted its private process of decomposition in a parking lot somewhere. Judging by the dirt under her fingernails, she very well might have. 
     Had Mr. Bancroft mentioned a granddaughter? I thought he had, but I couldn’t remember. 
     “Hey,” said the girl. It sounded like a threat. 
     A dead leaf blew in from the open doorway. I wondered if I should get up to close the door. The girl was gripping her screwdriver like a weapon, though, so I remained seated. 
     The girl’s nostrils flared. “Hey.” 
     Jesus Christ. Whose kid was this? “Hey,” I said. 
     The girl stood still. A clump of mud dropped off the underside of her left knee. 
     “Did you know?” she said. “Did you know? The exoskeleton.” 
     I opened my mouth, but the words caught in my throat. Did I know the exoskeleton? 
     I tried again. “The exoskeleton?” 
     “Yeah. Did you know it?” 
     “I think so.” 
     “Okay,” she said, and she stared at me, eyes wide and hardened. It was a little bit terrifying. 
     I asked, “Did… you know it?” 
     She tilted her chin up, squinting down her nose at me. “Yeah,” she said, with the tone of someone about to tell a twenty-year-old story from their prison days— “I knew it.” 
     I waited, and when she didn’t say anything, I prompted— “Did you want to tell me about it?” 
     She said, “It crunches.” 
     “Neat,” I said, because there wasn’t much else to say. 
     But she frowned. “No,” she said, “it goes everywhere. When it gets broken.” 
     “Did you step on one?” I asked. 
     “The bug is still inside it. The exoskeleton is on its outside. But the bugs are on the insides.” 
     “Oh,” I said. 
     “Did you know about that?” 
     “I did.” 
     “Okay,” said the girl. “What about it being blue?” 
     What about it? “No, I don’t know about that.” 
     “Okay. It isn’t.” 
     “It isn’t?” 
     “No,” she said. “I used to think it maybe was. They’re s’posed to be blue, but it comes out red.” She paused. Then she lifted her screwdriver up high and tilted her head back. 
     My gut lurched—because holy shit was she about to stab that thing in her eye—and Mr. Bancroft’s granddaughter losing an eye on my watch would probably not do me any favors regarding the job application process, and I lowkey needed this paralegal position at Mr. Bancroft’s law firm if I wanted to continue affording my weekly two packs of Marlboro Lights and the (expensive) applewood barbecue mushroom jerky they only sold at one gas station in a thirty-mile radius— 
     But she just furrowed her brow at the screwdriver and said, “I think it changed.” 
     I said, “Can you please put that down?” 
     She looked at me. 
     “I’m scared it’s going to hurt you,” I told her. 
     Her face scrunched. She looked at the open door. Back at me. “Do you think it hurts?” 
     “I think it can,” I said. 
     “Do you think…” She blinked. “Really?” 
     “Yeah.” 
     Still holding the tool above her head, she tapped the soft of her index finger against the blunted tip. Carefully. 
     “Oh,” she said. “So would I feel it?” 
     I said, “Probably.” 
     “It would hurt bad?” 
     “Yes, probably. Please put it down.” 
     She lowered it, finally, but then she started poking its end into her stomach. She frowned down at it. 
     “I don’t think so,” she said. “Are you sure?” 
     “I am.” 
     “But what if it just went right through you?” 
     “That would… hurt.” 
     “Worse than poking?” 
     “A lot worse.” 
     “Okay,” said the girl. “I’ll put it down.” 
     She didn’t. 
     The dead leaf that had blown in earlier moved again, scraping across the hardwood floor. It knocked against her feet. 
     What did people normally chat about to children with screwdrivers? Maybe I could offer one of the hard candies on the coffee table? That might be a health risk. “What’s your name?” I asked. 
     The girl looked down at the leaf. She raised her foot and stepped on it, gently. Soft crunch. 
     “I thought it left,” she said. 
     “What?” 
     “It wasn’t moving. I thought the bug inside already left.” 
     She looked at me. Held up the screwdriver. I realized—that reddish stuff at its tip wasn’t rust. 
     “I didn’t know,” she said. 
     “Okay,” I said. 
     “I thought it was gone.” 
     “Okay. You didn’t know.” 
     “I didn’t know,” she said. 
     The girl’s bottom lip twitched upward. Sharp inhale through her nose. She walked forward and laid the screwdriver gently on the coffee table in front of me. Dull clink of metal against wood. One kick at the crushed remains of the leaf on the floor. Then she left, the front door closing softly after her.