Boy meets girl and girl meets monster.

He glares at her charming crow’s feet.

He scoffs at her intelligence.

He ignores her witty rebuttals or ludicrous thoughts.

He licks his lips if she says something remotely suggestive.

He only ogles over the parts of her that are

uncovered marble in the heat of his persuasion.

She knows it's not healthy.

She laughs at his jokes.

She caresses all his scars and assures him she loves them.

She readily holds him in times of need.

She takes initiative to make him her biggest priority.

Her body is an hour glass; her beauty falls in grains, though slowly.

He told her it was better to be beautiful and careless,

but then she asked him, “what will happen when I grow old?”

He looked at her but didn’t actually see her.

“You’ll fade just like all the other stars, you’re nothing special.”

All the stars in her sky faded that night with that remark.

She caught him with a neon sign of a woman later that week.

It was time, she thought, for this little star to die.

Everyone was there, all the distant relatives, the close friends, the full parade.

The boy never came in body, but shook and shivered and wept in spirit.

Boy implants the monster, and the monster consumes the girl.