Some people are like candy. Or daiquiris. Irresistible and suckling.

I’m not one of these.

Mosquitoes usually leave me the hell alone. I’ve seen others surrounded by them while they just disinterestedly float by me. They only other person I’ve met like this is my sister. It makes me wonder about the type of blood we’ve inherited. Garlic? Would we repel vampires in a similar fashion? Maybe my great great great grandmother was a Transylvanian vampire huntress who carried stakes hooked into her belt buckles and crossed spurs on her heals.

Blood not up for grabs. (Only when I give it to you).

But last night, the mosquitoes are getting me, and the battery has run down on the computer that I dragged kilometers to the beach, and the pluggin is wrong, and all the student papers are making me want to find a nice tall tree to climb, and then fall out of. I could go on a rampage like my first night. I could hunt down a party and make sweet love to borachos who can barely lick my chin.

I decide to sleep, but the mosquitoes are biting me, and this I am un-used to and incredible impatient with. How do others deal with this nuisance?

I pull down the netting, so very precious and fairytale. I tuck it into the bedframe, careful not to let the corners up so that I trap mosquitoes on the wrong side of the net. I then quickly lift up the edges and climb in.

And notice how… the mosquitoes alight on the outside of the netting, as if they could suck right through its mesh. I curl tighter into the center and read my book. I see shadows of mosquitoes and hear their peeved hummmm. I look up, wondering if one has slipped in. They are all nestled right above me. They are all looking at me, waiting for me to make a mistake in my sleep, roll right up to the edges of the net where they can stick their proboscis through the holes and reach me. I see it in their eyes.

I turn off the light and climb back into the bed quickly. The same way. I know they are still around me, and hope that one didn’t ride on my skin under the net. At least I can’t see them. But as I sit very carefully, right in the center of this barrier, not touching the sides, I think of how very very alone I am. How unexpectedly hurtable, breakable, drainable. The moonlight comes in from the window and casts mesh waves around me. I hear the humming. I feel strange. Very Awake. The only person in the world to be in this place.