Page 5 of The Slug Crystal
When I get back to my apartment, I set the cup on the table next to the Vermis Transformo crystal. The snail seems completely at home, unbothered by its sudden relocation. I tap the side of the cup, and the snail pauses, eye stalks rearing up in what I swear is recognition.
I swallow, heart pounding, and whisper, “Welcome to your new life.”
The snail blinks, or does whatever the snail equivalent of blinking is, and inches toward the edge of the cup with stubborn optimism. I sit on the floor, back against the wall, and for the first time since the breakup, I have absolutely no idea what comes next.
I text Alina, “You busy?”
She replies in less than ten seconds, “Never too busy for you. WTF now?”
I take a photo of the snail and send it with the caption, “I think the spell worked.”
The three dots appear and vanish. Appear. Vanish.
Then she finally responds, “Be right over. Do not let that thing out of your sight.”
The snail is still glued to the inside of the coffee cup when Alina arrives, which is impressive considering how many times I’ve opened and closed the lid to check if it’s dead, reincarnated, or plotting its escape.
Alina bursts through my front door like she’s on a police raid, no knock, clutching a lemon-lime Gatorade and an enormous tote bag overflowing with pamphlets. It looks heavy enough that it could double as a weapon, but I’m too overwhelmed by the snail to ask what the hell is going on with her bag.
She beelines for the kitchen, eyes the closed cup and the crystal arranged on my counter like a still life painted by someone on mushrooms, and sets her Gatorade down with a slap.
“Where is it?” she demands, already scanning the apartment for signs of supernatural mayhem.
I point mutely at the cup. Alina lifts the lid slowly, like she is worried something is going to spring out at her. The snail, sensing an audience, extends its eye stalks about the rim of the cup with the slow, dramatic flourish of a magician revealing the final card. Alina leans in, face inches from the lip, and lets out a low, “Ho-ly shit.”
“I told you,” I whisper, as if the snail can hear us.
She sinks onto one of my barstools and cracks her knuckles. “Okay. One, we’re officially living in a Goosebumps book. Two, you have to tell Jake. Three, I call dibs on naming it.”She raises her eyebrows. “I’m thinking ‘Gary.’ You know, like SpongeBob’s pet?”
I shake my head so hard the room tilts. “This isn’t a pet, Lina. It’s my ex.”
She grins. “All men are basically equivalent to mollusks already, babe. I see no change.”
I snort and reply, “Okay, but he already has a name. It’s Alex…”
She shrugs, picking up the cup and twirling it around in her hand, seeming to inspect the snail from different angles.
I shake my head, then grab my phone and open a FaceTime with Jake. He answers on the second ring, still in bed, his brown hair sticking up like someone tried to style it with the static from a balloon. His background is a wall covered in old running bibs, all neatly laminated and arranged in perfect rows.
He blinks blearily. “It’s barely even ten. Who died?”
Alina waves. “No one, but check this out.” She reaches over and angles my phone toward the snail, which is now attempting to summit the rim of the cup with the focus of a tiny, squishy Everest climber.
Jake squints, then sits up, blanket dropping to reveal a white tank top and his entire right shoulder. “Is that… what I think it is?”
“It’s a snail,” Alina crows.
“It’s Alex,” I add, voice wobbling between panic and pride.
Jake pauses. For one glorious moment, I think he’s about to hang up on us forever. Instead, he rubs his eyes, then says, “Do you need me to stomp it?”
Shocked laughter explodes out of me so hard I nearly spill the snail onto my lap when I move to slap a hand over my mouth.
Alina, undeterred by my looming mental breakdown, launches into a TED Talk about the possible moral implicationsof turning people into snails. My attention wanes as she dramatically exclaims, “Is it technically murder if they’re happier as a snail? Discuss!”
Jake, still appearing half-asleep, clicks his fingers across the screen of his phone. “I’m looking up snail care,” he mutters, also ignoring Alina. “First hit is a Reddit thread titled ‘Help! My boyfriend is a slug now,’” he reports.
“Wait, wasn’t he supposed to turn into a slug??” Alina asks.
