Invitation to the Autopsy: Specimen No. 6

A Developmental and Line Editorial Pass on a short by Zivah Avraham

(Original still of Narrator on the toilet trying to order furniture, Fight Club, directed by David Fincher (20th Century Fox, 1999) Meme finished by Emil Ottoman, Cult of the Rainbow Rat, 2020?1?)

Welcome to the Autopsy

I hope you all find a seat.

The archives and instructions for how to submit your work for a weekly autopsy exist at the link below and in short thereafter.

Submit 5 pages, include AUTOPSY all caps in the subject line, give me your Substack handle so I can byline you if chosen, that’s it. Email to: emilottoman@gmail.com

AUTOPSIES ARE NOW OPEN FOR SUBMISSION ALL WEEK

Thank you all for continuing to support the experience. If you’ve taken anything worthwhile from anything I’ve done, maybe spare a coin. There is only the work. And the work is never finished.

I WILL NEVER PAYWALL THESE POSTS! I AM DOING THIS FOR SUBSTACK, FOR THE WRITERS WHO SEND ME THEIR WORK IN GOOD FAITH, FOR THE LOVE OF OUR CRAFT, & TO HELP WRITERS GROW

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Flash, short, novella, novel; I specialize in line and developmental editing for clients who are serious about working on manuscripts for pub (self, trad, doesn’t matter) that are non-traditional, experimental, or cross genre, with an emphasis on literary style, story at the systems and sentence level, and your voice as an author. If you feel like you’re on the brink, have hit a stall, or you are interested in a consult do not hesitate.

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ON WITH THE SHOW. I PRESENT TO YOU. I PRAY YOU ENJOY. I HOPE YOU TAKE SOMETHING OF VALUE FROM IT.

The Autopsy

This is a short. You could call it flash but I honestly think that would be doing it an injustice, but this is a short story, four pages long, ready to be expanded if the author so chooses, coming in at 1,579 words.

Zivah Avraham

has presented a very tight, very well composed piece of short fiction that I would say transcends flash in breadth of scope. Usually flash doesn’t DO this much. If it does, it doesn’t do it this well unless the writer is very seasoned. I picked the piece because it’s challenging. It’s good. There is a poetic quality to the use of space on the page that I would keep, and explain my reasons for suggesting so in the autopsy. All in all, this is an excellent piece of writing and it was my pleasure to be able to go over it with a very sharp blade and very bloodshot eyes.

The story is in first person present, which is perfect if you ask me, not that you did, and about someone who either owns or buys an old house, a very old house, and this unnamed protagonist goes full luddite. It’s never explained, but apparently the protagonist and POV character is without family. But they WANT family. In the top beams of this old house they find a young girl’s diary, they become obsessive, they lose their shit, they fantasize about the family and the girl writing the diary, how they lived in the house circa the time of the diary. They research the family. Then shit gets awful weird. It is a very creepy little story and I would only change it in so much as I would say, it could be WAY more fucked up. To say much more would be to give up the goat. I do intend to do audio for this autopsy. But for now, we will continue as we have.

The Text

Long Lost¹

The power was cut off yesterday.²

Finally.³⁴

It’s funny how even when the TV is switched off, there’s still so much background noise, so much electricity in the atmosphere. Motors running, fans whirring, clocks humming, pipes clanging. Even the silent radio transmits a low-level buzz. If you press your ear to the speaker, you can hear it.⁵

Now, all of that is gone.⁶

I stand completely still.⁷ I can hear the rasp of cotton against wool as my chest rises and falls, rises and falls.⁸ The house is settling into itself, relaxing, losing tension, revisiting its old rhythms. Sighing with relief.⁹

Old houses like mine weren’t built for the modern age, for technology, for energy¹⁰ — zap, zap, zap.¹¹ Their walls weren’t built with care, only to be gouged out to accommodate cables, wires and pipes. Their kitchens weren’t designed to hold washing machines, fridges, freezers, microwaves, air fryers. These houses were homes for people, for laughter, for pain, for joy, for fear, for living.¹²

For shelter.¹³

Slop. Slop. Slop.¹⁴ I hear the steady percussion of water dripping on tile. As expected¹⁵, the freezer is leaking onto the pantry floor. I picture the pool encroaching, seeping, growing.¹⁶ No matter. I will mop it up. Peace will reign.¹⁷

I step outside to tend to the pot bubbling on the fire in the yard.¹⁸ I sniff, inhaling the stew’s aroma. It’s nearly ready to eat. Good enough for me and certainly fit for the family who lived here, all those years ago.¹⁹

I found their headstones in the churchyard, abandoned and unloved in a remote corner. When you have nobody of your own, adopting someone else is easy.²⁰ You just find them, think about them, talk to them, imagine their lives, construct a family tree in your head.²¹

I scraped away the moss, cleaned off the lichen, pulled away the bindweed and cut back the wild grasses.²² Daylight illuminated their names for the first time in centuries,²³ a mother and three daughters, dead within weeks of each other. I traced them, etched into stone, softened by weather and my heart broke.²⁴ It’s one thing to never know a family, quite another to love and lose each other, one by one. I like to think that I’m bringing them back to life in a strange kind of way.²⁵

Strange.²⁶

There’s a parish register filed away in the village church, but few people bother to investigate it these days.²⁷ They have more important things on their minds.²⁸ I made an appointment with the vicar, who opened a cupboard, pulled out a cracked and disintegrating ledger and left me to my own devices as he phoned parishioners in far-flung corners of the county.²⁹

Look after the living, the dead are long gone, was all he said as he paced about, eager for me to leave.³⁰

I ran my fingers over their names, tracing the fine copperplate, the ink now faded to a translucent brown. I thought of the rector who had taken the time to record the birth, marriage and death of each of his flock. I wondered how he had managed to carry on as the deaths mounted, how he had maintained his flagging spirit as he intoned the last rites of man, woman and child. Did he despair at his dwindling pot of ink, did he sigh as his nib scratched the same date of death over and over again? Did he shudder with the fever in his own last days as he struggled to maintain his scribe’s hand?³¹

Were those his tears blemishing the last entry on the fifteenth day of June 1665?³²

For once, it isn’t raining. It feels as if the skies have been overcast for months.³³ Winter turned to spring and now it is early summer.³⁴ The clouds are the same steel grey as ever,³⁵ but at least it is warm and the birds are singing, enjoying the rich pickings that have burst forth from the ground.³⁶

The conditions are perfect for worms, grubs, insects — and other things.³⁷

I wonder what the weather was like all those hundreds of years ago. When did the villagers stop rejoicing in the rich harvest, cease thanking God for the sun, and turn inwards on themselves? When did the mother abandon her vegetables to the ever-present weeds? When did the children leave their toys silent in the hall? Where was the father in all of this?³⁸

They spoke to me, my family of long ago. I pat my pocket, feeling the little book nestled safely next to my hip.³⁹ I picture it⁴⁰ age-worn, threadbare, delicate, revealing its secrets, page by desiccated page. It had been such a stroke of luck, finding the crumbling beam in the bedroom. I had cursed the woodworm at the time, but without them, I would never have found the book tucked tightly in the eaves of the attic. Spiders had bound cobwebs around its leather cover, locking it shut for hundreds of years.⁴¹

‘The Journal of Emily Wainwright’ was inscribed on the first page. She was a daughter of the house, but I had not found her name in the register of deaths in St John’s Church. She must have survived and made a life elsewhere. She was my link to my imagined family tree.⁴² She was my ray of hope. I wonder why she hid her journal.⁴³ Was it to keep her childhood hopes and fears a secret, or was it to put away her past and deal with a future alone, once all her family had gone?⁴⁴

Much like the church register, the ink in Emily’s journal was faded. The paper was tissue-thin and the writing almost impossible to decipher in certain lights. Last month,⁴⁵ I lit candles in the evening power cut, and it was in their soft flame that Emily’s secrets revealed themselves to me, page by delicate page. The less the modern day impinged on us, the more we connected and the more vibrant the ink became. That’s how it seemed.⁴⁶

That’s how it is.⁴⁷

It won’t be long before the cottage returns to Emily. The electric appliances will be gone. There will be an open fire in the kitchen, a hook from which to hang a cooking pot, herbs drying from the mantel. The house will breathe and live again.⁴⁸

I remove the journal from my pocket and settle down for the next instalment. Emily will tell me her plans today. I know it.⁴⁹

‘Sixteenth day of June 1665

Mother died two days ago and the rector buried her with seven others, despite his failing health. Now, it is only Father in the house with me. He appears strong as an ox although he is burdened with grief. I must hide my sickness from him. I am so scared to die. Dear Lord, do not let me die.’⁵⁰

I turn the page — it is blank. All the others are empty too — there is nothing more. Where are you, Emily? Where are you?⁵¹

Something falls from the back of the book and I catch it. A lock of brown hair, tied with a creased, black ribbon. I stroke the soft strands across my cheek, imagining the young girl holding me close, like a daughter.⁵² I ache to hold her in return, to feel a loved one in my arms.⁵³

On the final page, I find a last entry in an older, more deliberate hand.⁵⁴

‘My dearest daughter Emily died of plague this twenty-fifth day of June in the year of our Lord, 1665. Here, I press a lock of her precious hair. I will bury her body in our favourite place. No space remains in consecrated ground and no man of the Church is alive to lay her to rest.

Dear Lord, I ask Your forgiveness for my transgressions in these desperate times. Keep her soul safe on her journey and may we all meet again in the next life.

Abraham Thomas Wainwright⁵⁵

So it was Abraham who had survived, he who had hidden his daughter’s journal so securely. My heart opens to the man, picturing his final moments with Emily as he sent her on her final journey. Cruel, cruel fate.⁵⁶

I imagine her body lying below me, somewhere nearby.⁵⁷ Still, but not at rest, buried outside the boundary of St John’s Church. Such things mattered in those times. Her father would have been distraught at her un-Christian burial.⁵⁸ I kiss the lock of hair, bring the book to my lips and do the same, inhaling the scent of both. I imagine the sickness, locked away until now.⁵⁹ I sense how it invaded her home, her family and finally Emily herself. I fancy that she sneezed as she wrote her last words. I breathe it all in, willing my body to consume, to absorb, to mutate.⁶⁰

I shake the little book over my bowl, watch as motes of dust and skin flutter from its folds. I stir my stew and suck a spoonful into my mouth.⁶¹

Her body will stay where it lies. But her soul needs to be in holy ground — it is what she and her father would have wanted. I look up, the spire of St John’s a great finger pointing to the heavens above. The clouds are pregnant with rain. The humidity will soon do its work. I finish my soup, make my way to the churchyard.⁶²

Many organisms flourish in this type of damp, in this type of heat. Worms, grubs, insects — and other things.⁶³

FIN

This was a fantastic story to cut into

Zivah Avraham

writes poetry, and it shows. There’s a poets sensibility to the prose, which is always good, but a lack of storytelling and storycraft to an amazing piece. I don’t write poetry, or I’ve never tried, but I’ve been told that there’s sometimes, at my best, a poetic quality to my prose.

I’ve always taken this as a compliment instead of “your prose is to Baroque and fancy you utter gilded Rococo fuck.” This could be a poem, but it’s better as a story. And I want more of the story to the story. The use of space to control pace and time is excellent. I can’t wait to see another draft.

Since we’re still in the “figuring all this shit out” phase of the autopsies, and I’m going to run them to their terminus, this week I may drop vocal commentary on it after the fact. (If I can?) Either way, I’ll figure it out.

So, thank you for sending in your work. Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoy this tight creepy little story by

Zivah Avraham

, and I hope that you get up the guts to send me something to put a scalpel to. What’s the worst that could happen? I like it and think you’re a better writer than you’re allowing yourself to be because the world is full of charlatans and people who repeat the same bad advice over and over and over again?

I hope to see you again next week.

01:05AM CST Sat, Feb 5, 2025

- Emil Ottoman, The Editor

1. Good title.

I can't really tell this enough, but once you have enough friends irl that are published authors you'll hear this a lot "shit, that would make a great title" or some variation thereof. As this is a short story, you could call it flash but I'm deciding not to because I feel like it doesn't REALLY feel like it when you read it. And I'll get to that in a second, because it comes in at 4 pages and under 1600 words, but there is a FEEL to flash fiction versus the short story.

I'm sure I could dive deeper and give more information or better reasoning, but for this piece, just listen to me, trust me, read the story with me, and decide for yourself maybe. Is this flash, or is this a short story? Does the distinction even matter.

2. This is a great opening sentence. We've immediately got a statement that presents both a question and a conundrum, a mystery presents itself, is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

But I would also mention that if you look at the structure of this sentence, what does it immediately remind you of? If you lose this one go home.

"Maman died today." It's a past tensing of a very simple statement (and double the words, but who's keeping score) in the vein of Camus. Almost anyone who has literary scruples will recognize it whether consciously or not. (caveat: If they've read The Stranger)

A sentence like this, or like Camus used in The Stranger, is perfectly fine to start something that will very shortly go off the rails with. It DOES get attention. An editor's weary eyes, developmental or otherwise will appreciate the brevity and simplicity of it in comparison to a lot of what they see, and they will move on to the next line

3. For the space above the footnoted: I would like to herein comment on something that in this series so far I've noticed is very, very lacking, and that is the lack of visual space on the page.

I've talked a lot about how you can use tone, rhythm, authority (established here exactly and immediately) sensory details, weaponized punctuation, and any number of other things as tools in your literary toolbox, but CONSIDER the use of the control of white space, that is the blank space on the page, or the design of your words upon it.

And when I say this, I'm very serious. These are all, could be, should be, or sadly aren't, intentional choices. This white space after the first sentence, instead of bursting into a first paragraph, gives me time to breathe, move down, and a beat has passed unless I'm speed reading.

I have a friend who will NOT abide by one printing of his books because of this. It is not typeset as intended and the words on the page, which were very carefully placed, including the spaces left blank, eat him to think about. In short, he fucking hates a printing of his own book because it's not what he INTENDED to put out into the world.

For more examples just check out Danielewski. He's not the only example I can think of (not by sight) he's just the absolute and most OVERT.

Use your white space, negative space is a tool too.

4. This one word para is the perfect way to end the very short introduction to the story. It's also a very great introduction to building and releasing tension.

"The power was cut off yesterday" creates tension (if you live in a modern world and you're reading this on a screen, trust me, even if you think it doesn't, your amygdala was screaming over the thought, that's tension.)

Beat

"Finally" The tension is released. In six words and one hard break.

Now do this again for the entire rest of your story. Identify your source of tension (it doesn't literally have to be thrilling or some shit, but there WILL be tension between two things if it's narrative) ideally crank it up, let a little out every once in a while, but the effective use of it is that the tension ebbs and flows but always moves upwards, otherwise what's the point? (I'm not looking at you right now anti-plot and anti-novel, go sit in a corner) The point is the CLIMAX and resolution, where the tension is fully expunged and resolved (or not, but this is a general heuristic I'll stand by for most narrative fiction)

5. This is exposition, but this isn't exposition as I normally would critique it in a story. When I say there's a time and a place for exposition, I mean like this. I don't know that I'd touch this section unless I really wanted to. It continues the establishment of authority from the perspective of the protagonist, and it speaks to the universal, which is to say the reader, and yes, it is funny because I'm very sensitive to ambient electronic noise.

6. Here I would shorten. I would at least get rid of the comma. The comma creates a pause that the space between the two paras already created, a space that is also created in and around this one sentence para.

I hate that, I would suggest "it's all gone now"

Emil, why is that syntax like that, you've yelled at us about it before?

Because it echoes the first line. I'd also cut the Now and put it as a one word para after the para starting with "it's funny"

OK, now look at he form it's created. It's nearly self symmetrical. It's as elegant and pared down as a fine equation. (And if you waste 20 years of your life being a dork you can think like this too!)

7. cut completely, go sensory or on the body. Detail about what completely still IS, just one.

8. Cut "can" the rest is excellent

9. Even now, there we go, with no electricity, the house itself is becoming more itself, it's losing tension.

I don't know if "revisiting" is the word I'd use there.

Otherwise outstanding.

10. Love the vibe, give me something more about the house. Detail. in America an old house is from 1900, in some parts of the world an old house is from the 1400s.

One issue "like mine" never referenced again. Wonder why? Was this intentional or just a gloss?

11. While I am a fan of repetition, I do not know if this works here. something like it might, but I don't know if zap is quite right. The sound of it at the end of the sentence after the en (em? even I mix them up) dash, combined with the first much softer word of the next sentence creates dissonance but it's never really returned to in this way. As a one off I'd either cut it, rethink it, or expand it.

12. Beautiful, I'd ask for just a little exploration in this para. Details give authority. What were they gouging out to accommodate cables? Thistle Hardwall (which I'm very sad I can't get in the US) Something older? This is an opportunity to flex a little of the factual bits you throw in later. They need not be exhaustive, but it would create both authority, add detail, inform, (people love facts and shit they don't know, just ask Chuck Palahniuk's first seven books) And the violence of it, that's tension, you can go in on that.

13. Stet, again, great use of the page, the space, the pause.

14. I could see this as an attempt to echo zap zap zap, but it doesn't really work because the zaps stand alone, and this is a sound. One is an abstract onomatoeopia and the other is a concrete onomatoeopia standing in for a noise being heard.

Is this the sound of water dripping on tile? Consider the imagery that slop brings to mind as a word. Less wet generally, even if this is an onomatoeopia.

15. Cut. Clutter. You don't need it and the prose in this is sparse and exacting so far, this rings as out of place. With no power we don't have to expect the freezer will start to leak on the floor, we know it will. Two point deduction for mollycoddling and hand holding your reader.

16. Whether you notice it or not you're using triplets throughout. Also, consider the language here that is distancing us from the action. "I picture" instead of "I watch"

Consider putting the protagonist in scene. They're in most of the other scenes, why not here? What's the purpose.

17. 'd suggest moving this to active for the action instead of pressing it forward. As directly after this we leave the house. So obviously things are being performed, yes?

I'm a shit for double entendre and wordplay. If you've read any of my work (and this IS just a me thing, it DOESN'T always work, but when it does, it works on SO many levels.) I'd consider "peace will rain." (No allusions to royals in this story, many to wet or damp or otherwise.) (Yes, I'm this cheesy) (Burnt tongue "Peace will rain" would be burnt tongue.)

18. one more detail about the pot on the fire, modern or old. Don't ask me why, I imagined one hanging from a chain on a tripod over a burning fire, medieval style. It would be much more curious and speak to the metal state or mind of the POV character if it was modern. A dutch oven. La Crueset. That's insanity. Burning a $250 dutch oven for stew over a makeshift fire in your back yard. (fire pit?) A few details would make this scene pop.

19. Pitch perfect, cut "all those years ago. telegraphing, the reveal in the next paragraph does the job better.

20. Now we have tension. Why does protag have nobody? But the statement rings true. Wanna be extra creepy, burn the tongue againg. "When you have no body of your own" it would even serve double duty as "what the fuck?" if you hyphenated it.

21. Zoom in and explode this a little. Give it maybe another sentence in the next draft. Separate each concept or thought just a little maybe.

22. Leaning heavy on I starts for sentences. Submerge the I. That is, make the protagonist invisible, we already have interiority and know who's talking. Start with Scraped. Otherwise, great.

23. I'd compound this with the sentence behind it with a comma separated ", and" Start fresh next sentence.

24. Excellent. Strong voice. I think you could bring it home a little bit more. Consider anything that sounds like you've heard it before, and try to write something you've not heard before in its place that does the same thing. Cliches and stock phrases work because they're symbols that everyone understands. Say it the way you can, and you transcend simple storytelling to literary art.

This IS what separates the alpha dogs from the also rams in literature that stands the test of time.

Shakespeare just made up over a thousand words.

He was considered "low" theater. Always remember that.

25. First sentence is mildly confusing if only because it syntactically doesn't seem to fit. Again, explode the second sentence. Avoid doubling strange here. Explode the symbol of strange in the para.

26. Let this strange stand.

27. This is fiction, feel free to use bombast or absolutes, it's your story, and it's weird. No one bothers with the thing anymore. These days sounds a little off. The vibe is perfect.

28. Examples. You've given examples for other things this person is against viz modernity, hand us some more here.

29. I arrived, if appt is made must be gotten to, disrupts flow. Two more details on the ledger. Linger one beat on the Vicar at the end, shows disdain for both him, his not caring about his duties, and possibly continues the near luddite or past facing themes of the story that run as an undercurrent. Maybe have the Vicar get a line of banal dialogue in.

30. Move to active verb form. If this is later, imply the phone being done with. He's pacing about agitated. Eager is a placeholder. give adjectives or descriptors to show the eagerness because the dialogue doesn't get it off exactly.

Thank you for not using dialogue tags, I think they would have hurt the piece here.

31. Cut anything that removes one level of distance. I thought. Of course you did, you're telling us and we're in your head, most of this the protag is properly talking to the reader, lovely, but "I thought" nix. "I wondered" nix ("How had he managed?" more power there. just read it aloud.) Does the writing become shaky? et al. Wonderful scene.

Maybe move para above this one to below. Would be a better hit after this paragraph, which, feel free to expand.

32. This would also be perfect to go after the Vicar talking about the dead being gone... Just a thought.

33. The as if simile construct here cuts the narrator's authority. If I were to put a simile like this here I would use a negation and opposite of this. "For once it feels like it isn't raining"

34. Another triplet. Consider adding a layer of intention to them. I keep seeing them.

35. Cliche phrasing.

36. You can name a bird species or two, don't ever hesitate to not be vague. If I wrote "he got fucked by a dinosaur" that's a wide field of prehistoric dicks to be impaled upon... Rich pickings on, excellent.

37. Cut the dash, just use a comma. This is goddamn telegraphing. Never telegraph. It ruins a reveal. I don't care if it's a dash, an ellipses, make everything normal, or as normal as your story can let it be, until it very much is not. also, the offhanded nature of the comment, instead of separated, hits harder, seems creepier. Anything said casually or offhandedly that sounds just... wrong, it always sounds.... just wrong.

See American Psycho (film) for some funny moments like this when people mishear Christian Bale's Character when he's talking about "I'm mostly in murder and mutilation" or whatever he said. etc. et al.

38. Cut I wonder, maybe add in a little more sensory or another sentence, otherwise print.

39. Cut of long ago.

40. Cut, doesn't need to picture it, knows, just describing it for the audience, unless you want this voice.

41. Love this. one more detail on the cover. How were books bound in the 1600's? Would they be likely to be literate? (Honest questions, I can't remember, it's one past midnight.)

42. Cut "my" she was the link to my extended family tree. Bring home the crazy to roost.

43. Directness. Why did she hide her journal? "I wonder" creates narrative distance. Unless that's what you're going for, the closer to the bone, the closer the reveal cuts. The more language you use to distance one subject from the other creates one more layer of abstraction and distance that you don't want between the reader and the storyteller whose head they occupy. This story is big on interiority, cut as much fat as you want, or don't, but I'm telling you the truth.

44. You nail so much of this, it's why I'm hard on everything I think could improve significantly.

45. Cut much, maybe Just, One place I would suggest just, because here it's justifiable. Tissue thin is weak, onionskin or other is hot. The point about the faded ink and the light, it being hard to read, zoom in there for one moment.

46. PERFECT REVEAL, "the evening I had the power cut" and cut "that's how it seemed." this is a big statement. Let it stand on merit, you've earned this moment.

47. Even without the precursor, keep this or some variation of it.

48. There's some fat you can trim from this if you want. "Electric appliances all vanished, taken away, an open fire in the kitchen, a hook from the ceiling to hang a cooking pot, herbs drying from the mantel" etc.

For the coming reveal, cut last sentence, let it stand as a one sentence para. Dogwalks the reader.

49. You could backtrack earlier and add in some about reading the diary in snippets, etc. Settle down where? I mean, avoid vague and abstract. Settling down is something you do, but there is a place. If settled down on a couch it's normal, if on a dirt floor in front of a candle, much more insane. Otherwise, nailing this.

50. Perfect.

51. control space, control time. Get rid of the dashes. Here you can slow down.

I turn the page (builds tension further after the last para, we're about to find out)
[break]
"It is blank" (Fuck!)
[break]
"All the others are empty too."
[break]
The rest of the para as written.

And there needs to be a beat or something after this. Narrator is attached to Emily. Give me panic, emotion, something. Narrator is fucking insane.

52. Then maybe flipping or shaking the book, in a panic, this moment. See, build tension, release tension.

53. Stand this as its own para.

54. trim fat, "on the final page, a last entry, written in an older, more steady, deliberate hand" or the like.

55. perfect, forgot closing single quotation mark

56. Expand and zoom in on this moment. Use no imagining. If you state something about the scene, state it as if fact.

57. This is the only place I would allow you to use "I imagine" because it's appropriate, and very sad.

58. Again, you can zoom in on this.

59. This is its own para, because this is where we're getting to the fucked up part.

60. I love this, bring in more body horror. It hits, but god it could hit harder. I was there. But you could take the reader higher (Sly and the Family Stone)

61. Perfect for how normal this seems when clearly it's deranged.

62. I love this. I'd change some phrasing and play with it, definitely get rid of pregnant with rain, you're better than that. The humidity will soon do its work is great though. Make clear final sequence of action though, does protagonist finish making or eating the soup, is it taken with inside of or with in container, to churchyard. Slight confusion on sequence of action.

63. Perfect way to end it. Cut the dash. Sentence frag as whole sentence finishes para. Final sentence is "And other things." FIN. Beautiful.