CHAPTER I
family food

IT WAS PAST MIDNIGHT, but there was something keeping Roze Flores awake.

It wasn't just the feeling of "I can't sleep" where you toss and turn in bed like a hotdog on a rolling stick, despite your eyelids pulling themselves down. No, Roze felt uncomfortable, like the blood coursing through her was replaced with molasses, clogging up every hole. The feeling was in her stomach, in her heart, in her eyes, maybe even in her gums. Worms weaving their way through your brain and moths picking at the leftovers, an uncomfortable, rotting sensation. It wasn't painful, but maybe Roze didn't know what pain was.

Roze had thought too soon. Before she knew it she had shot out of bed, and was now holding a hand over her left eye. Its throbs were like a boombox on full volume, loaded with knives. The rest of her body felt as though it might be melting, as fast as butter on high heat, sizzling away within seconds.

The pain was fast. Roze held in her wails, and she thought tears would beg to spill, but it felt... Dry in there. In her eyes. The only noise was Roze's laboured breathing, and in between sounded a few gasps of pain, but she kept as quiet as possible... It wasn't like her parents were home, but if Roze fully expressed her pain in the moment, she was certain her cries would wake the whole neighbourhood.

They were coming back tomorrow afternoon, her parents. Her mother and father had left for a trip of some sort, though they didn't bother to tell Roze where they were going, leaving her brain like a broken jigsaw puzzle. They didn't leave Roze with much to eat, which was why she had to fend for only a granola bar tonight. (Unless she wanted to eat the sour remains of a nearly-empty jar of mayo.)

God, Roze knew she shouldn't have eaten a granola bar from the garbage, despite it having been fully wrapped... It was suspicious. Maybe it poisoned her, Roze thought. Her stomach was indeed churning, but she knew that poison was the most stupid idea in existence.. It had to have been something else, maybe she was sick.. Should she call 911? Roze was unable to think much now with how rapidly the pain was growing, she just hyperventilated, and groaned, and held her body tight.

Then it was over. Roze couldn't see a thing in the pitch black of her room, but it felt as though her pain was snapped away by the fairy godmother... Of pain? Roze felt nothing but numbness now, not even a tingle in her body, not a thought in her head.

Roze brought her hand up to her left eye again, where a great amount of the pain had been coming from. She touched her cheek underneath, grazing her bottom eyelid. It felt sticky, sticky and warm. Roze didn't gasp, she didn't panic, her heart in fact, didn't feel like it was racing at all. It felt like one of those boring museum paintings that has been there for 100 years. Her heart felt like it was going too slow.

Despite this, Roze carefully got up out of bed and felt around for the lightswitch. When she pushed it, the room flickered for a second before lighting up. Well, only half the room lit up.

Why did only half the room light up? No, no.. That wasn't it.. Roze just couldn't see out of her left eye. With what she could see, her attention was brought to something round on the floor nearby, surrounded by dark red.

Roze would panic, if she wasn't completely unphased. She felt nothing but numbness, an empty room without anything in it. It was hard to process.. The gears in her brain felt rusty, but from what she could gather, her eye had fallen out and was now laying on the floor in front of her.

"Okay what the actual..." Roze didn't finish her sentence, her voice was a little raspy, which could be expected after such a large amount of hyperventilating. But she watched, she watched her eye move. Having just lost said eye, it was hard for Roze to see, but she couldn't have been dreaming this. Legs popped out of her eye, three on each side. It then scampered towards her, but Roze was glued to the floor. It got closer, and that is when she felt her heart beat once, which made her head spin so fast that she thought she might pass out.

And she did.

...

The sound of a buzzing heater and the soft click clack of something unknown was what Roze awoke to. She blinked her eye open, vision fuzzy and wavering, but no pain in her head or her body at all. Roze began to sit up slowly, noticing she was still in her room, and had passed out on the floor. The girl turned her head to her right, where she spotted the eye creature staring back at her.

"What's up?" Roze asked, with no intention of asking in the first place, the words just sort of popped out of her mouth. In response to this, the eye creature scampered a little closer and seemed to tilt its... head? A little.

But it was almost like Roze knew what it was trying to say... She felt it, deep within her bones and her slow beating heart. The creature was asking if she was feeling okay.

"I feel nothing dude, it's fine.." Roze replied to the silence the eye had given her, turning her head to her bedroom door and staring at it. Due to the sun shining into the room, Roze assumed it was now morning.. She was wondering when her parents would be back, her curiosity pulling at her spine as though she was a puppet. How would they react to... Whatever had happened?

Roze brought her hand to her left eye again, expecting to feel the empty socket, but instead she felt... Fabric? Oh. It must be an eyepatch. Who put an eyepatch on her? No one was home.

"Did you make this?" Roze asked her eye, and the movement it made in response was similar to a nod, so Roze could only assume the answer was yes... Wow, Impressive...

"What do you think of the name Francis?" Yet again, this just came flying right out of Roze's mouth. No thought beforehand, just words. If anything, she may as well gift her own eye with a name, right? I mean, she would give the eye context, but before she could speak it started to jump and scamper around excitedly. Roze supposed that they liked the name. Roze felt like smiling at it, but she wasn't sure if she did smile at all. The girl felt pretty numb right now.

And then Roze heard it clearly.

The sound of the front door opening, and two voices she recognized immediately, her parents.

It wasn't just the voices she recognized, there was a... Surprisingly pleasant scent radiating off the both of them. It made Roze feel slightly lightheaded and uncomfortable, a tightness forming in her stomach. Roze was so numb that she couldn't piece it together, but she supposed that for once, maybe she was happy to see her parents? I mean.. She had experienced the worst pain in her life and her eye had fallen out, she needed comfort... But didn't expect them to give it to her.

Still, Roze got up onto her feet immediately. "Stay here," She told Francis, walking out of her room and peeking back to make sure the eye hadn't followed her. Luckily, they stayed put. Roze then made her way down the hall, her feet creating a soft thumping sound when she went down the stairs. Roze spotted her mother and father standing in the kitchen, speaking to each other softly. If Roze was making it out correctly, it had something to do with money and selling something.

The teen girl cleared her throat to get their attention, but neither of her parents responded. Typical. Roze didn't care about her parents much, but she didn't need to, because she was certain they didn't give a care in the world about her.

After no response, Roze walked into the kitchen completely and stood behind her parents, then spoke.

"You didn't leave me food,"

Roze's mother was the one to turn her head, to look Roze in the eye. She seemed to somehow be unbothered by the fact that Roze was wearing an eyepatch. And she didn't act concerned at all, nor did she ask what happened. Instead, Roze's mother spoke one line.

"You look hideous with that thing on,"

Roze felt a fresh feeling fill her, but it wasn't a good one. It was perhaps an anger, though one she had never felt before. It was a fire spreading through her arms and legs, a boiling in her blood... Roze also hadn't realized how hungry she felt until now. It was true she only had a granola bar for dinner last night, and she felt extremely ravenous.

"You didn't leave me food," Roze ignored her mother's comment and spoke again, sternly. She was feeling a rumbling in her stomach that she just wanted to satisfy, and an anger in her body that shook her core.

Roze noticed how her mother had gone back to speaking with her father about the same subject as earlier. But she couldn't listen, she could only hear the blood running through her body, and the abnormally slow pumping of her heart. Normally, Roze wouldn't care about being ignored. It was a common occurrence with her and her parents. But god, they had been gone for a week and had barely left her food. Roze had to go scavenging. And she was pretty convinced that she had eaten a poisoned granola bar.

"I'm hungry," Roze spoke again, inhaling the sweet scent that was floating through the room. Roze wasn't sure what was so appetizing about it.. Had her parents brought home food? Roze couldn't get enough of that smell, and she was so, so angry, she just felt like punching both of her parents square in the face.

"Don't whine," Roze's father had replied to her statement shortly after, and that was it. Roze got so angry a scream came from deep in her throat. A... Scream? It was more like a growl of some sort. A sharp, terrifying snarl. And then she didn't think, she just did. It felt like her body was moving on its own, and all of a sudden her hands were on her mother, and her mother's head was cracked against the fridge, and she was dead. Her father was trying to grab her from behind, giving Roze a punch in the back, which caused her to let out an unnatural screeching noise. But Roze didn't stop. She turned around and she bit him. She bit them both.

Roze hadn't thought about what she'd done until hours later, when she was laying in her bed, staring at the ceiling. Red coated her face like paint but her hands were scrubbed clean, though the sink in which they were washed was now stained of blood. Still, Roze felt nothing. And She was numb for 2 weeks.

2 weeks later.

"Good afternoon!" rung Arnau's voice in Roze's face, as she opened the door to greet the mail boy, who had a package in his arms. Roze peeked behind him and spotted his bike parked on the side of the road, but she didn't say a word.

Arnau himself wasn't used to seeing Roze at the door, it was usually her parents... But he did recognize her from school, somewhat... Something must have happened to her eye though. "What'd ya order?" He asks, simply curious as Roze took the package. It was something he asked customers frequently.

"A bone saw," Roze spoke in return, staring at Arnau with her one eye. She was starting to feel a strange sensation in her body again, as she finished her stash of food almost 48 hours ago. The stash of food that had been her parents' bodies. Roze ordered this bone saw because she had struggled to cut parts up originally, and because of not eating, Roze had no clue that she was drooling while staring at Arnau.

"Oh... Interesting order! Have a nice day!" Arnau chirps, seemingly unbothered by Roze. Roze watches him hop on his bike and ride away with his bag of mail and packages, until he was out of her sight. Then Roze headed inside, unsure of what to do.

Roze often felt like there was a snake in her stomach when she laid on the floor. She had been doing this frequently, in a starfish position, questioning her life, if she was even alive, that is. The snake felt like it was biting inside of her and aching for something more. Roze was starting to feel worse overtime, and she seemed to connect it to the lack of food— or.. Dead bodies? Roze seemed to enjoy eating those now, it was strange. She had even bought herself a pack of cookies, but never touched them. They simply didn't lick her appetite. In fact, they were repulsive.

All of a sudden there was a tickle on Roze's leg, and she sat up just in time to see Francis crawling into her lap. Francis stared at her, causing Roze to let out a breath of air that resembled a sigh. "I know... I need to eat again soon..." The undead girl groaned softly, rolling over so that she was laying on her stomach. "But where the hell am I supposed to get a dead body? Or an alive one?"

Roze felt Francis' communication again and quickly sat up, staring down at the eye and it's brilliant idea. "The morgue? Wow, I completely forgot there was a morgue... I'll go tonight," Roze seemed to smile at the eye a little, thanking it for the suggestion. "You know, you're really clever," Roze adds, causing Francis to scamper around excitedly.

Minho Choi was used to the blood and guts of his job. For four generations, a funeral home and morgue in his family's hands. Mars often liked to think of his corpse surgeries like a craft or sewing. It was fun for him, considering he had always had such an interest in the dead. This being said, it had made him a loner as a child. Rumors had spread about him and his family, it was true he had always been seen as creepy.

Mars found himself staying up late working in the morgue again and again. Though the room never smelled nice, his nose was practically numb to it. Despite the occasional annoyance of having to wipe blood off of his safety glasses, working in the morgue gave Mars comfort. However, it was never comfortable without his favourite scalpel, which he remembered he had left in a separate section of the place. Mars went off to find it, and when he came back—

At first he thought it was some sort of strange creature, but it was a girl, that couldn't have been any older than 17. Her body was able to move in ways Mars had never seen before, and she appeared to be eating a body from one of the mortuary cabinets. Not politely either, brutally. There was blood on the floor, on her face and hands, but her head was deep in the middle of the corpse.

Mars was hesitant on approaching. But his scalpel slipped from his hands, clattering to the floor loudly, gaining the attention of the cannibal girl in front of him. Mars noticed that when she looked up, she had one eye and a cute little makeshift eye patch over the left side of her face.

It was silent for a second, there was simply the sound of this girl chewing on this body and then gulping the bite down, before she speaks.

"I can explain—" she chokes on her own spit, coughing a little, before giving the morgue man a sheepish smile of sharp teeth.

Mars leans down to pick up his scalpel, his eyes wide, but he was more confused than panicked. "PLEASE DO??? Who are you?! Why are you eating one of my corpses–?? I left for five minutes!" Mars was used to seeing dead bodies being ripped open, he just wasn't used to... someone eating them.

Roze stands up, wiping her bloody hands onto her white dress, the contrast like red paint on a blank canvas. "Well.. I'm Roze, I was hungry and—"

"Why are you eating on the floor? It's highly unsanitary," Mars interrupts, more concerned for the girl's health than anything.

Roze couldn't help it, she suddenly broke down into tears for the first time since her infection. She had been so numb that even rubbing alcohol wouldn't sting, and now? Everything was flooding in on her like the world's biggest tsunami wave. She could barely speak through a mess of sobs and snarls, blood dripping down her mouth like strawberry juice.

Mars himself didn't quite understand, but even if she was eating a corpse, he didn't like to see this young girl cry. So, Mars carefully walked closer (a slight fear that she might bite him deep down) And went to grab onto the girl's arm, to which she could only flinch away.

"Here... Come sit, tell me what's going on," Mars says as he grabs a tissue and hands it to the girl, to help her wipe up the mess she had made (of tears and blood). Mars didn't know what he was doing, really. But there was something in him that wanted to listen to this girl's story. She seemed so.. Troubled. Besides, Mars himself was an expert at listening.

Roze went to the freshly cleaned embalming table and sat on its shiny surface. She cried until her tears were more or less gone and slowed down, the mortician passing her tissues along the way, until it was over. Then, Mars figured it was finally time to speak to this girl properly.

"You can call me Mars.. You said you were Roze, right?"

The girl nods, her one eye staring at the floor. She didn't bother to make eye contact with this Mars mortician guy, she figured she was scary enough. Roze hears Mars ask another question, yet still stares at her shoes.

"What... Happened? Why were you eating a corpse? That's probably going to make you sick.." Mars said, his tone flat yet somehow hinting worry for the young girl at the same time. The funny thing was that while asking all these questions, Mars got back to work on his latest corpse, carefully slicing it with his scalpel in certain spots.

"Okay... Here, let me just.. Explain, like I said I would," Roze lets out a small sigh, finally meeting her one eye with Mars' pair. "My parents went on a vacation and... Well, they left me at home. They didn't leave me with much food so I went scavenging,"

Just hearing this to start out made Mars' heart drop down three stories into his stomach, breaking each wall of flesh in his body until it made it all the way down. What kind of parents leave their kid at home on a vacation? With no food!?

"I'm pretty sure a trashy granola bar I got in the dumpster did this to me– It was still wrapped so I thought it'd be fine, I really should have known it was in the garbage for a reason... But really, I have no idea if it was the granola bar that did this to me or not.." Roze continued to tell the story, dangling her feet off the edge of the table she was sitting on, her Mary Jane shoes clacking together occasionally.

"So basically– I couldn't sleep... And then I felt like.. The world's worst goddamn pain. Worse than period cramps that make you throw up.. And then my eye fell out, and yeah, now I want to eat people, sooo yeah..."

Mars nodded, taking his eyes off of his project to look up at Roze for a moment. He was.. Concerned. Actually, well, that was an understatement. It was a very confusing and strange story, and Mars had certainly never heard anything like it. "Mhm... Okay.. Do your parents know about this?" He asks, looking back down at the dead and grey corpse he was cutting up.

Roze, who was pretty much back to numb again, blurted out "I ate my parents,"

"What?" Mars was simply shocked, near to dropping his scalpel again, but he gripped onto it firmly to prevent that. To be fair... This Roze girl had been gulping down the innards of a corpse, so these words somehow didn't surprise him, but they were still crazy to hear.

"I ate my parents,"

"Sorry, I'm just.. Wow"

"I ate my parents,"

"I heard you the first time sweetie," Mars sighed slightly, only to jump from feeling a tickle on his leg, looking down to spot... An eye? With legs? Mars was used to many things, blood, dead bodies, but this? This was unusual. The mortician shook the thing off his leg in a slight panic and backed up, looking over at Roze. "What. Is That."

"Oh, that's Francis." Roze quickly explains. "They're my lost eye, if you couldn't tell,"

"How... Interesting..." Mars responds, watching the so-called 'Francis' creature go over to Roze and crawl up onto the embalming table, hanging out beside her. It seemed to stare at Roze and she stared back then giggled out of nowhere, as if they had been communicating in silence.

Mars sighs slightly, wondering how he got himself into this situation, (really it wasn't his fault, she had broken into his morgue) but... Mars did feel bad about this, and he wanted to help out, he supposed. Besides, he was extremely curious about everything. "So let me get this straight... Your eye fell out, and you ate your parents..."

"Yeah, I think I'm dead or something? My heartbeat is also really slow, it's crazy," Roze adds, recalling the time she had listened to her heartbeat in complete silence, and it only beat 12 times per minute.

For Mars, when Roze mentioned being dead, something popped out of his mouth. "Like a zombie?"

"Mm.. Probably," Roze answers, shrugging in return to Mars' question.

Their conversation went on for about an hour. Roze sat and explained everything that happened in more detail, and Mars took it all in. Surprisingly, listening to Roze had helped him work on his current corpse faster, and he was already finished. In fact, he was proud of his work.

Eventually a conversation turned into cleaning. Feeling awful, Roze had helped to clean up the bloody mess she had created from her corpse dinner. When they were done, Mars had told Roze that she could come back for food if she needed, since he did have extra corpses and flesh bits laying around. He then sent her off with a container of spare organs and hands.

Roze turned and waved with her shark-like smile on her face, but it was then that Mars asked one more question, gathering Roze's attention again.

"Are you... Living alone?" He asked, simply curious if this 17 year old girl could take care of herself on her own like this. If she could pay bills, (which she probably couldn't) keep her house clean, anything else.

"Yeah."

"Oh... Okay, Well, just know you can visit here any time, alright? See you whenever, Roze."

"See you whenever, morgue man!" Roze pivots and then walks off with Francis on her shoulder, out into the dark street, all the way back home.

Mars smiled a little, finding the nickname weird but fitting.. He shuffled back into his morgue and decided it was time to close up this strange night. Sure, Mars had just met this unusual Roze girl, but it was safe to say he connected with her. Somehow, he related to the girl's loneliness. People avoided him all his life, calling him creepy... He supposed that being a mortician, it was about time he made friends with the living dead.

﹙☆﹚. . .  AUTHOR'S NOTE  ‹3

CHAPTER 1 IS DONE!! i'm aware it's long and mostly roze, please don't bully me- there will be many more characters in the next chapter and so on, so stay tuned!!! (voting and commenting also makes me happy, pls do that hehe)

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