There it is again. The fly. Watching me through all its eyes, iridescent and globular, like oil spilt over a crystal ball. 

It’s been surveying me for days. Following me from room to room, a drought stalking the sun, buzzing away in my ear. 

It’s a fat, bulbous, black scab of a thing, with a long proboscis dotted with sharp hairs and pin prick legs that it rubs, always rubs, together when it looks at me. 

And it is looking at me. While it rubs its little feelers together in glee. Excited for something. 

Laura is here, drinking her usual peppermint tea while the fly scales the window. 

The sharp smell of menthol makes my stomach roll into itself with nausea. I used to like the smell of peppermint, but ever since that fly started watching me, I can’t stand it. 

Laura’s not meant to be here. We both work from home and are supposed to be at our desks like good little worker bees. But we haven’t gone a week without seeing one another since primary school, so she often comes over for tea in the middle of the day. I offer her another cup and she cheerfully accepts.

“Have you done something different with your makeup? You look fresher somehow.”

The fly follows me around the kitchen as I collect Laura’s mug, dump in a tea bag, wait as the kettle hisses.

“No,” I say.

The fly continues to stare as Laura chatters on. 

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Did you know: Flies have superior vision to humans. They can see a much wider range of colours and lights which are not visible to other animals. This means they can see things that are invisible to humans. 

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A week goes by, and my stomach hasn’t stopped churning. It groans and gurgles all day long. 

Something is very wrong with me and that fly knows it. It continues to rub its little hands and feet together as it watches me.

I try to catch it. I run madly around the house with a roll of newspaper in each hand but the stupid thing is too fast. 

It laughs in fly buzz. 

I sob in human tears. 

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Did you know: Flies are short sighted, but even a short-sighted creature knows when you’re trying to sneak up on them from behind.

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I don’t know much about flies. But I do know it’s not normal for them to try and burrow their way under your eyelids while you sleep.

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Did you know: Some flies will regurgitate stomach fluids onto food to break it down so they can drink it through their proboscis.

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A month after her last visit, Laura comes again. It’s unprompted and unwelcome. I didn’t want the fly to see her again. To try and sit atop her head and wrap itself in her hair like it does with me.

“We haven’t seen one another in weeks.” Her eyes are wet, voice cracking. “I thought I’d come and check you were ok.”

She forces her way in and pulls me into a big, cosy hug. I hold her back so tightly I worry she’ll crumble to dust. 

But I’m not enjoying the moment for long. 

Because, on the side table next to the open front door, sit two flies. An ally for my tormenter. 

My arms go limp as Laura continues to barrage me with questions about my welfare. She leads me into the kitchen and begins making tea. As if re-creating our old ritual will bring back what once was. 

“They’re working you too hard, aren’t they? That’s the problem with working from home, you work all day and don’t see a single soul.”

The flies slink in after us, place themselves atop the bread bin, their new HQ. They peer down at me, interchangeably rubbing their feelers together as if dancing to a song I can’t hear. 

Yesterday I found out that flies are not supposed to live longer than 28 days. The first fly has definitely been with me longer than that. At least two months. 

“I can’t stand this silence.” Laura sits herself down in front of me and slides my tea across the table. “Please talk to me.”

The newcomer decides to leave fly HQ. I fix my eyes on it and don’t let them wander as Laura continues to babble. It flies fast, up into the air, till it almost touches the ceiling, and then drops fast, nosediving towards Laura. 

I leap across the table and push Laura down to the floor out of the fly’s path. 

Laura yelps like a wounded dog as she falls beneath me onto the ground. I stay on top of her as I continue to scan the room for the fly. It’s doing circles around the kitchen, its friend laughing from the countertop. 

“What on earth?” she squeals. I look into her eyes. They are filled with fear. 

I stand and help her to her feet. She’s shaking. I feel sick for making my friend look at me like that. But I can’t let that thing, that monster, touch Laura. 

“There was a fly,” is all I can say. 

Laura says nothing.

I make my excuses about needing to carry on with work and hurry her outside. 

I vow not to leave the house or let anyone else in until I have dealt with these monsters. 

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Did you know: Flies can beat their wings at 200 times a minute, thus allowing them to change direction quickly mid-air. 

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I think they are speaking in morse code through their buzzes. Maybe that’s how they communicate. I search morse code to learn the basics. Listen to them buzz at each other all night. 

‘Georgie Porgie pudding and pie.’ ‘Georgie Porgie pudding and pie.’ ‘Georgie Porgie pudding and pie.’

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Did you know: Flies have been on earth for around 150 million years, adapting and evolving over time. No doubt they will be here for 150 million more.

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Two more months have passed, and there are now at least ten flies watching me. 

I have not stopped feeling unwell since that fly nosedived at Laura. I make a list of my symptoms.

My stomach burns, as though someone’s scrapped the lining away and used it as kindling for a fire (I hope the flies are not camping down there).

Sleep is difficult and infrequent (I worry what the flies do when I’m not watching).

I’m gaining weight (Are there flies in my food?).

My body aches (The flies perch on my head and ride me like a donkey).

I conclude that the flies are making me sick.

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Did you know: Flies can taste with their feet.

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My new routine is as follows. 

I wake to the sound of a hundred beating wings and the first thing I see is a mass of black blots whirring around my room. An inversed sky with a whitewashed galaxy and shifting black stars. 

I clean the house from top to bottom with vinegar and dish soap. 

Light citronella candles in every room. 

Hang up more sticky tendrils of flypaper. I waddle through the house with a permanent hunch to stop my head sticking to them. So far, the only thing stuck to them are strands of my hair, follicles and all. 

I attempt to work while ignoring the flies’ gawks. When I fail, I revert to drawing flies, writing about flies, researching flies, in an attempt to understand them. But the only thing I know for sure about flies is how much I hate them. 

After work, I chase them around the house with a comically large fly swatter. I have yet to swat a single fly.

Eventually exhaustion deals its final blow and I surrender myself to bed. 

The last thing I see through heavy eyelids are flies crawling up my body, onto my face, tucking me in with a blanket of their bodies. 

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Did you know: A female fly can lay up to 600 eggs in their lifetime. 

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Occasionally my mother calls. She talks about Spain, about Juan, about their cat. I tell her I am fine. She is satisfied with this answer every time. 

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Six months’ worth of flies are now in my house. I can’t move for flies. The flies are the woods, the flies are the trees, and I can’t see the flies for the flies. 

My body is swollen. Ankles, arms, face, taught and wobbly like rubber gloves filled with sewage. Everything tastes strange. Bitter and wrong. Most food curdles in my mouth and tastes acidic. The only thing I have been able to eat is fruit. 

I have to eat it fast though because everything in this house is rotting so quickly. 

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Did you know: Because of their liquid diet, flies defecate every time they land. 

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Laura still calls. She tries to come to the door, but I don’t let her in. I speak to her through the letterbox so I don’t let any more flies in or out. She’s leaving me some shopping at the doorway. I am lucky to have her as a friend. I hope the flies don’t follow her home. 

She says she is here if ever I need her. 

I don’t tell her that that’s what I’m afraid of.

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Did you know: Flies are drawn to light. They use it as a way to guide them when they are looking for food, shelter, or escaping predators.

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There is a loud banging at my door. The flies scurry into dark corners that turn darker as they are invaded. They are afraid of what’s out there, beyond the door. I roll off the sofa and crawl on all fours, keeping low, nose to floor, prey hiding from predator. 

I peek my head around the living room corner, into the hallway to see what thing, so evil as to scare even the flies, could be lurking at my door.

I understand why the flies were scared.

Through the circular blur of distorted glass I catch the outline of a thick black cloud that bellows and fumes, tumbling and clashing against itself from behind the door. It leaks through the cracks, and I can smell the sharp tang of sandalwood and tonka mixed with stale sweat. 

My heart leaps up and hides in my throat. Blood pools there, turning my breath shallow, my mouth metallic. I dare not move. Not an inch. Just in case it sees me. 

“…says you’ve been acting weird…”

I don’t think I believe in God, but I pray anyway. I pray for it to go away. 

“…I need to clarify what happened. Make sure we’re on the same page…”

But God’s clearly not listening. I’ll have to save myself. 

“…we’d both been drinking…”

I shut my eyes tight and imagine a hole opening up beneath me and I let myself fall down, deep into the earth’s core.

“… you seduced me, remember…”

I’ll burn down there, the fire too hot for the flies to follow. 

“… that dress. You knew what you were doing…”

I’ll be cleansed, melted down, transformed into magma. 

“…I’m marrying Sarah next week…”

Turn into rock. 

“…she doesn’t know…”

Hard and tough and solid.

“…Just don’t make things difficult for me…” 

Impenetrable.

“So, are we good?”

Eventually the banging and the shouting stop. 

I know it has gone because the flies have emerged from hiding. 

There are ten times as many of them now. 

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Did you know: Male flies have a ‘love spot’ within their eyes which is used to track down and chase females.

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Once upon a time when I was small, my mother was sick and I was sent to live with a stern aunt for a week. She had no toys or games and did not let me watch TV. But her most important rule was that I was not to go into the woods. They were dangerous and full of bears and wolves and witches. I would stare out the bedroom window and watch the children on the street gather before sneaking off into the woods together. I stayed inside and watched the sky change from blue to red to black until the children came home for tea, full of sly smiles, dirty knees, and tales of adventure. 

Once upon a time when I was older, I was at a house party with a friend. A guy we didn’t know invited us to an exclusive DJ set in a dodgy part of town. I declined. My friend went and said the music was so enchanting, so ethereal, it felt like you were being carried through the air by it. She’d never heard anything so beautiful. She met her now-husband there. I went home early and knitted a tea cosy. 

Once upon a time when I was even older, I was at a family friend’s garden party. I knew everyone and they all knew me. It was a perfect summer’s day and the earth breathed out long, hot, heavy sighs of contentment. Pools of shade amongst the golden rays were a rare oasis in that big open garden. I found one around the side of the house by following the trail of roses which looped along the fence like breadcrumbs to a shaded patch of solitude. I leant against the cool bricks, which were the exact colour of a pheasant in a shaded glen. I could still hear the yelps of children as they bounced higher and higher, trying to touch heaven on the trampoline. Smell the hot smoky coals of the barbeque. See the small blades of grass that edged the wall bend to the will of the summer breeze. 

And then the sun became so bright, so blinding, that all I saw was black.

And then I was on the floor. 

And then the children were still laughing. The barbeque still sizzling. The roses still blooming.

But I smelt of sandalwood and tonka and a single fly was buzzing in circles over my head.

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Did you know: Flies like to lay their eggs on a food source for their young. This will sustain the young flies until they are old enough to fend for themselves and repeat the process over and over and over and over… 

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I awake in extreme agony. It feels like my stomach is about to burst wide open and scatter itself across the room like pomegranate seeds. The flies are in ecstasy. Hundreds of them fizzing about the room with glee, bubbles in a shaken champagne about to pop. This must be what they were waiting for. They dart into me. Leaving me with a thousand tiny bruises dotted all across my body. 

In a panic I pick up the phone and call Laura. 

She doesn’t see me as I open the door, the haze of flies is too solid. 

“How are there so many?” She asks, trying and failing to swat them away with her hands.

But when she does see me through the fly fog, her face falls. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

She bundles me up and we fight our way through the thicket of flies to the living room. 

“We need a doctor, or an ambulance or a mi…”

I cut her off with a sharp scream as my abs tear in two and something falls low and deep into my pelvis. 

I lie on the floor and the flies settle down onto various perches around the room, each jostling one another for the best view as I spread my legs apart. 

Something drops— rips and breaks through me. I shout and roll my head forwards and backwards while Laura holds my hand. 

Eventually she reaches between my legs and lifts something up, red and wet. 

“What is it?” she gasps, and then screams, “What is it!”

The thing she holds is a huge, melon-sized, black bug with a long hairy proboscis, bulbous hexagonal eyes, and six spindled legs.

It rubs its legs together and a chorus of buzzing erupts from around the room.

“Mother,” it names me, “Mother.”