she tells pictures with her stories

is it the writing that keeps you at an arm's length? you want to stay here, he asked. she said no, i couldn't be bothered, and she grabbed her new fur coat and left. she couldn't be bothered, he mumbled under his breath, piss off then, and he slammed the door behind her. he turned to face the damage that'd been left behind but he never saw what she had done to his insides. only years later, the doctors told him he had a rare heart disease. but the sensation that came right after was one he would never forget. as if in a trance he lay upon the rough orange carpet in the hall so that his back touched the ground. from underneath him came a rumbling noise and he felt a strange tingle in his right hand shoulder blade. something entered his body and pierced straight through his chest. the neighbors later recalled a scream so unearthly it made their blood freeze. he saw what had caused the tingle was growing out of his chest, with multiple black arms, turning into branches, becoming a tree. leaves began to sprout and bright red cherries appeared on the ends of twigs. his mouth was a big gaping hole from which not a sound escaped now. he must have lay there for hours, days on end. blossoms blew around him, white soft gentle ones making him forget the pain. i should have been kind, he thought. then a cherry plummeted to earth and fell into his gaping mouth. he choked and closed his eyes. when he opened them again, the tree had returned to from where it had sprung. but nothing was as it had been before. he said later, he considered himself lucky the tree hadn't pierced his beating heart.