Expecting by Luke Wortley

When I open my front door, I see that the porch has turned into a clutch of eggs. All of them dumb and round and nestled tightly, packed in like pebbles on a drive. I’m afraid to step out and see what the temperature actually feels like other than a swipe of my hands, fingers slipping through the frigid air. I’m a mess. I don’t know how to care for these eggs, how to keep them warm. The first gauzy drips of snow lean on the breeze like lace. I can’t care for them all. Even so, I grab all the blankets in the house, pause at the door, and toss them. The wind screeches to life, and they land haphazardly in a pile some feet away, useless. It’s too far to jump over all these eggs, and the temperature is dropping. Then, I feel my skin coming undone, the bonds decoupling from tendon and bone. I’m nearly blown away as I stretch and transform into a mantle of flesh. All of me stretches out of necessity to cover the porch. Under me, I hear the whispering cries giving way to the quiet stupefaction of the entire nest.