I’m lying flat with my arms and legs strapped to the corners of a large, rectangular table. There are vials and tubes everywhere, and it’s dark, with dry ice mist covering the floor. I realize suddenly I’m in Frankenstein’s laboratory--like in the movies, you know. But I’m the monster. I’m the creature Dr. Frankenstein has made, the creature who wants desperately to be human, but isn’t.

Cramps start in my arms and legs, but all I can do is shiver under the straps. I can’t move an inch. When will someone come for me? I mean, if I’m Frankenstein’s monster, there has to be a Frankenstein somewhere, doesn’t there?

I wait and wait, but no one comes. Then it occurs to me. What if I’m the trial run, the monster that didn’t work? What if Dr. Frankenstein isn’t coming back?

“Help me!” I try to yell. But no words come out of my mouth. Did the doctor just not get around to giving me a voice?

Which makes me wonder—what else did he forget to give me? I try to lift my head to look down at my body. Two legs. Two arms. Fingers and toes. It’s all there as far as I can see. But what about inside? I can’t see there.

I hold my breath for a long while, listening for the slightest sound. But there is nothing. It is absolutely still in the laboratory and all around it. How long before I die of thirst? Or starvation?

But I am only a monster, I think. I don’t need to eat. I don’t need to drink. I don’t need to speak. I will live forever, strapped on this table. Alone.

I pull at the bands frantically, trying to get free. I wonder if I can rip my hands off and pull the stumps through, but the doctor has sewn them on too tightly. They aren’t human hands, made of flesh and blood. They’re made of rubber and steel and I’m not strong enough to tear them apart.

After a long while, I give up and lay back again on the table. I close my eyes and tell myself that it doesn’t matter. I can learn to live this way. I have to.