She microdosed every day for a year and felt better than ever. The mushrooms came from Brazil, she’d been told. Trish made her own tincture: boiling it down, diluting, filtering, and repeat. Then one drop in each eye and she felt like she was blinking away her troubles. Her migraines improved. She slept better. She was more outgoing. The only problem was all the imaginary monsters everywhere.
          Trish knew they were imaginary because a) There are no such things as monsters, and b) No one else saw them and she could walk right through them. Otherwise they might have freaked her out, with their rocky hides, slavering fangs and bloodstained claws. They still sometimes startled her, when she opened a door and one was eating a kid on the toilet or stuff like that, but it was mostly fine. It was weird when she was in bed with Bill, since there was one monster in particular with a—this is sort of embarrassing—a really big purple cock, with evil-looking red thorns all over it, and it liked to watch her and Bill, and masturbate. So when pressed she would admit there were a few drawbacks.
          At work they pretended to eviscerate her coworkers. They pretended to piss in her coffee. At church they did really wild stuff. She went to a baseball game and the whole diamond opened up into a sharp-toothed pit of sulfurous fire. But no one else ever noticed, so it was okay.
          Nonetheless, for New Year’s she resolved to give it up. Maybe she’d already gotten whatever therapeutic benefit there was from it all. But right away, even before her hangover had cleared, Trish knew it was a mistake. She was overwhelmed by a sick feeling of deep dread, and it just grew worse over the next few days. Sleepless nights, or nightmares. Unexplained scratches on her chest. Dry eyes. Libido? Forget it. She came out in hives.
          The day of the big blizzard she was snowed into the house, all alone and bored. So what the hell. She brewed some up and dripped it in her eyes. Right away she felt alive again. And there were no monsters.
          Full of vim, she put on her boots and mittens and hat and heavy coat and went for a walk in the park. It had stopped snowing and the sun was out, and everything was blanketed thick. Kids were playing: snowballs, snow angels. Ice skaters! What a world!
          She brushed off a bench and sat down next to a man.
          Can I tell you something? Trish asked, uninvited. I’ve been on my own since I was fourteen. My dad was a drug addict. He’s dead now. Don’t ask about my mom or my worthless brother. But I made it. I have a job and a boyfriend and a little bit of money and it took me a long time but I think I can look at the world and not see it as a threat. It took me until—I’m almost thirty—but I think I’ve put the worst of it all behind me.
          The man, who must have been sitting there for a long time, so covered in snow as he was, had been listening intently, even unblinkingly. When she was finished speaking, there was a long pause as she waited for his reaction. Just when it began to get awkward, just as she was about to ask him a question about himself, he nodded his head vigorously, once, and a cap of snow fell from his head into his lap.
          Now let me tell you a story, he said.
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