Greg's words limped from his mouth, smelling of Dewars and the Benson & Hedges menthols. Feeling fine, he let one butt fall to the ground, and immediately reached for the shiny gold and green pack in his shirt pocket. He fumbled with the pack intentionally for a moment, drawing Lisa's attention to it, letting her see he wasn't smoking generics like he used to when they first met. She did glance at his muddling fingers, and when she did, he snuck a glance at her chest thinking she wouldn't notice.
"Jesus, Greg. You're such a boy." Lisa muttered, turning her back to him and stepping further out onto the sidewalk, further out into the rain. Rain is a strong word for this, she thought as the mist swirled around her, making everything damp but not quite wet. It had been doing this since she crossed the state line and didn't seem to be showing any signs of stopping.
"Sorry, Love. Old habits."
"Growing old is getting old." Lisa muttered, turning back to him.
"What's that?"
"Nothing."
Greg felt he had missed something, but he missed lots of things when he was around Lisa. He ran the fingers of his left hand through the black milk of his hair, tucking its length behind his ear, and then ran his hand over his face, wiping across his closed eyes and down over his mouth. He opened his eyes to find her watching him and flashed a smile at her. It was his smile, the one that only she would recognize. Lisa smirked and shook her head.
"You're drunk."
"Working on it, yeah." He let his eyes close again and leaned the back of his head on the cold brick wall behind him.
He's just like this city, she thought, watching him waver in the thin streetlight glow. He looks so good from a distance, but when you get up close it's all burger wrappers in the streets, cigarette butts collected in the scrub grass alongside stop signs, and everything smelling of spent batteries. From the sky though, it's just an orderly series of golden glowing squares stretching to the lake. It's a special kind of punishment to get fooled by what you see, she thought.
"The Chinese were the best at it, you know."
"Hmmm?"
"Calling something by a real nice name, especially when it was for something more terrible than you could imagine. A good old fashioned verbal bait and switch."
Greg managed to tip his head forward towards where Lisa stood. It was the sound of her voice breaking with anger and sadness that brought him back to the stoop, his cigarette, and his ex-wife. Not saying anything, he waited.
"This is the 'Frame of the Furrowing Eyebrow', Greg. That's what the Chinese called it. They'd strap you to a bamboo stand, leaving you to kneel for hours while they tighten the slats that went across your fingers, toes, balls, and neck. Nice and slow, just a nice steady pressure until pieces of you start to give out under the weight of it."
Greg dropped his eyes to the pavement between his feet, and followed a crack that ran from the tip of his dusty boot to where she stood wiping the last of the dozen tears she let herself cry. They stood, listening to the highway rumble and the sounds of Wednesday giving up to the threat of Thursday.
"C'mon Leece, let me buy you a drink."
"Yeah, sure. Just one."
Showing posts with label micro fiction. Show all posts
Showing posts with label micro fiction. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Seasonal Winds
The wind played with the hem of her dress, pulling it back tight against her. The shape of her legs, wiry and slim as cattail reeds, stood out in the folds of black fabric like engorged veins, pumping blood from her pelvis into the loose earth where her feet were planted. She was connected to her world in ways I had prayed for.
She didn’t move when I asked her to move, just kept looking at me, seeing a new piece of me that had been hidden until just this moment.
Now she knows, I thought. Not that she knows everything, but she knows enough. Enough to make her want to run. I’d want to run. I’d want to be anywhere but here.
I saw it. There was a loosening of the tension in her face, and her hands fell absently to pull the fabric out from between her knees where the wind had gathered it. I knew she had decided whether or not she was going to stay, but did not know what her answer would be.
I felt the sun on my balding head and caught small breaths of her soap in the racing wind.
I was unable to remove my eyes from the end of her dress, flapping in the wind like an overenthusiastic tail on a falling kite.
She didn’t move when I asked her to move, just kept looking at me, seeing a new piece of me that had been hidden until just this moment.
Now she knows, I thought. Not that she knows everything, but she knows enough. Enough to make her want to run. I’d want to run. I’d want to be anywhere but here.
I saw it. There was a loosening of the tension in her face, and her hands fell absently to pull the fabric out from between her knees where the wind had gathered it. I knew she had decided whether or not she was going to stay, but did not know what her answer would be.
I felt the sun on my balding head and caught small breaths of her soap in the racing wind.
I was unable to remove my eyes from the end of her dress, flapping in the wind like an overenthusiastic tail on a falling kite.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Elise - The Funeral (Part II)
Elise had married into the family business four years ago with the understanding she would move on once she found work of her own. The dental office she had worked in for the past eight years had closed, and she had agreed to help out around her husband's funeral home while she searched the web for a new place to land. After a few months though, Elise found herself spending less time checking the new postings, and instead working around the office freeing up her husband Chris to focus his attention to family consultations and the restoration work taking place in the basement.
In those first few weeks she spent time down in the basement with Chris learning about the restorative process, and the steps taken to preserve the appearance of life long enough for the family to say good-bye. Very little of what she saw bothered her at first, but she quickly came to learn that in order to do her job, she couldn't see the process. On the table, the deceased lost their histories and personality and became projects. They were a series of fluids, stitches, realignments and positionings. They stopped being human, and in order to work with the families she needed to do everything in her power to remember the role these bodies had in the lives of the people who knew and loved them.
During viewings and services, Elise would stand out in the foyer and direct people to the bathrooms and water fountain. She would replace boxes of tissue, show distraught families to one of the private grieving rooms, and assist when Chris needed. Mostly though, she stood close to the wall, or sat on a stool just outside the office door, and watched the family members and friends come and go while listening to their conversations and cliched sentiment. People would tell each other that the man or woman in the casket looked good, or that they had lived a full life. People said the flowers were beautiful and took turns reminding each other that funerals are for the living.
For Elise though, funerals were only for the dead. She idealized their lives, making them all moral fun-loving people. They made mistakes, but atoned for them. They raised families who may be too selfish to see yet everything that was given to them. They loved hard, and forgave quickly. They stayed up with sick children, and lay down faithfully with their spouses. The indulged in kindnesses and had a genuine interest in the well being of strangers. They left the world a better place than it was when they first arrived.
Each and every funeral she worked, Elise purposefully created these histories for the deceased because she believed firmly in another oft said cliche: "Funerals bring out the worst in people."
It was at the funeral that the first whispers of pain and disappointment were whispered amongst scorned family. It was during the viewings that people would arrive after lunch-time cocktails and start sharing intimate secrets a touch too loudly to be discreet while stealing glances at the open casket. The only way to combat the ugliness and create an environment where she could still have compassion was to invent a living version of the corpse before her that she could love.
It came naturally to her, and after a few months, she didn't consciously realize she was doing it. With a glance at their slack gray skin, entire lives would suddenly be visible to her. A few months after that, she would even find herself drained and saddened at the end of her day, mourning the loss of the life she had created.
In those first few weeks she spent time down in the basement with Chris learning about the restorative process, and the steps taken to preserve the appearance of life long enough for the family to say good-bye. Very little of what she saw bothered her at first, but she quickly came to learn that in order to do her job, she couldn't see the process. On the table, the deceased lost their histories and personality and became projects. They were a series of fluids, stitches, realignments and positionings. They stopped being human, and in order to work with the families she needed to do everything in her power to remember the role these bodies had in the lives of the people who knew and loved them.
During viewings and services, Elise would stand out in the foyer and direct people to the bathrooms and water fountain. She would replace boxes of tissue, show distraught families to one of the private grieving rooms, and assist when Chris needed. Mostly though, she stood close to the wall, or sat on a stool just outside the office door, and watched the family members and friends come and go while listening to their conversations and cliched sentiment. People would tell each other that the man or woman in the casket looked good, or that they had lived a full life. People said the flowers were beautiful and took turns reminding each other that funerals are for the living.
For Elise though, funerals were only for the dead. She idealized their lives, making them all moral fun-loving people. They made mistakes, but atoned for them. They raised families who may be too selfish to see yet everything that was given to them. They loved hard, and forgave quickly. They stayed up with sick children, and lay down faithfully with their spouses. The indulged in kindnesses and had a genuine interest in the well being of strangers. They left the world a better place than it was when they first arrived.
Each and every funeral she worked, Elise purposefully created these histories for the deceased because she believed firmly in another oft said cliche: "Funerals bring out the worst in people."
It was at the funeral that the first whispers of pain and disappointment were whispered amongst scorned family. It was during the viewings that people would arrive after lunch-time cocktails and start sharing intimate secrets a touch too loudly to be discreet while stealing glances at the open casket. The only way to combat the ugliness and create an environment where she could still have compassion was to invent a living version of the corpse before her that she could love.
It came naturally to her, and after a few months, she didn't consciously realize she was doing it. With a glance at their slack gray skin, entire lives would suddenly be visible to her. A few months after that, she would even find herself drained and saddened at the end of her day, mourning the loss of the life she had created.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
The Funeral (Part One)
Tommy's past wasn't that interesting, so I created one for him. In my version, he did all the same mundane things he actually did, except in my version there was always the possibility of being something more. In my retelling of his past he actually had something special within him that he just hadn't managed to tap into. That is something that was sadly not in his reality.
Tommy wasn't a killer, but that didn't mean that he hadn't wished a lot of people dead. For many of the long hours he would spend behind the wheel of his semi, he would line pick out a spot on the windshield (watermark or bug remnants, no matter) like it was a gun-site, and imagine the dotted line of bullets traveling through the air, eventually finding their home in the heads and chests of passing motorists. He spent at least eight hours a day on the road, and many of them spent playing this game.
He dreamt about it other places too. Standing in line at the bank or at Wendy’s or walking the aisles in the grocery store. He could imagine the sound of bullets on bone and the rapturous roar of the gun in his hands as people ran screaming.
But Tommy had never held, much less owned a gun. He was no real threat. He was just a man bored on the road, and like most of us, wishing he were someone else.
I hadn’t seen him for eight years, but there’s nothing like a funeral to bring family around. We had never been close, so it wasn’t odd for me to stand in the corner and not make the effort to go over and greet him right away. I watched him for awhile as he spoke with the rest of the family that had gathered around upon his arrival.
His suit was a flat new blue that had most likely never even been cleaned before. I checked the wrists for hanging tags. The cut and look of the fabric made me conclude that Wal Mart had started selling suits. A thick linked gold bracelet sparkled out of the cuff of his right sleeve, and the silver of a chunky Timex poked out from under the left. He wore silver cufflinks, and the way he waved his arms about as he spoke told me that he thought they were classy.
I imagined him replaying the afternoon later that night at the hotel bar, thinking to himself that the strangers in the room must have been asking themselves who that sharp dressed fellow with the soul patch and cufflinks was. That guy had something.
When in fact, what Tommy had was a hotel bill being paid for by his sister and a 1997 International with over 900,000 miles on it; A truck that the bank was threatening to track down and take back unless some money exchanged hands quickly.
There was a lull in the conversation, and some of the family members drifted away to speak in smaller circles. I watched Tommy as he ran the palms of his hands down his face. To many, it was a sign of grief; a man wiping away sadness. I knew that it meant he had been drinking, and was not alone in my thoughts.
“Someone got started early,” someone whispered nearby.
I watched quietly as he approached the casket for the first time, crying softly to himself, looking down at his sister. For the first time since his arrival, he wasn’t making a production of his actions. I looked away and gave him privacy.
Tommy wasn't a killer, but that didn't mean that he hadn't wished a lot of people dead. For many of the long hours he would spend behind the wheel of his semi, he would line pick out a spot on the windshield (watermark or bug remnants, no matter) like it was a gun-site, and imagine the dotted line of bullets traveling through the air, eventually finding their home in the heads and chests of passing motorists. He spent at least eight hours a day on the road, and many of them spent playing this game.
He dreamt about it other places too. Standing in line at the bank or at Wendy’s or walking the aisles in the grocery store. He could imagine the sound of bullets on bone and the rapturous roar of the gun in his hands as people ran screaming.
But Tommy had never held, much less owned a gun. He was no real threat. He was just a man bored on the road, and like most of us, wishing he were someone else.
I hadn’t seen him for eight years, but there’s nothing like a funeral to bring family around. We had never been close, so it wasn’t odd for me to stand in the corner and not make the effort to go over and greet him right away. I watched him for awhile as he spoke with the rest of the family that had gathered around upon his arrival.
His suit was a flat new blue that had most likely never even been cleaned before. I checked the wrists for hanging tags. The cut and look of the fabric made me conclude that Wal Mart had started selling suits. A thick linked gold bracelet sparkled out of the cuff of his right sleeve, and the silver of a chunky Timex poked out from under the left. He wore silver cufflinks, and the way he waved his arms about as he spoke told me that he thought they were classy.
I imagined him replaying the afternoon later that night at the hotel bar, thinking to himself that the strangers in the room must have been asking themselves who that sharp dressed fellow with the soul patch and cufflinks was. That guy had something.
When in fact, what Tommy had was a hotel bill being paid for by his sister and a 1997 International with over 900,000 miles on it; A truck that the bank was threatening to track down and take back unless some money exchanged hands quickly.
There was a lull in the conversation, and some of the family members drifted away to speak in smaller circles. I watched Tommy as he ran the palms of his hands down his face. To many, it was a sign of grief; a man wiping away sadness. I knew that it meant he had been drinking, and was not alone in my thoughts.
“Someone got started early,” someone whispered nearby.
I watched quietly as he approached the casket for the first time, crying softly to himself, looking down at his sister. For the first time since his arrival, he wasn’t making a production of his actions. I looked away and gave him privacy.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Unnatural Fear Number One
Sometimes, I'm awake and I'm waiting for it. I'm expecting it.
It will be a thousand thunderclaps at once or a shotgun blast in your head bouncing back and forth between your ears. It will be the sound of my bedroom door being kicked down in the middle of the night, splintering, the frame fractured and seeping its pine scent. Gabriel's horn will roll through the hills, beating the lush green mountains to dust and leveling humanity.
I flinch with each dropped box or gunshot that rings out in the dark, honestly worried it will be the thing that finally tips the scales out of our favor, setting flame to the short fuse rooted in the powder keg of night. The explosion will push across the universe, no atmosphere to slow its path. Its light will bloom so intensely from behind the sun that the warm rays of sunlight will be replaced with a thin caustic shadow withering plants and scattering the animals.
I've been waiting since I was a kid. I would lay there in the night, door cracked allowing light from the hallway to spill into the room, waiting for the crash..the explosion. Logically I don't really believe it will ever come, and I get the feeling that I keep imagining it so that if it ever does happen, I won't be surprised. I'll be the one person who knew.
And I'm still that kid. Sometimes, there in the night I still wonder when it will happen. When will the sky be torn apart leaving us to float in its blood? When will the monumental sound of everything stopping all at once rip us screaming from sleep?
It will be a thousand thunderclaps at once or a shotgun blast in your head bouncing back and forth between your ears. It will be the sound of my bedroom door being kicked down in the middle of the night, splintering, the frame fractured and seeping its pine scent. Gabriel's horn will roll through the hills, beating the lush green mountains to dust and leveling humanity.
I flinch with each dropped box or gunshot that rings out in the dark, honestly worried it will be the thing that finally tips the scales out of our favor, setting flame to the short fuse rooted in the powder keg of night. The explosion will push across the universe, no atmosphere to slow its path. Its light will bloom so intensely from behind the sun that the warm rays of sunlight will be replaced with a thin caustic shadow withering plants and scattering the animals.
I've been waiting since I was a kid. I would lay there in the night, door cracked allowing light from the hallway to spill into the room, waiting for the crash..the explosion. Logically I don't really believe it will ever come, and I get the feeling that I keep imagining it so that if it ever does happen, I won't be surprised. I'll be the one person who knew.
And I'm still that kid. Sometimes, there in the night I still wonder when it will happen. When will the sky be torn apart leaving us to float in its blood? When will the monumental sound of everything stopping all at once rip us screaming from sleep?
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Untitled (First Draft Doodling -Now with extra edits!)
(NOTE: The following post has been cleaned up a bit since it was first posted. My lovely wife is the best editor I could ask for when it comes to grammar and punctuation. It's nice to have someone you care about point out how bad you are at something. Thanks, honey.)
"Why don't we hear birds singing more often here?" she asked as they walked through the forest, following the ragged, rock-studded trail. Phillip had stopped walking and closed his eyes listening, noticing for the first time the oddly quiet trees. It did seem strange to be in the middle of the forest and to hear so few birds.
"Maybe it's too early for most of them?" he said, guessing. He heard his wife sigh as she started walking again. She had little use for guesses as a rule, and even less patience for guesses that came from him. She had once complained that he had to have an answer for everything, and even if he didn't know, he would make up an answer just to have something to say.
It was the lack of bird song in the air that Phillip found himself thinking about as he regained consciousness. He was on his back, and his blurry gaze smeared the electric-green pines across a clouding sky. He lay still, letting his over-tasked mind take stock of the dozens of messages his body was sending him all at once. The left leg screamed the loudest, its voice cracking and breaking with the force, pushing the slightly softer voices coming from the rest of his body to the background. Phillip started to reach instinctively with his right arm to run down the outside edge of his leg, but it wouldn't move. Best to think about the arm in a minute, he thought, and decided to try his left.
Phillip's index and middle fingers walked slowly down the outside of his hip and down his leg, pulling its arm behind it until he felt his left shoulder lower just slightly, causing a jagged flash of pain to rip across his chest. His fingertips rested on jagged splinters of what he reasoned must be bone. "Shit" he muttered.
Slowly he tried to account for his injuries as best as he could without moving. His left leg was broken into kindling, right arm still immobile, left wrist throbbing with each beat of his heart. Phillip's chest felt like a barbed-wire tumbleweed was blowing around, scraping at the inside of his skin and lungs with each breath. He closed his eyes and tried to control his breathing, not wanting the panic that was tapping him on the shoulder to crawl on top of him and start screaming the truth of his situation in his face.
In movies, when someone wakes up after being knocked unconscious they awaken confused, never sure what happened to them. It takes a doctor or sensative-eyed police officer gently breaking the news before realization and memory comes flooding back. For Phillip though, he remembered everything. He remembered standing on the overlook, watching the swaying treetops at eye level. He remembered the sudden absence of ground under his feet. He remembered the blur of rock and sky. He remembered the warmth of Janelle's palms in the middle of his back and being surprised at the force and strength behind them as she pushed.
Slowly, Phillip opened his eyes and looked to the cliff face above where she still stood, looking down on him. Small in the distance, he imagined a look of disappointment on her face as she looked down at his small movements. They stayed that way, Janelle with arms crossed glaring down the cliff, Phillip reclining amongst the rocks his limbs improbably folded in 45 degree angles, looking at each other through the distance. Slowly, Janelle turned and disappeared from sight.
A soft red movement caught Phillip's eye, and he turned his head to examine the source. High above, perched near the top of a still-budding Maple, a Robin had lighted and swayed in the breeze watching him. Feeling insecure with its perch, the Robin flitted and adjusted, finding purchase on a thicker branch. The bird seemed unafraid, accustomed to the heavy weekend traffic of the state park. Still, it kept its distance while appearing to maintain eye contact and Phillip found himself seeing the same disappointed look that had clouded his wife's face in the sharp intelligence of the Robin's eyes.
Without telegraphing intention, the Robin swooped down and found rest on a lower branch, this one a mere ten feet from Phillip. Still it seemed to keep its focus on him, never looking side to side.
Phillip smiled up at the bird. He saw it breathe in and open its mouth.
"Are you going to sing for me?" he whispered up, his chest pinching around the words.
The bird closed its mouth, turned to the side and flew away.
"Why don't we hear birds singing more often here?" she asked as they walked through the forest, following the ragged, rock-studded trail. Phillip had stopped walking and closed his eyes listening, noticing for the first time the oddly quiet trees. It did seem strange to be in the middle of the forest and to hear so few birds.
"Maybe it's too early for most of them?" he said, guessing. He heard his wife sigh as she started walking again. She had little use for guesses as a rule, and even less patience for guesses that came from him. She had once complained that he had to have an answer for everything, and even if he didn't know, he would make up an answer just to have something to say.
It was the lack of bird song in the air that Phillip found himself thinking about as he regained consciousness. He was on his back, and his blurry gaze smeared the electric-green pines across a clouding sky. He lay still, letting his over-tasked mind take stock of the dozens of messages his body was sending him all at once. The left leg screamed the loudest, its voice cracking and breaking with the force, pushing the slightly softer voices coming from the rest of his body to the background. Phillip started to reach instinctively with his right arm to run down the outside edge of his leg, but it wouldn't move. Best to think about the arm in a minute, he thought, and decided to try his left.
Phillip's index and middle fingers walked slowly down the outside of his hip and down his leg, pulling its arm behind it until he felt his left shoulder lower just slightly, causing a jagged flash of pain to rip across his chest. His fingertips rested on jagged splinters of what he reasoned must be bone. "Shit" he muttered.
Slowly he tried to account for his injuries as best as he could without moving. His left leg was broken into kindling, right arm still immobile, left wrist throbbing with each beat of his heart. Phillip's chest felt like a barbed-wire tumbleweed was blowing around, scraping at the inside of his skin and lungs with each breath. He closed his eyes and tried to control his breathing, not wanting the panic that was tapping him on the shoulder to crawl on top of him and start screaming the truth of his situation in his face.
In movies, when someone wakes up after being knocked unconscious they awaken confused, never sure what happened to them. It takes a doctor or sensative-eyed police officer gently breaking the news before realization and memory comes flooding back. For Phillip though, he remembered everything. He remembered standing on the overlook, watching the swaying treetops at eye level. He remembered the sudden absence of ground under his feet. He remembered the blur of rock and sky. He remembered the warmth of Janelle's palms in the middle of his back and being surprised at the force and strength behind them as she pushed.
Slowly, Phillip opened his eyes and looked to the cliff face above where she still stood, looking down on him. Small in the distance, he imagined a look of disappointment on her face as she looked down at his small movements. They stayed that way, Janelle with arms crossed glaring down the cliff, Phillip reclining amongst the rocks his limbs improbably folded in 45 degree angles, looking at each other through the distance. Slowly, Janelle turned and disappeared from sight.
A soft red movement caught Phillip's eye, and he turned his head to examine the source. High above, perched near the top of a still-budding Maple, a Robin had lighted and swayed in the breeze watching him. Feeling insecure with its perch, the Robin flitted and adjusted, finding purchase on a thicker branch. The bird seemed unafraid, accustomed to the heavy weekend traffic of the state park. Still, it kept its distance while appearing to maintain eye contact and Phillip found himself seeing the same disappointed look that had clouded his wife's face in the sharp intelligence of the Robin's eyes.
Without telegraphing intention, the Robin swooped down and found rest on a lower branch, this one a mere ten feet from Phillip. Still it seemed to keep its focus on him, never looking side to side.
Phillip smiled up at the bird. He saw it breathe in and open its mouth.
"Are you going to sing for me?" he whispered up, his chest pinching around the words.
The bird closed its mouth, turned to the side and flew away.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Baby's Breath
Stepped out back to watch the dogs run through the yard and play in their early morning exuberance. Snow was falling and it stung my face. It felt good as it iced over my grogginess and made me wish for a moment I could be small like them and run around the yard in figure eights, nipping at their tails. The air was so clean and that it seemed to fill corners of my lungs that hadn’t been used in months.
I thought this must be like being a newborn, sucking in that first confused breath with infant lungs. I am a baby, gasping for my first mouthful of sterile hospital air. Just enough breath to be able to close my eyes and scream at you all for pulling me out of the damp warmth and dark that had been home.
I thought this must be like being a newborn, sucking in that first confused breath with infant lungs. I am a baby, gasping for my first mouthful of sterile hospital air. Just enough breath to be able to close my eyes and scream at you all for pulling me out of the damp warmth and dark that had been home.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Table Top Garden
Earlier in the day, Edward couldn’t drink enough beer. One after another they were drained as he sat at his desk, staring out the window overlooking the front yard and refusing to count the collection of bottles piling up beside the dormant printer. From the computer’s speakers played some mostly forgotten blues song from a CD Edward purchased because he didn’t have enough Blues in his collection. None of the songs were exactly grabbing him, but he listened anyway, feeling that he was supposed to like what he was hearing even if he didn’t.
Edward opened another beer and resumed his gaze out the second story window overlooking the front yard.
Dandelions are waging war against the sidewalk in front of my house.
Each day, more and more of them shoulder their way through the cracking concrete. Mustard smudges from his view on the second floor, and little more. While the cracked and ragged sidewalk seems stuffed with the rusting blooms, Edward’s yard, un-mowed for the past week and a half is devoid of them.
“Why wouldn’t they just come up where it’s easy?” he mumbled to himself, reaching for the bottle at the edge of the desk. Three feet to the right, and the soft ground would practically push them into the sun, plus they’d avoid his neighbor Dan and his German Shepherd Daisy on their frequent mile long walk into town.
“Dan and Daisy. Ha!” Edward looked away from his translucent reflection coming from dormant computer monitor.
With teeth shrink wrapped with gelatin from too much mouth breathing, Edward felt groggy and hot. Suddenly feeling weighed down by the clothes he’s wearing, Edward shifted uncomfortably in his chair while pulling absently at the chest of his T-shirt. He felt as if the cotton sticking to his skin was soaked in honey, and it stung like a cat scratch. He wanted to be naked, but didn’t want to chance seeing his own body reflected in the monitor to his right. That, and he know the chair would against his naked skin would feel like rolling in gravel.
He never seemed to get his glasses clean. Through the greasy lenses the dandelions Monet themselves. Edward takes a long pull off his bottle of Shiner and closes his eyes to the harsh Texas sun and the sidewalk battle taking place outside. When he was a child, Edward would pick what seemed to be hundreds of Dandelions, stuffing the stems into ever-dirty hands that smelled of earth and their overgrown lawn. When he had as many as he could carry in small hands he would take them into the house and give them to his mother. With her thick glasses low on her nose and her brow creased with worry, she would smile as she saw me coming.
“What a nice gentleman you are to bring your favorite lady flowers!”
In a home without a vase, the flowers would be stuffed into a Mason jar filled partially with water where they would stay until they browned and wilted. During dinner in the evenings she would point them out to the family.
“Dave, did you see the flowers Edward brought me today? Aren’t they pretty?”
“Yeah, I did. Real nice, Eddie.”
Edward opened his eyes slowly to the sun. Looking back, Dandelions were the only flowers that ever came through the door of that house when he was a kid. He never remembered his dad surprising his mom with even a simple bouquet of spring flowers or a pot of mums in the fall. Not sure why he was even thinking about these things, Edward stood unsteadily to head downstairs where it was cooler.
Edward opened another beer and resumed his gaze out the second story window overlooking the front yard.
Dandelions are waging war against the sidewalk in front of my house.
Each day, more and more of them shoulder their way through the cracking concrete. Mustard smudges from his view on the second floor, and little more. While the cracked and ragged sidewalk seems stuffed with the rusting blooms, Edward’s yard, un-mowed for the past week and a half is devoid of them.
“Why wouldn’t they just come up where it’s easy?” he mumbled to himself, reaching for the bottle at the edge of the desk. Three feet to the right, and the soft ground would practically push them into the sun, plus they’d avoid his neighbor Dan and his German Shepherd Daisy on their frequent mile long walk into town.
“Dan and Daisy. Ha!” Edward looked away from his translucent reflection coming from dormant computer monitor.
With teeth shrink wrapped with gelatin from too much mouth breathing, Edward felt groggy and hot. Suddenly feeling weighed down by the clothes he’s wearing, Edward shifted uncomfortably in his chair while pulling absently at the chest of his T-shirt. He felt as if the cotton sticking to his skin was soaked in honey, and it stung like a cat scratch. He wanted to be naked, but didn’t want to chance seeing his own body reflected in the monitor to his right. That, and he know the chair would against his naked skin would feel like rolling in gravel.
He never seemed to get his glasses clean. Through the greasy lenses the dandelions Monet themselves. Edward takes a long pull off his bottle of Shiner and closes his eyes to the harsh Texas sun and the sidewalk battle taking place outside. When he was a child, Edward would pick what seemed to be hundreds of Dandelions, stuffing the stems into ever-dirty hands that smelled of earth and their overgrown lawn. When he had as many as he could carry in small hands he would take them into the house and give them to his mother. With her thick glasses low on her nose and her brow creased with worry, she would smile as she saw me coming.
“What a nice gentleman you are to bring your favorite lady flowers!”
In a home without a vase, the flowers would be stuffed into a Mason jar filled partially with water where they would stay until they browned and wilted. During dinner in the evenings she would point them out to the family.
“Dave, did you see the flowers Edward brought me today? Aren’t they pretty?”
“Yeah, I did. Real nice, Eddie.”
Edward opened his eyes slowly to the sun. Looking back, Dandelions were the only flowers that ever came through the door of that house when he was a kid. He never remembered his dad surprising his mom with even a simple bouquet of spring flowers or a pot of mums in the fall. Not sure why he was even thinking about these things, Edward stood unsteadily to head downstairs where it was cooler.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Doodling At Lunch
It was finally over. Silence fell on the cellar as her screams trailed off into unconsciousness. He loomed over her, a machine assembled for destruction with eyes flat and lifeless. They had stood calmly out in the middle of the chaos of flailing limbs and random violence like twin eyes of a hurricane. Slowly, he ran his finger along the exhausted and crumbling mortar in the wall watching the graying clumps soundlessly fall to the dirt floor.
I had been too afraid to follow him into the cellar, and now he looked back to where I was standing in the doorway. The dim light from the stairwell crawled limply toward him, but thankfully failed to illuminate the far corners. My shadow, also refusing to enter the room, collected under my feet trembling.
"Yes," he said moving his eyes back to the body at his feet. "This place will do just fine."
I had been too afraid to follow him into the cellar, and now he looked back to where I was standing in the doorway. The dim light from the stairwell crawled limply toward him, but thankfully failed to illuminate the far corners. My shadow, also refusing to enter the room, collected under my feet trembling.
"Yes," he said moving his eyes back to the body at his feet. "This place will do just fine."
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