You are currently browsing the monthly archive for October 2006.
Monthly Archive
Open Closure
October 30, 2006 in 299 Words, Books, Fiction, Flash Fiction, Literature, Poetry, Short stories, Stories, Very Short Novels, Writing | Tags: Breakup, Closure, Drinking, Loss, Separation | by davidbdale | 6 comments
Already the breaking up has lasted longer than the love affair and provided her more pleasure. Another week of breaking up and this will be her most satisfying relationship yet. I’d rather drink and stay out with friends than be with you, he tells her; I never cared about you, and I don’t care about you now. I need some kind of closure, she says. I lied about the job interview, he tells her; I spent those five days sleeping with my ex. We haven’t tried everything yet, she says. I didn’t sleep with her to hurt you, he tells her; I don’t care enough to want to hurt you. I can’t believe you would lie to me when I love you, she says; if you take that job and leave me it will kill your mother; you love me but drinking confuses you. Go away now and leave me alone or do I have to hurt you, he tells her. This is what I don’t understand about men, she says, always pushing away what’s best for you. We were good together for a time, he tells her. Oh yes we were my love, she says. We were good together because you could take me or leave me, he tells her, and I could take you or leave you. I was more to you than that, she says. Don’t make me hurt you, he tells her. I’m coming up there right now, she says; we’ll talk this thing out; you owe me that much. Don’t come, he tells her; I’m drinking tonight and sleeping with my ex. The police are looking for your car, sweet baby, she says; I told them you left here driving drunk; I’ll be there in an hour. Good fuck linding me, he tells her.
Copyright ©1997
Stand and Burn
October 26, 2006 in 299 Words, Books, Fiction, Flash Fiction, Literature, Poetry, Short stories, Stories, Very Short Novels, Writing | Tags: Breath, Cry, Fire, Forget, Laugh, Memory, Mother, Panic | by davidbdale | 5 comments
My mother draws her breath like a bad cartoon. No doctor can tell us what’s wrong with her, so we don’t let them bother her. She was always busy living, proliferating. Now she’s making a career of her one death. Dad doesn’t exist. Dad never existed. She had us without him. The realtor’s office is a waking nightmare. We’re buying her last house, which means selling one. What if? she says, then loses the thread forever. Her breathing is erratic and shallow, noisy, ineffectual, disturbingly occasional. Her tissues are in panic, but in her eyes a generous urgent willingness to laugh off what is after all the very funny comic horror of her confusion if only I will signal her please signal her that I too find it funny. This is richer than fear. My hair is on fire and only she notices but no one will listen and maybe after all it’s just a style. The realtor says my mother won’t earn interest on her escrow and I say Of course, and she has to trust her son whose hair is on fire but who doesn’t seem to notice. The realtor will not meet her eye. He aims his casual agency at me. His days begin and end in conflagrations. Commissions are the warmth radiating from buyers with their heads ablaze. He shows me where to have her sign and hands me a flaming pen. Mother forgets. The world she believes to be changing so quickly is really only breathing, bellows in, ashes out. I show her again where to sign. She searches my face for a clue. She’ll cry before she signs, I know, but dammit, this time she’ll sign. If I can hold my breath and take the heat, she’ll sign. Together we stand and burn.
Copyright ©1997
Very Short Novels 