fiction

You can see me?

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Photo by Max on Unsplash

“You can see me?” 

I used to say that to strangers who insisted on talking to me when I just wanted to be alone.  Of course, they didn’t think I was really a ghost they just thought I was crazy. 

If they only knew.

I’ve been living in this town for just shy of 20 years. I have friends who are asking more and more about family and my origins-compulsing about how alone I am in the world. Wanting to be my family. 

It’s time to move on.  I don’t age and people start asking questions. There was that unfortunate situation in 1918 that I’d rather not repeat. Usually, I move on after about 15 years, but it’s getting harder to pull this off. 

In 1918 I didn’t need a photo ID or a social security card.  They’ve made identity theft harder than ever, but I manage.  I am resourceful.

I’m partial to college towns. There are lots of young women and they get careless with their backpacks especially when they think they’re sitting next to another young woman. 

“Hey!  Can you watch my stuff? I need a refill.”

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Platitudes

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Young Lady Reading a Red Book
by Amalia Suruceanu

Where did you find this card?  It is scrumptious — hand-made paper and a soft watercolor image that I think might have been an original.  You didn’t make this, did you?  Was this all your handiwork?

If so, I’ve never had a handmade card deliver an I’m breaking up with you message before. 

Your card arrived in the mail today.  I noticed the pink envelope first, and then my heart beat faster when I saw it was your handwriting. 

You’ve always been an original. 

My heart stopped for a minute after I read the first line. Although those opening words were innocuous, I knew what was coming.  I knew as soon as I saw your writing on the envelope. 

I knew. 

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Scoot

/ wvfurandroot / 7 Comments
Photo by Omar Ramadan on Unsplash

The kids were so excited to come home from school to find Scoot sitting on the porch.  His backpack was on the floor, and he was practicing the chords for Folsom Prison Blues. Marianne managed to tear herself away long enough to let me know with the required after-school phone call to check in.

“Mom, guess what!  Uncle Scoot is here! “

At that news, I wrapped the coiled cord of the business’s landline around my neck and pulled. I often did this as a joke to amuse my colleagues, but today?  Today I did want to strangle myself. 

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The Girl in Black

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Photo by Gioele Fazzeri on Unsplash

Dear Diary,

They think I don’t hear them.  They think I’m oblivious and lost in a haze of weed.  They think I’m a retro Goth.  

I don’t care what my senior class thinks.  I quit caring about sixth grade when the cliques got serious.  I really stopped caring when my great-grandfather died. I wore black to his funeral and have worn black ever since.

They all have no idea, and I like it that way.  I’m not just an introvert, I’m very private.  I don’t even talk to the therapist my social worker has been making me see for two years.  The one my state insurance pays for because we don’t have any money.

I don’t care what my family thinks.  I was a mistreated child that nobody could be bothered to rescue.  My summers with Great-Grandfather are the only reason I’m not a real mess.

I don’t care what anyone thinks.

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