A Thick View of the World

He worked in a new commercial park, all of the buildings low and long stretching like a fungus over the cleared land. He was sitting on the steps outside of his building, his head between his legs.

She rolled down the car window. "Why aren't you inside?" she asked.

"Are you kidding me?"

"What's the matter with you?" she asked. "It was like there was a shooting here, the way you were beeping me, a mutiny or something."

"I don't feel very well." He took off his shoes and reclined on the passenger side, the seat clicking all the way down. "I hate this car," he said.

She could never sleep in the car; it would make her sick. She would wake up with nausea and a thick view of the world.

"Should I get you some soup or something?" she asked. Chinese noodles out of a plastic sack with salty spice, a food made for the very poor, and not nutritious, something his mother prepared when he was ill. His mother's rituals made no sense to her.

"I'm craving clove cigarettes," he said.

"I don't know where I'd get those."

"You used to smoke them when you were quitting." It was true; for the time she spent in the car alone, she had three in the glove box, slid in the body of a flashlight. Her eyes went there. His head was turned.



Bluejay

When the attendant brought out the garbage, we stood from the curb and went inside. He shoplifted while I tried on sunglasses at the rack by the front door. Looking in the mirror on the rack, I realized my hair had dried wrong and became embarrassed. I pulled my barrette out and shook loose the sticking strands above the rest of the listless mass. He must have thought my hair looked ugly too, but he hadn't said anything, not all day, and for a moment I didn't know if I should be grateful. I saw him slide two packs of cigarettes into his back pocket as I passed by the automotive accessories, touching the Jesus air freshener, my tennis shoes squeaking over the tile. "Let's share a Big Gulp, Bluejay," he said.

Ekleksographia:
Wave Two

March, 2010

Fiction

Jennifer Pieroni

Jennifer Pieroni is editor-in-chief of the literary journal, Quick Fiction. Her work has appeared in Hobart, elimae, Bateau, Corduroy Mtn, and Wigleaf, among others. Work is forthcoming in Another Chicago Magazine and PANK.