The man in black with Sprite and Pop-Tarts

~ Christi

Ana T. knew it would be a strange day the moment she opened her eyes. The sun streaming through her purple curtains cast its eerie glow around her room, but that wasn’t what alarmed her. She rose and looked at her alarm clock, blaring No Sleep Till Brooklyn like usual, pulled off her pjs, walked naked to the shower, and stood under the steaming water wondering what would be different about today.

Ana T. dried herself in front of the full-length mirror, dressed in a t-shirt and jeans (no bra), and contemplated. No, it wasn’t nerves over her audition this afternoon or boredom over the morning she needed to spend studying. No, it wasn’t her dwindling food supply or her nearly empty bank account. It was something else.

She slung her backpack over her shoulder and reached into the cabinet on her way to the door. She was pissed off to find the box of Pop-Tarts empty. She tossed the box in the trash and slammed the door on her way out. She compensated for breakfast by listening to Cake on the train and she used her last set of quarters to buy a coffee from a cart outside the library.

Ana T. noticed the man in black slouching over a desk in the back corner of the library and wondered if he was reading something interesting. A bottle of Sprite sat before him on his desk. She took a desk next to the stacks and dumped her bag on the chair. She set her coffee down and wandered the row of books until she found the one she was looking for on the very top shelf. It had a unicorn on its spine.

She reached way up for the book, and she caught the man in black watching her. No, there was no mistake about it, he was staring. Probably checking out my boobs, Ana thought. Her hand slipped and the book with the unicorn on its spine fell. It was quite heavy and it hit her on the forehead with a thud. Ana crumpled to the ground, a goose egg forming and the book lying upside down next to her, dejected. Damn, she thought, her hand pressing on the goose egg. How am I going to explain this at the audition?

“Let me help you up,” the man in black said from behind her.

“Thanks,” Ana held up her hand.

He pulled her up and bent down to pick up the book with the unicorn on its spine. He flipped through it. “Looks like a good one,” he smiled and handed it back to her.

“Yeah,” she said, straightening her shirt and rubbing her head.

“That’s going to leave a mark,” the man in black laughed. He seemed to be joking, Ana T. thought.

He walked back to his desk and picked up his bag and the bottle of Sprite. He walked back to her and held out the bottle. “Here, it’s cold. Put it on your head.”

She did.

Meanwhile, the man in black pulled something out of his bag. It was a Pop-Tart with rainbow sprinkles.

“Would you like a Pop-Tart, young lady?” he asked with a grin.

Ana T. could not believe her eyes. “What flavor?” she asked.

“Um, I think it’s chocolate,” the man in black peered at the Pop-Tart to make sure.

“Yes, thank you!” Ana T. grabbed the Pop-Tart and took a bite.

“One more thing,” the man in black reached into his back pocket. “I have a job that I think you’d be perfect for. Here’s my card in case you’re interested. Just call anytime,” He held out the card. Ana looked deeply into his face as if she were deaf and trying to lip read. Finally she set down the bottle of Sprite and took the card.

“Thanks,” she murmured. He smiled and walked back to his desk. She took another bite of Pop-Tart and looked at the card in her hand. It had a unicorn on it. Ana T. didn’t think it was a coincidence. She finished the Pop-Tart and pulled her phone out of her pocket. She called the number on the card. The man in black reached for his phone.

She ended up skipping her audition.

 

Day trip

~ Christi ~ 5 Comments

The sun cast long shadows on the lush hillsides when they stopped for a cathedral lunch and watched the pretty girl with light green eyes worm a proposal out of her silver-haired date.

 

I totally swiped the cathedral lunch idea for this week’s Trifecta Challenge, including the third definition of worm. Please don’t tell!

Ted Nugent, this is not about you

~ Christi
via guitarworld.com
via guitarworld.com

Ted Nugent, I have to admit that I don’t know much about you. We don’t have a lot in common. I’m not a big fan of classic rock and I don’t own a single gun. But I think you made a good point last month with your tirade at President Obama. You got to me, Mr. Nugent.

You called him a subhuman mongrel. I would have chosen a different, less disparaging term, like maybe uncanny hybrid. Yours was richer, though. Yours was more immediate and more emotional. You exploited the specter of race and the cold blunt dagger of Nazism. You scared us. You went on to throw in some astute observations of Chicago politics and you romanticized it all with your reference to those Roaring 20s bad boys, the gangsters.

Mr. Nugent, you were right, you know. Barack Obama showed us all how he operates beyond the boundaries of politics, and he did it from the start of his first campaign for president, when he shamelessly called on us Americans to hope, that four-letter word that just refuses to be pushed down into the mundane. And President Obama continues to refuse to play by the rules. Did you notice how, in the State of the Union Address last month, he laid out his plans to dodge Congress to achieve his goals? President Obama knows how to deftly create his own reality. Like I said, I prefer to spin toward the positive, but we can work with subhuman. At least it gives him space to fly under the radar.

And, Mr. Nugent, you do know that African Americans have long capitalized on the so-called tragic mulatto, right? That mixed-race figure that never quite fits in anywhere can turn its hybrid possibilities into a road map for interracial relations. Not that you are overly concerned with racial relations, Mr. Nugent, but you called it. President Obama is a mixed breed. I’m one, too.

I don’t know if you’ve ever lived in Chicago, but I’ve lived here for awhile now and surprisingly, I’ve discovered that this town has driven me away from the far left. All that I can say is, when one party runs things unchecked, bad things happen. This city has an infinite appetite for money, like a ravenous beast gnashing its teeth at us taxpayers, demanding us to fork over its next binge. You’re right, Mr. Nugent, there is something soul-crushingly communist about paying for parking on Sundays.

Now, I know that you like guns, Mr. Nugent. And when I see a photo like the one here, I can’t help but wonder whether you don’t really fancy yourself a bit of a gangster, too. So maybe you speak from experience when you call the president one. Whatever – I’ll bet Barack Obama doesn’t mind the bad boy moniker.

You’re a rock star, Mr. Nugent. You’re also multifaceted, just like our president. You’re not only a down-home rocker but also a hobbyist, a writer, a speaker, a Christian. You’re a real agent provocateur. What made your tirade so powerful was the truth at its core. I know that, you know that, and I’ll bet President Obama knows it too.

I think you’re on to something here, Mr. Nugent. You got our attention, and even though your friends in Congress made you apologize for it, you got us thinking about how things could be different. But what’s next? I’d like to see more of you. Maybe you should run for president.

Better off after all

~ Christi ~ 11 Comments
hay-bales-sandra-c
Copyright Sandra Cook

She hid her children deep within the bales of hay on the truckbed and watched the laborers as they drove off, up the rutted roads. Inside the walls of the community, the workers lifted heavy bale after heavy bale, all the while wondering at the tiny squeaks eking out now and then.

Mice, they thought.

When one tall, dark laborer at last reached the children’s cubby, the squeaks had long since quieted. He wailed when he saw their thin faces, and unwound their small bodies from their brightly colored blankets.

Sad—true—but at least they had found a better life, he thought as he lifted his shovel.

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Invaded

~ Christi ~ 14 Comments

When he was inside her, Suzanna could feel his deep voice reverberating through all of her chambers. His voice was so deep that it seemed not quite human.

The first time it had happened, she couldn’t believe it.

Having someone invade her body felt like being on an extended job interview, as if every move, every single thought was somehow being judged for its merit. Suzanna found herself constantly on her best behavior while he was inside her.

That first time, they went shopping together. He was kind enough to let her drive, since he didn’t have complete control of all of her muscles and joints. She parked near Nordstrom. Why not shop at a nice place, Suzanna reasoned, since he was paying after all.

I’m not paying, he warned, in that deep voice of his. Damn, she thought. Oh, well.

She floated in and out of consciousness as he chose one thing and then another for her to try. No, she said to the hideous black dress. Yes to the collection of sheer tanks that showed just the right amount of skin. Yes to the purse, yes to all the shoes he chose. It was so hard to say no to that voice. It just did something to her, and Suzanna liked it. She felt more alive under its command. Suzanna put everything on her mom’s credit card. She knew that she’d regret it later, but right now she was having fun.

He took her to the lingerie department and showed her a good time. Her shopping bags were getting heavy by the time she stopped for a coffee. No need to buy him his own, Susanna laughed to herself. “What’s so funny?” asked the cute coffee guy. Wipe that smile off your face, the deep voice echoed off something inside her. She stopped smiling and took her coffee without a word.

They drove home in silence. Suzanna went in and put on some of her new things, and while she waited to hear his voice she used her blackest eyeliner pen to draw a perfect circle on her cheek. She couldn’t have said why. She filled it in, and admired her reflection in the full-length mirror. She twirled in her new shoes and barely noticed how quiet it had gotten in her mind.

After a while she got confused. She couldn’t tell where she ended and the world began. She lay down on her bed in her new heels, panties, and tank top and she waited for someone to tell her what to do next.

 


Feliz cumpleaños, chica

~ Christi ~ 1 Comment

Growing up is hard, that’s for sure. I’m not talking about those magical years when you get to skip out on college and bum around Europe or work some crummy dead-end job. No, I mean the day when you realize that you are irrevocably on your own for better or worse.

When I was 29, my mom died suddenly, from complications of an arthritis drug. She wasn’t exactly healthy beforehand but her death came as a shock. I got the call at five in the morning and we piled in the car and drove east for 12 hours with the radio off. I remember grasping for thoughts, for anything to make sense of what had happened. I tried to imagine a world without my mom in it, and I couldn’t do it. I was 29, about to turn 30, and I knew without a doubt that I was an adult.

I remember walking into a rest stop, and out of nowhere I heard a voice. “I love you,” the big warm voice said. “It’s going to be okay.” I looked around. No one was talking to me, but I wasn’t scared. I just imagined this voice belonged to my new – Hispanic, I imagined – mom. My new Hispanic mamá didn’t have to talk much to let me know she was there. She could just give me a word or two here, a hum or two there to let me know that things were all right. She calmed me down and showed me how to trust myself.

I know it’s silly and more than a little crazy, but I still think of my Hispanic mamá pretty often. She always knows just the right thing to say when I’m feeling bad, and she is always there with a smile when things are going right.

Today is my favorite niece’s birthday. She’s turning 29. She isn’t looking forward to her birthday or to the year ahead. She actually said that she can’t remember the last birthday that turned out how she wanted it to. She can’t remember the last birthday that was fun.

I love my niece, and I’m worried about her. She is a truly beautiful person who can’t seem to see that. She’s dealing with the fallout of having a mom who never knew how to love her. She’s struggling with health problems, with anxiety, with a comically bad living situation. I wish that I could do more for her than I can. I’m far away and ill-equipped. But I do love her very much.

I’ve been thinking of what to send my niece for her birthday. Cash is on the list, and music. But that doesn’t seem like nearly enough for a girl who is on the brink of adulthood and needs a lifesaving infusion of love. How do you love a girl from afar enough to make a difference?

I’m packing up a box to send to my favorite niece. I’m putting lots of little things in it that I hope will make her laugh, but I have one more gift for her and it won’t fit inside the box. Sarah, I’m giving you my Hispanic mamá. She’s yours now. Do you feel her inside of you? She’s sweet and kind and a little tough.

“Te amo, chica.” Can you hear her? “Tu eres hermosa.” Listen to her, it’s true. One more thing: She gives the best hugs.

 

 

Too far

~ Christi ~ 11 Comments

I told her to lose the yoga pants.

Get hot again, I said.

I caught her draping her tits on that biker dude’s arm and I lost it.

I’m hot, baby, she said.

That wasn’t what I meant.

 

Thirty-three words ending with “That wasn’t what I meant.” The possibilities are truly endless. Why don’t you take a shot?


Encore

~ Christi ~ 13 Comments

My mom was murdered by a used-car salesman.

If my mom were telling you this story, it would be a comedy. She would twist her heartbreak into dark tendrils of humor until you were on the floor laughing. But she’s dead, so I will try to do it justice.

My mom died under mysterious circumstances but she was not murdered. In retrospect, her death fell at the end of a long line of clues, as well documented as any stack of stolen credit card receipts shoved in a dresser drawer could hope to be.

My mom liked creeps and I suspect that she knew a lot of them. Three creeps in particular she knew intimately. She married one at nineteen, my sister’s dad, and she had a run-in with one at 35 that left her with me. She found the worst of her creeps in a phone-sex chat room in early 2002. She was 64 and ten years older than him – you can do the math.

Mike was an on-again, off-again used-car salesman. He’d sell you a used car whether you wanted one or not. He’d sell you a used car if you asked him about the weather and he’d sell you a used car on your birthday. He sold used cars so well that he went to jail for it several times, the last time just weeks after he married my mom in 2003.

My mom waited patiently for his return a year later. I won’t tell you about how I paid her rent and her expenses while he was in prison. It’s beside the point how much I worried that Mike the used-car salesman would return, or worse, that he wouldn’t.

Mike the used-car salesman returned shortly before my Bubbie died. He timed his reappearance well, and made off with my Bubbie’s life savings, an act that revealed his great ingenuity and patience. He spent his treasure trove on scummy motel rooms and gifts for younger, hotter finds from the sex chat room.

In 2006, my mom fell on the grass while she was walking their Yorkie. She waited hours on the ground for Mike to return from the used-car lot cum scummy motel room. My mom died a few days later in a crummy hospital ICU, her organs shutting down because of drug complications. My mom was not murdered by a used-car salesman, but she may as well have been.

In a cruel twist of fate like most twists of fate are, Mike the used-car salesman died two months later in my mom’s bed of all places. When I got there, I found all of his receipts and bank statements stuffed in a drawer and I had to laugh.

 

A revision of last week’s Yeah Write essay. Thanks for the thoughtful comments, Obed, I do think this post is a lot cleaner now.

What’s the feminine word for creep?

~ Christi ~ 10 Comments
Copyright David Stewart
Copyright David Stewart

Ann liked to lurk on the bench behind the bell and watch the JV team run sprints while she officially graded midterms. Surreptitious, she knew. But if she had to focus her mental energy on their ridiculous, self-involved schlock, she felt that she deserved the reward of watching their young, lithe bodies disturb time and space. Ann eyed the walkway as she flipped open another abysmal essay. Good. No one yet, she thought. Then she glanced down at the blue book in her hands.

“You spy, Mrs. S.” And next to it, a little smiley face. Ann cringed.

 

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