I wake up and
I’m in the desert
—
Francine Witte
AND SURPRISE, IT’S VIBRANT and lush. Nothing like movie deserts we watched in scratchy black and white with water puddles all hazy and mirage. There’s even a diner, Maizie’s Desert Diner, and that is, in fact, how I know where I am.
I don’t know how I got here. I went to sleep at Martin’s house. We didn’t have sex, thirteen weeks in a row. When I told my shrink about this week six, she called it a sex desert. Said I was stranded or something. A sex desert, yes.
Martin is nowhere to be found in my beautiful new desert. And then I am thinking, was Martin a mirage? Was he a puddle of love in the almost distance, something I thought I could reach?
I walk into Maizie’s Desert Diner. Men and men and men at the counter. I take a seat in a booth. There are pots of coffee and glazed pastries under glass domes. I am hungry everywhere I look.
Maizie, 40 and plump and comfy, comes over and hands me a menu and I start to scan for burgers or maybe soup. “Oh, we don’t do that here” she says and points to the daily special—She suggests the special—a vacation in Florida. Adorned with palm trees and sprinkled through with misty salt air.
I’ll give you a minute she says and whisks away through the double doors that lead into the kitchen. I look over the menu. Under the section, badges I should have gotten in the Girl Scouts,I go right to the cooking badge which I could have gotten had I been able to boil eggs.
I go on and on. Things I wish I could tell my mother, and cars I wish I could own. And the men, all those men, at the counter, are offering to help me. Maizie brings me a tall iced tea. We never get that thirsty here in this desert, she says, but this is on the house.
I am thinking how odd it is to be this quenched in a desert. On my phone, a tiny text. Martin, of course. Still love me, boo?
My mouth dries up, like the blowy scratchy sand you see in those old movies. I suddenly want to crawl right into a puddle. •
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Francine Witte is a flash fiction writer and poet, and the author of the flash collection RADIO WATER. Her newest poetry book, Some Distant Pin of Light, has just been published by Cervena Barva Press. Her work has been widely published, and she is a recent recipient of a Pushcart Prize. She lives in New York City.
Website | Twitter | Instagram
I don’t know how I got here. I went to sleep at Martin’s house. We didn’t have sex, thirteen weeks in a row. When I told my shrink about this week six, she called it a sex desert. Said I was stranded or something. A sex desert, yes.
Martin is nowhere to be found in my beautiful new desert. And then I am thinking, was Martin a mirage? Was he a puddle of love in the almost distance, something I thought I could reach?
I walk into Maizie’s Desert Diner. Men and men and men at the counter. I take a seat in a booth. There are pots of coffee and glazed pastries under glass domes. I am hungry everywhere I look.
Maizie, 40 and plump and comfy, comes over and hands me a menu and I start to scan for burgers or maybe soup. “Oh, we don’t do that here” she says and points to the daily special—She suggests the special—a vacation in Florida. Adorned with palm trees and sprinkled through with misty salt air.
I’ll give you a minute she says and whisks away through the double doors that lead into the kitchen. I look over the menu. Under the section, badges I should have gotten in the Girl Scouts,I go right to the cooking badge which I could have gotten had I been able to boil eggs.
I go on and on. Things I wish I could tell my mother, and cars I wish I could own. And the men, all those men, at the counter, are offering to help me. Maizie brings me a tall iced tea. We never get that thirsty here in this desert, she says, but this is on the house.
I am thinking how odd it is to be this quenched in a desert. On my phone, a tiny text. Martin, of course. Still love me, boo?
My mouth dries up, like the blowy scratchy sand you see in those old movies. I suddenly want to crawl right into a puddle. •
Francine Witte is a flash fiction writer and poet, and the author of the flash collection RADIO WATER. Her newest poetry book, Some Distant Pin of Light, has just been published by Cervena Barva Press. Her work has been widely published, and she is a recent recipient of a Pushcart Prize. She lives in New York City.
Website | Twitter | Instagram