Runner
—
Masha Shukovich
I KEEP HAVING THE SAME DREAM: I’ve left my husband. But if I somehow stumbled into leaving while awake, he would find me, grab me by the chin, and hold my face close to his, my mouth staring at his mouth, like through a foggy window. People may think he’s poised for a kiss, and smile. “How in love those two are!” they’ll say admiringly. But they won’t see the tightening of fingers around my jaw as he feels for weak spots, little crevices where he can push until the wall crumbles. In his free time, he’s a craftsman who unmakes things.
My husband is not a man you can just leave, so I start leaving parts of him instead.
I take his slippers to the park first: I put them under the bench, lined up neatly next to my sneaker-clad feet. It’s like sharing the bench with an invisible man who likes his feet warm. We sit there silently for a while, the invisible man and I.
“I have to go,” I say finally. “It’s starting to rain and I have a meeting I can’t be late to.”
The words taste strange in my mouth, like a bite of too-sweet fruit from a land far away where the sun always shines.
“I’m leaving now,” I announce to the slippers, and then actually go. It’s hard, but I don’t look back once. Leaving is like training for a marathon: one step at a time. First a mile. Then two. Then three. Before long, you’re half the world away.
I used to think someone like me could never be a runner. But now I can imagine myself doing it. There’s no law against imagining, even if you don’t have the legs for it.
“Where in the hell are my slippers?” he roars later that night.
“What slippers?” I ask.
“The brown ones I wear every fucking day!” he screams.
But I can tell by the color of his voice that he’s uncertain, wobbly. There’s a hint of Egyptian blue in it, like a hairline fracture in the sky. Something is getting dislodged there.
I shrug. He blinks, like a thing that crawled out of a cave into the sunlight by mistake. I’ve never shrugged like that before. He never blinks. This is new.
It’s his socks next, then his pants. They wrap themselves around my arm, like a cat with its claws out, or an obstinate child. But I’m right there, with my best soothing voice, ready to help.
“It’s okay,” I say as I pry them away. “You’ll like the park.”
The white undershirt is the one to follow. It escapes my grip for a moment as I jog down the street and surrenders itself to the wind. How far would it fly, if I let it? Would it reach the ocean shore? Would a seabird take it to its nest, to keep its eggs warm? Do seabirds have nests, or do they sleep on top of black rocks amidst the sea spray? Do they ever feel lonely, those seabirds, or are they just glad to be free?
Soon he stops asking about his things.
“I must’ve left my sweater at work,” he mutters absentmindedly.
There’s less of him in the house; he’s wearing thin. I shrug again. There’s a rhythm to it: shrug, shrug, shrug, and away I go.
At last, it’s his hat’s turn. It refuses to budge, holding on to the stand like a drowning man, but I’m emboldened by my newfound strength, my shoulders more flexible and resilient from all the shrugging, my legs sturdier from all the jogging to the park and back.
“Come on, get going,” I say to the hat, peeling it away.
When my husband’s hat and I get to the park, it looks like there’s a person sleeping under the bench, but it’s just the clothes that live there now. It’s strange no one wanted them. They’re still good clothes. Anyone can see that, even I. The invisible sleeping man’s empty knees are bent at an impossible angle. I cover his imaginary face with the unwilling hat. Would you look at that: it fits perfectly!
Today is my last day.
I wait for my cue: the sound of the door slamming shut. I tie my shoelaces and collect my purse. I leave my keys on the counter and carefully close the door. I walk down the stairs, each familiar crack a bygone song. The pavement meets my feet with a welcoming thud. I start off walking, but once at the park, I break into a run. My legs have a mind of their own, and their mind is set on flying. I pass by the invisible man and his bench. The sleeves of his sweater flap in the wind, like he’s waving to me to stop, but I keep on going. Halfway around the world isn’t far when you’ve learned how to run. •
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Masha Shukovich (she/they) is a writer, storyteller, folklorist, teaching artist, neurodivergent person, and a brown immigrant from a country that no longer exists. Masha's ancestral and indigenous roots are in the Balkans; the Mediterranean; and West, South, Central, and Northeast Asia. Masha is the winner of many writing awards, including the Prism Review Fiction Contest, the Cutthroat Magazine’s Rick DeMarinis Short Story Prize, Page Turner Mentorship Award, and the Courage to Write Writers of Note Award, among others. Masha's work was recently shortlisted/finalist for The Masters Review’s Anthology; First Pages Prize; Jesmyn Ward Prize in Fiction; CRAFT Short Fiction Prize; and Fractured Lit’s Legends, Myths, & Allegories Prize. She is at work on a novel and a collection of short stories. Masha’s writing is inspired by the lived experiences of humanimals, shapeshifters, and apparent outsiders who seem to belong nowhere and everywhere. Masha lives and writes on the land colonially known as the Salt Lake Valley.
Website | Instagram
❊
My husband is not a man you can just leave, so I start leaving parts of him instead.
I take his slippers to the park first: I put them under the bench, lined up neatly next to my sneaker-clad feet. It’s like sharing the bench with an invisible man who likes his feet warm. We sit there silently for a while, the invisible man and I.
“I have to go,” I say finally. “It’s starting to rain and I have a meeting I can’t be late to.”
The words taste strange in my mouth, like a bite of too-sweet fruit from a land far away where the sun always shines.
“I’m leaving now,” I announce to the slippers, and then actually go. It’s hard, but I don’t look back once. Leaving is like training for a marathon: one step at a time. First a mile. Then two. Then three. Before long, you’re half the world away.
I used to think someone like me could never be a runner. But now I can imagine myself doing it. There’s no law against imagining, even if you don’t have the legs for it.
❊
“Where in the hell are my slippers?” he roars later that night.
“What slippers?” I ask.
“The brown ones I wear every fucking day!” he screams.
But I can tell by the color of his voice that he’s uncertain, wobbly. There’s a hint of Egyptian blue in it, like a hairline fracture in the sky. Something is getting dislodged there.
I shrug. He blinks, like a thing that crawled out of a cave into the sunlight by mistake. I’ve never shrugged like that before. He never blinks. This is new.
❊
It’s his socks next, then his pants. They wrap themselves around my arm, like a cat with its claws out, or an obstinate child. But I’m right there, with my best soothing voice, ready to help.
“It’s okay,” I say as I pry them away. “You’ll like the park.”
❊
The white undershirt is the one to follow. It escapes my grip for a moment as I jog down the street and surrenders itself to the wind. How far would it fly, if I let it? Would it reach the ocean shore? Would a seabird take it to its nest, to keep its eggs warm? Do seabirds have nests, or do they sleep on top of black rocks amidst the sea spray? Do they ever feel lonely, those seabirds, or are they just glad to be free?
❊
Soon he stops asking about his things.
“I must’ve left my sweater at work,” he mutters absentmindedly.
There’s less of him in the house; he’s wearing thin. I shrug again. There’s a rhythm to it: shrug, shrug, shrug, and away I go.
❊
At last, it’s his hat’s turn. It refuses to budge, holding on to the stand like a drowning man, but I’m emboldened by my newfound strength, my shoulders more flexible and resilient from all the shrugging, my legs sturdier from all the jogging to the park and back.
“Come on, get going,” I say to the hat, peeling it away.
When my husband’s hat and I get to the park, it looks like there’s a person sleeping under the bench, but it’s just the clothes that live there now. It’s strange no one wanted them. They’re still good clothes. Anyone can see that, even I. The invisible sleeping man’s empty knees are bent at an impossible angle. I cover his imaginary face with the unwilling hat. Would you look at that: it fits perfectly!
❊
Today is my last day.
I wait for my cue: the sound of the door slamming shut. I tie my shoelaces and collect my purse. I leave my keys on the counter and carefully close the door. I walk down the stairs, each familiar crack a bygone song. The pavement meets my feet with a welcoming thud. I start off walking, but once at the park, I break into a run. My legs have a mind of their own, and their mind is set on flying. I pass by the invisible man and his bench. The sleeves of his sweater flap in the wind, like he’s waving to me to stop, but I keep on going. Halfway around the world isn’t far when you’ve learned how to run. •
Masha Shukovich (she/they) is a writer, storyteller, folklorist, teaching artist, neurodivergent person, and a brown immigrant from a country that no longer exists. Masha's ancestral and indigenous roots are in the Balkans; the Mediterranean; and West, South, Central, and Northeast Asia. Masha is the winner of many writing awards, including the Prism Review Fiction Contest, the Cutthroat Magazine’s Rick DeMarinis Short Story Prize, Page Turner Mentorship Award, and the Courage to Write Writers of Note Award, among others. Masha's work was recently shortlisted/finalist for The Masters Review’s Anthology; First Pages Prize; Jesmyn Ward Prize in Fiction; CRAFT Short Fiction Prize; and Fractured Lit’s Legends, Myths, & Allegories Prize. She is at work on a novel and a collection of short stories. Masha’s writing is inspired by the lived experiences of humanimals, shapeshifters, and apparent outsiders who seem to belong nowhere and everywhere. Masha lives and writes on the land colonially known as the Salt Lake Valley.
Website | Instagram