FIVE FLASH FICTIONS BY FRANCINE WITTE
COLD COMFORT BY R. C. WEISSENBERG
March 13, 2019
20 THINGS CHANNEL 4 DOESN’T TEACH YOU ABOUT OCD BY JOSH WEEKS
March 19, 2019I’m standing at the alter like an idiot,
waiting for Alan to show. I stand here, limp with August all around. Thought I was clever
setting this up, telling Alan in a sexy blur to meet me in the treeless part of the forest. Past the
part where ducks quack on a waterless pond, past the part where I should know better than to
plan a surprise wedding to man who couldn’t care less, and just as I accept this, I notice Rodolfo,
the cater waiter, tray of peeled shrimp and snappy tuxedo, standing there, giving me the foxy
eye.
On the Road Again
with Willie Nelson on the radio. All kinds of Arizona surrounding us now. Flat sand desert we
have to drive out of. This car so hot, our tongues go wordless. Was it already yesterday we were
boozed up in that motel room, the two of us flying every which way? You finally confessing
about the other one, after swearing it was over, but it wasn’t. After that, there only seemed to be
one road, and we are on it now, and if we turn up the radio nice and loud, we won’t even need to
talk.
So Jimmy
sitting next to me, more a pile of bones than a person. Car hit a patch of oil and spun us into a
gully.
So Jimmy, who, in life, was just a dreamless fuck. It’s a strain, this waiting for help to come and
knowing it won’t. So Jimmy that he threw our phones away.
So Jimmy that he thought it would make us free.
So Jimmy, with his road-tanned skin and me with a hunger hole in my stomach. And help better
get here quick, before he starts to look like he’d make a pretty good meal.
Okay…
Harry tells me everything. Like how he says the quiver in his eyelids when his ex-wife calls is
out of fear, and not because of unfinished love, like I’ve suspected all along. He says she wants
more alimony. How he tried to dine it out of her last night over lobster and champagne. How he
left the house all cashmere suit and spice cologne. How when I find the motel matches in his suit
pocket, he says he was really afraid and was only trying to fuck some sense into her for once,
and, anyway, you don’t even like lobster.
Did You Bring Me a Fish Like I Asked You?
Did you think I meant one of those tuna fish affairs in aisle 6? Did you ever hear of the ocean?
Don’t you think the ocean is the obvious choice? Do you even own a fishing rod? Do you even
know how to hold a fishing rod? Is the best I can expect from you for the next fifty some-odd
years? Should I just give up now and learn to like steak? Is there somewhere else you would
rather be right now? Tell me, are these questions getting too hard?
Francine Witte is the author of four poetry chapbooks and two flash fiction chapbooks. Her full-length poetry collection, Café Crazy, has recently been published by Kelsay Books. She is reviewer, blogger, and photographer. She is a former English teacher. She lives in NYC.
