Flash Fiction by Lee Bob Black

Following a selections from a flash fiction collection I'm writing, which I've pompously yet playfully titled, Rushed Relationships, Metaphysical Masturbations, Immediate Ideas, and Shadow Selves: Lee Bob Black’s Flash Fictions Volume 1. 

Sudoku and Scrabble! Cleverness and Conspiracy!

 

“Have you heard that playing Sudoku and Scrabble keep you smart?” Trevor says.  “That by regularly exercising your brain, you keep it strong?  Well who is behind this convenient theory?  I’ve figured it out.  Women.  Women play Sudoku, yes?  Yes.  And who plays Scrabble . . . ?”  Trevor raises his eyebrows and shoulders. 

Clarissa hesitates.  “Ahhh . . . women?” 

“You bet!  Sure, men play puzzles and games, but not nearly to the extent that women do.  So by logical extension, where must the theory come from that playing them keeps you intelligent?  Women!” 

“I . . . .” 

“You’re shocked, Clarissa, I know, I know.  Why do women go to all those lengths to suggest that something they’re doing more than men is beneficial for the brain and the mind?” 

“Who knows.  You tell me.” 

“So that women can shoot off their accusations that men are stupid,” Trevor says triumphantly.  “That’s what’s up!  It goes like this . . . men don’t play Scrabble and Sudoku as much as women do, women claim that these games and puzzles keep minds sharp, then when a man’s mind gets softer, a woman can explain it.  She can say, ‘Aha!  I told you that you were stupid!’” 

“You play Sudoku, Trevor?” 

“Nah.”   

“Ever played Scrabble?” 

“Nope.” 

 

Ashes, Surfing, Asking Her Emotions.

 

The father and daughter stand on the beach in view of Janis’s house.  He doesn’t ask his daughter if they’re ever going to be here in the years ahead, together on this beach, watching the surfers in the very waters where, tomorrow or the next day, they’ll say another goodbye to Janis. 

The father and daughter walk arm-in-arm, the sand scratchy and cold between their toes.  This is their second time walking this beach, carrying Janis’s ashes.  Both times the father has said, “It’s time to heal.”  Both times he’s urged her to scatter her mother’s remains.  Both times she’s started to say something, but has never managed to get out more than a few words.

Normally when the daughter is in a panic, or feeling lost or inadequate, and she wants to harness the opportunity, maybe learn something from it, she’ll get away from people, find a quiet place, and talk with her emotions.  She’ll sit in the bathroom of a friend’s house, or under a tree, or on the stairs leading up to her bedroom, and she’ll say something like: “Hello fear, what can you show me?”  Or she’ll say something like: “Hi loneliness, what do you have to teach me?”  Visuals appear.  Sentences form.  One time she saw herself pre-pubescent and unsure, tugging the hand of her older, current self.  The little girl inside her just wanted safety. 

They approach a surfer standing in the sand, watching the sets of waves.  The daughter asks if the surfer will teach her to surf.  He declines, and they move on to the next surfer, a woman rigorously waxing her board.  She also turns the daughter down.  The father and daughter move on. 

Three’s a charm.  The surfer says, “My name’s Travis, but you can call me Razzamadam.”

He doesn’t offer the history to his nickname, and they don’t pry. 

“I’ll teach you surfing,” Razzamadam says to the fifteen-year-old girl.  “No worries.  Would love to.  Do you have a wetsuit?” 

“No,” the daughter says, holding her mother’s box of ashes on her hip like it’s an infant.  She doesn’t tell him that she wants to learn which waves to choose, which waves to let pass.  She doesn’t tell him that she doesn’t know which questions to ask her emotions. 

Janis’s house will be up for sale next month. 

“I have a spare wetsuit that might fit you in my car,” Razzamadam says.  “We can have our first lesson now, if you’re game.” 

“I’m game.” 

 

To Cumulate.

 

“If I’m with someone,” she says, “it’s a long concentrated road to drive home an orgasm.  Lots of concentration is required.  But if I’m alone I can make myself cum quickly every time.  Without fail.  Like clockwork.  I can even make myself cum just by thinking it, sans fingers or toys.  But if I’m with someone--”

“When you're with me,” he says, pointing softly to his chest.  “We’re together.  Me and you.  Together.”

“Sorry,” she says. 

“Your abstractness grates on me.  It’s worse than referring to me in third person.”

“Sorry.”  

“All I ask,” he says, “is that you please stop speaking about having sex with men.  I'm sitting across from you.  I’m sorry to snap at you, but you speak like this often.  You speak almost dismissively.  Sure, make generalizations about having sex.  Go for it.  But when you speak of having sex, remember that you’re only having it with me--at the moment.” 

“Okay, okay,” she says, almost like a protest.  “When I’m having sex--with you, honey.  When I’m having sex with you . . . I can--sometimes--lose it.  By it I mean attention.  I can get distracted.  If I’m doing something that gives me pleasure, like riding you all wet and wild and loud and jolting--”

“I like it, I like it.” 

“--then I can be doing that for ages and loving it, absolutely loving it, and it’s likely that the more I’m loving it, the closer I am to popping off a really big silly orgasm.”  She pauses.  In a slower and lower voice, she says, “But then if something untoward happens, for instance it might occur to me that you might not be enjoying yourself, or that I’m enjoying myself at your expense, or whatever--I know, fucked up, right?--then it’s like all my cumulative pleasure, because that’s what it is, the pleasure builds and builds, and thus it’s not pleasure pure and simple, it’s a complex, cumulative pleasure . . . well, when I’m distracted, all of my pleasure gets wiped away and I have to start the orgasm again from zero.” 

“If I can be of any help, just let me know.” 

 

Pick On Somebody Your Own . . .

 

I’ve always enjoyed messing with straight people’s heads. 

Twenty years ago, upon seeing a delicate thin man, you would think: He’s definitely gay.  Nowadays, if you see a strong muscle guy with big tits, you’d think: He’s most likely gay as a goose.  

We switched that shit around. 

And remember that charismatic sociopath in that movie Basic Instinct?  She was that bisexual bitch played by Sharon Stone, remember her, the one who manipulated everyone around her and enjoyed killing people?  Well, when that movie came out, LGBT rights activists complained about the casting of a bisexual killer psycho.  Not me.  I was thrilled because I knew that straight people would start to look at me and my big strong gay chest and think: He’s got an ice-pick in his bag. 

 

Step Into Yourself.

 

You’re on a beach.

You’re warm, lonely. 

The beach is straight and visually bleeds into infinity in both directions.  There are no bays and no hills.  

You look straight ahead to the water. 

You look left.  The beach takes up a quarter of your view, the ocean another quarter, the sky the remaining half.  Half of the sun is viewable on the horizon.  The sun is rising.  From your vantage point, the rising sun is in the middle point where the sand, water, and sky converge.  

You look right.  The beach takes up a quarter of your view, the ocean another quarter, the sky the remaining half.  Half of the moon is viewable.  You don’t know if the moon is setting or rising.  From your vantage point, the moon is in the middle point where the sand, water, and sky converge. 

Except for you, the beach is unpopulated.  There’s no wind and no seagulls. 

You take your clothes off.  As soon as they hit the sand, your clothes disappear.  

You dance.  Spinning, kicking up sand, arms above your head, perspiring, screaming, giggling, almost crying. 

This is suddenly not the middle of nowhere.  This is everything; there is no middle. 

As you converge, you realize it’s all about you.  It has nothing to do with the sun, moon, beach, ocean, sky.  Without you in this picture, there is no picture, just big rocks and big gaseous explosions and everything revolving and gravitating. 

Quickly, you hate how self-serving you are. 

You stop dancing.  You reach down to the sand.  Your clothes materialize and you put them on.  You turn your back on everything and walk back to the city. 

 

Brown Triangular Pills.

 

He found the first pill in the back pocket of his blue jeans, and he instantly threw it down his gob. 

What did the pill represent?  Was it supposed to enhance something, or weaken something? 

In a pocket of his jacket, he found another pill.  This one was just like the first one: triangular and brown.  What does that mean?  And who the hell manufactures brown triangle pills? 

He swallowed it. 

He figured that these pills could be for his heart or for his blood, though their shape and color made this seem to him unlikely. 

Maybe they would augment his concentration, maybe they were vitamin supplements, or maybe they prevented something that would kill him if he didn’t take them.

He had no idea!!

He also didn’t know how these pills came to be in his pockets.  He phoned Wanda.

“Daniel,” she said, “those pills are for . . . for . . . they’re for . . . erectile function . . . I mean, erectile dysfunction.  This is always hard for me to talk about, Daniel.  It makes your erectile--I mean, it makes your erections function.”

“I don’t have erectile dysfunction.” 

“Not since you’ve been taking those brown triangles,” Wanda said. 

“How do you know all this, and why do I not remember this?” 

“How did you know to phone me to find out?”

They were silent for several moments.  Eventually his sister said, “I’m the one who gets your prescriptions filled.” 

“When did you last fill this one?” 

“A month or two ago.” 

“Why?” 

“Because you have erectile dysfunction.” 

“But I’m telling you I don’t.” 

“Because you take those pills, Daniel.” 

“Take these pills?  I found two of them randomly in my pockets--” 

“You know how you play that Coins game with Dad?  From his perspective, what’s the beauty of spilling a huge coin jar onto a table and him grouping nickels with nickels, dimes with dimes, quarters with quarters, pennies with pennies, and then, when every coin is in its group, you mix them all up and he starts again?”

“I don’t know,” Daniel said.  “He maybe thinks it’s fun because . . . I don’t know.” 

“Dad remembers how to play it, doesn’t he?”

Daniel grunted acknowledgment. 

“He remembers the rules, Daniel.  And Dad could play that game for, what?”

“Hours and hours.  He never gets bored.  Ever.”

“It’s more than that,” she said.  “He forgets that he’s already been playing it for hours.  Tomorrow you’ll have forgotten this entire conversation.” 

“Is this about denial?” he said. 

“Of course.  But that’s only the beginning.” 

 

Money and Monica and a Little Heart-To-Heart.

 

I’m Monica Lewinsky’s boyfriend. 

Just as Bill Clinton’s impeachment proceedings start up, I leave the US because the media is hounding me. 

An American journalist tracks me down in Singapore.  He shoves a microphone in my face.  A few yards away, a camerawoman does her thing.  I break out my still camera and take photos of them.  I say nothing, give no facial expressions.  I just snap their photos.  He continues firing questions at me.  I lift an index finger to my mouth and go ssshhhhh.  I turn on my heels.  The journalist and camerawoman follow.  I don’t look back. 

A minute later, I stop, look into the journalist’s eyes, and gesture disapprovingly to the video camera. 

The journalist instructs the camerawoman to hold off.  She points her bazookalike camera to the ground. 

The journalist and I walk around a corner.  I again turn my back on the journalist.  I let slip to the ground a small business-card that has one thing on it and nothing else: US$10,000.  He picks up the card, tries to chat with me.  I go sssshhhh.  I walk off. 

A month later in Hanoi, the journalist and the camerawoman are waiting for me in the hotel lobby.  He tells me he’s not going to pay me the money and he just wants to talk a little.  I walk off on him and another business card, this time with only US$15,000 written on it, drops to the ground. 

I disappear on him. 

The next week, in Bali, he gives me the $15,000 and I walk off and he protests and I say I’ll be in contact and the camerawoman does her thing.

 

Poo Yoo Boohoo.

 

It smells like poo in here!  I hate when that happens!  I just want to poo in peace, but this toilet stall already smells like poo!  That’s not cool!  That’s just not right!  All I want is to go into a public toilet that doesn’t smell like poo!  Is that too much to ask? 

I only take about five poos a year in public toilets, and my guess is that, on average, between two and four of the public toilets actually smell like poo!  That’s unbelievably annoying to people like me who don’t want to smell poo!  

No wonder that I try never to poo in public toilets.  But sometimes I simply can’t help it. 

Public toilets should smell like something nice, like roasting pumpkins or hairspray--but not poo.  That’s tacky!  That’s disgusting! 

 

Re-Shitting and De-Blaming.

 

“You started it,” Chester says.  “And if you can’t keep up with me, then don’t worry about it--because I’ll finish it.  It’s not just that if you push, then I’ll push back, or that if you fight dirty, then I’ll fight dirty.  It’s about finishing.  We both know that I’ve got truckloads more stupid stubborn energy than you, that I’m the die-hard cynical brute who’ll almost-never forget a grudge or forgive a transgression against me.  So you can start without me, but you won’t ever be able to finish without me.  But I can finish without you.”

“You have anger management problems,” Louise says.  “And articulation problems.” 

“I get what I want,” Chester says.  “And I don’t let people like you get the best of me.”  He holds up his hands as if they’re stop signs. 

“But are you justified in getting the best, so to speak, of other people?  That inherent contradiction means what to you?  Nothing?”   

“I actually manage my anger quite well, in my opinion,” Chester says.

“Taking your anger out on others isn’t managing it well.  People have been shitting on you all your life.  So what?  Does that justify you re-shitting on them?  Hardly.  That’s pathetic.”  She sticks her tongue out.  

“That’s how you do it, you get your money for nothing and your chicks for free”

“What?”  

“That’s a lyric from a Dire Straights song.”

“Oh,” Louise says, laughing slightly. 

“You give love a bad name.  Bon--”

“I know my Bon Jovi thank you,” she says.   

He laughs.  “Love is a battlefield.”

“Pat Benatar.” 

They chuckle like the lovers they once were. 

Eventually she turns serious and says, “Your problem’s not only your rage, Chester, it’s blame shift.  All your blame is like this.”  She repeatedly points her index fingers at him and around the room, thrusting her pointing fingers away from her body.  Her hands look like one of those electric turkey-cutting devices that have two alternating knives.  “By the way, I like that word, re-shitting.”  She stops talking, but her hands keep moving.  “You blame everyone else.  Chester, you’ve gotta stop doing that.”  She’s still repeatedly stabbing her accusing index fingers into his personal space. 

He rolls his eyes, shrugs his shoulders. 

Louise says, “You’ve gotta start doing more of this.”  She revolves her hands around so that her gyrating fingers are pointing directly into her chest.  She says, “You’ve got to own more of your shit, rather than claiming that everyone else is causing the shit in your life.  Take some goddamn responsibility.” 

“Cute,” he says curtly.

“Your view is that everyone else is to blame for your ills.  That idea adds up, but only if you misunderstand mathematics.  Mathematics can be beautiful, but not if your fingers are bleeding when you’re tapping on the calculator.  You can’t justify hate--especially with a flimsy argument such as, ‘They hurt me first, boo-ho me.’  Revenge isn’t justice.  Life isn’t about payback, it’s about love and laughing.”

“Prove it.  On second thoughts, don’t worry about,” he says.  “I know what you’re saying is unprovable.  Opinions are opinions, not facts.  And we’re just presenting our separate, contrasting opinions.” 

“Okay, fine.  But doesn’t the prospect of living my opinion seem more fulfilling than living yours?” 

 

Racquetball and Food.

 

Dear Mandi,

My Dad died.  He’d been going down hill for months. 

Last week the hospice informed us that he only had one or two days left.  So me and my sister Teresa flew home. 

All night, me, Teresa, Justin, and Mom, we all sat around Dad, with our hands on his body . . . I nearly wrote corpse just then, but he wasn’t a corpse yet.  He was warm--for some reason this was really important to me.  Previously I’d thought that as people got closer to death their skin chilled and became harder to the touch, like oyster shells. 

In the morning, sunshine was coming in the window, and his breathing stopped, then restarted a few seconds later.  And this went on for twenty minutes.  Stopping, silence, restarting, stopping, silence, restarting.  We held our hands on him the whole time.  Then his breath stopped for the umpteenth time, and Teresa said, “Was he always this stubborn?”  Then Mom said, “Yes.”  And Dad--that was it, his breathing didn’t restart.  It was intense. 

For the hours before he died, he looked a little deathlike--but he was still warm, like I said.  Yet a few minutes after he died, there was no mistaking that he wasn’t there.  He soon become cold like an ice tray just after you’ve cracked the ice out of it.

Our other sister, Wendy, she lives in Arizona and wasn’t able to fly home to see Dad for his last moments alive.  She has three sons, she has her own problems.  Remember, one kid with ADHD?  Another with that lung deal, remember?  Her third son hasn’t got anything wrong and debilitating with him, not yet at least.  Wendy made it to Dad’s funeral, but she felt guilty for not being there when he died.  She kept apologizing to everyone.  Over and over, apologizing.  She’d open a door and apologize.  She’d pass the breadbasket and apologize.

And wow, my Dad knew busloads of people.  At the service and at the wake, it took hours for all of his friends and acquaintances to shell out their words of sympathy, hugging us if they knew us, shaking our hands if they didn’t.  Even when strangers came up to Wendy, she apologized. 

Hordes of people I hadn’t seen in decades turned up from out of nowhere.  Where are all these people when you’re alive?  Am I stupid for asking this? 

I haven’t stopped eating for a week.  Food everywhere.  There was celery and cookies and peanut butter and coffee at the church.  I’ve never seen food like that at a church.  Is that standard fare for funerals?  Then there was a lunch--pasta and salmon and tons of finger food--at Mom’s house.  That night there was a meal at Helen’s.  People brought mounds of food.  It was strange.  The next day there was another mourning-slash-eating session at Dad’s lawn bowls club. 

Why’d I eat all week?  Because I couldn’t stop.  I’ve no clue what food signified to me, but . . . .  There’s something about death and food that just goes together. 

Are you coming up here?  I’m staying for a few more weeks, just to be here for Mom.  I think Justin’s leaving tomorrow, or he might be staying a week more, who knows.  We could play racquetball and I could show you our old high school. 

Love, Jake. 

 

Racquetball and Morphine.

 

Dear Mandi,

None of us have heard boo from you.  What’s going on?  Everything okay?  Everything not okay?  Something in between?

This has been the strangest week of my life.  Dad dying was just the start.  Justin--get this, this is absolutely crazy--he's been eating nonstop since he arrived.  He’s put on so many pounds.  Every knows that identical twins often act identically, but ever since Dad died, it’s as if Jake and I are been acting oppositely.  Where as he’s been stuffing his face with food 24 hours a day, I’ve barely eaten a morsel.  Crazy, right? 

I need to tell you about the morphine.  There was oodles of it. 

What freaked me out was the day I arrived at the hospice, this nurse shows up with a portable fridge filled with morphine.  His name was Brian or Johnny or Dave, a nothing name, one of those everyman names.  I kept thinking that this particular nurse hadn’t talked with the other nurses--the ones who had informed us that Dad was only going to live for a day or two more.  He brought days worth of morphine.  And that fucking fridge . . . I bet it had seen so many dead rooms.  So, the nurse wheels the fridge into my Dad’s room like this is the end, like there’s no turning back, like hello death.  Fill Dad up with painkillers because, ladies and gentlemen, if we don’t then he’s not going to go peacefully.  That doesn’t make sense.  If this was an email, I’d backspace over that.  Ah well. 

Back to Dad.  A few minutes after he died, this was around the same time that me, Mom, and Teresa took our hands off of him, I noticed that the fridge filled with morphine was no longer there.  That means that that fucking nurse had snuck in straight after Dad died, and had taken the fridge to the next death room!  Can you believe that?!

I played racquetball yesterday with Teresa.  Jake wouldn’t play with us.  He’s been walking--moping more like it--around our old high school, eating hotdogs like the world’s going to end.  By the way, have you given any more thought about when you’re going to tell him about us? 

Write me.  Call me.  Just respond. 

Love, Jake. 

 

If you see someone smoking, grab their cigarette and extinguish it on their cheek, teach them a goddamn lesson that they’ll never forget.

 

He throws his cigarette butt toward a subway grate.  The butt bounces then disappears down the grate. 

She walks to the grate.  There are dozens of discarded butts down there.  For a moment, she considers counting them. 

The man walks away. 

She follows him.  “Hey guy.  Do I know you from somewhere?”

“I don’t know.” 

“Do you go to Gimme Coffee Café?” 

“No.” 

“Mmmm,” she says.  “Doesn’t matter.”

He walks on. 

“Hey guy.” 

He stops, turns. 

She looks him straight in the eye.  “What you just did fucking disgusts me.  Throwing your cigarette away like that fucking disgusts me.  Understand?  People like you are disgusting.  You fucking disgust me.  How do you feel right now?”

He says nothing. 

She wants him to light another cigarette.  She wants to grab it out of his stinking hands, and to smoother it out on his cheek. 

“Come on,” she says.  “I gave you a piece of my mind.  Your turn.  Be bold.” 

He walks away. 

She yells at his back, “What?  Are you a pussy?  You can smoke thousands of packets of cigarettes in your life, and litter your cigarette butts all over our neighborhood, but you can’t defend yourself to a woman?  Look you asshole, see that trash bin right fucking there?  You couldn’t have extinguished your smoke on the cement, and thrown the butt in there?”

He continues saying nothing. 

She shouts, “What are you afraid of, cunt?  Afraid that I might tell you more about yourself that you don’t want to hear?” 

He walks. 

She roars, “Look, I just had an idea.  Don’t worry about littering your cigarettes--you can keep doing that.  But I want you to do one thing for me.  Keep smoking!  Up the numbers!  Blacken those lungs!  Bring on an early, painful death!  Prove The Origin of Species!  Sacrifice yourself to the common good!  You were never loved anyway!  Ignoramus!  Bad father!  Smoker!”   

 

---

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*****

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