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Mutual by Henry S. Kivett
Really, it's her attitude that keeps me coming back for more. She acts as if she's got the fuck face that launched a thousand ships. She flirts and she teases. She does yoga in knee socks and no bra. I consider myself, fuck face aside, a lucky man. But you can tell she knows something is up. She's overcompensating. So we break up—it's mutual—in April. Our lease runs out in June, so we decide that no one has to move out. I just start sleeping in the other room. Just until June, we agree. It makes sense financially, it's only a couple of months, and neither of us has anywhere else to go. In late May, I come home from work early to find her sobbing in the shower. I silently watch her silhouette, I listen while steam crawls inside my clothes. She cries very differently when she knows I can see and hear her. Tears well up and slip free. She brushes them aside and she sniffs delicately. It's nothing like this. This sounds like vomiting, like dying, like death. Creepy, I know, but this is a face I must see. I tiptoe across the bathroom tile and put my feet on the toilet lid. I tilt my head over the shower curtain and watch her. She shudders and gasps and she struggles to keep her spirit from abandoning her body. If this were a scene from a bad movie and we were shitty actors, I would whip open the curtain. Her bosoms would heave at being discovered, at being found so raw and so real. I would take her in the steam, slippery and gasping, and her face would send Greeks to war in wooden ships while I watch. Instead, I quietly step down and slip out. I close the door, walk to my bedroom and lie down. I close my eyes and wait and listen, and I imagine her face above mine, looking past me, right through me, off into space. Read the interview. Henry S. Kivett is a writer and graphic designer currently enrolled in the MFA program at NCSU. His fiction and humor has appeared online at McSweeney's Internet Tendency, Opium Magazine, Pindeldyboz, and Word Riot. Ashley Inguanta is an MFA student at the University of Central Florida and teaches two Introduction to Creative Writing classes. She also has worked as a creative writing instructor at Lakeside Alternative, a mental health facility. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in Pindeldyboz, Elephant Journal, and All Things Girl. She recently earned an honorable mention in Glimmer Train for their Very Short Fiction Award. Ashley was nominated as UCF's choice for the AWP Intro Journals Award in fiction. All content in SmokeLong Quarterly copyright 2003-2012 by its authors. Issue Thirty-Three (October 2, 2011): Egg Toss, August 1989 by Meagan Cass «» Dinner Parties Where Place Cards Leave No Choice in Seating by Chella Courington «» Sovetskoye Shampanskoye by Berit Ellingsen «» They Live in Black and White by Danica Green «» Watermelon Seeds by Micah Dean Hicks «» Gwendolyn by Robert Hinderliter «» Sleepless #7 by Joe Kapitan «» Mutual by Henry S. Kivett «» Wolf Cry by Sara Lippmann «» Jamila by Carmel Reid Mawle «» When I Lose Track of the Children, 5 & 7, Near the Magazine Section at Costco by Christopher Merkner «» Finally by John Minichillo «» I'm a Woman For Sure by Kate Nesheim «» Exposure by Katy Resch «» The Road to the Casino Del Sol by Mather Schneider «» Never Never by Amber Sparks «» The Language of Hairzilla by Chris L. Terry «» Interviews: Meagan Cass «» Chella Courington «» Berit Ellingsen «» Danica Green «» Micah Dean Hicks «» Robert Hinderliter «» Joe Kapitan «» Henry S. Kivett «» Sara Lippmann «» Carmel Reid Mawle «» Christopher Merkner «» John Minichillo «» Kate Nesheim «» Katy Resch «» Mather Schneider «» Amber Sparks «» Chris L. Terry «» Cover Art "Sparta, NJ" by David Ohlerking «» Letter From the Editor |
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