Jana

 

by  Elaine Barnard

cheap white wine

I looked for her everywhere; Jana, my daughter was eighteen when she left. No use contacting police. “She’s of age,” they’d say. But she’s never been of age. She’s always been well…how can I say it, backward, shy, challenged?

We’d had an argument, not our usual kind, this was worse. I suspected she’d been seeing someone. She denied it at first, but I knew something was going on. She’d come in from the job she had at 7-11 stocking shelves looking flushed, excited like it was her birthday or something. “Jana,” I’d say when she plopped down in front of the TV to watch some late-night horror show, “shouldn’t you take a shower and have a bite before bed?”  She’d give me that smug look like she had a secret, but she wasn’t telling.

“I’m not stupid,” I’d say, “something’s up. Now get your fat ass into that shower. You smell like that dump you work at.”

Jana never answered, just kept her eyes glued to that dumb screen. And speaking of dumb, she sure was. She only finished high school because they pushed her through to get rid of her. They’d spent enough taxpayer dollars trying to educate her, but she was so dense nothing took. “Your daughter’s a sweet girl,” they’d say at parent conferences. “She just doesn’t seem motivated to learn.”

I’ll motivate her, I’d think and drag her home, sit her down, open her books and yell, “Now study, damn it.” Do you think I was successful? Think again. I wasn’t. That’s how she ended up at 7-11. But what really began to worry me was when this Pandemic hit. Jana was in the front lines so to speak. No way could she isolate herself. 7-11 needed that merchandise, those shelves of beer and colas, bread, and cookies. Besides, she couldn’t afford to stay home. We needed that job. She wasn’t eating here for free. No way. Most of her pay went for board and room. What was left she could use for those trashy magazines she stored in her closet. I tried to get rid of them, but she knew every single one. She’d accuse me of stealing which wasn’t true. I was just straightening up, so to speak.

Now she’s not here I’m concerned not only because I’ve lost her paycheck which I’d come to depend on but also because of this virus. I mean if she’s infected and comes back home, I’d be infected too. We’d both be quarantined. What good would that do us?

So, I started searching every 7-11 I could think of. She wouldn’t tell me which one she worked at now. She was constantly being transferred between stores because she was too slow or too tired or the boss didn’t like her, or he liked her too much. I put on my mask and drove to the nearest one where I hoped she was still working. I’d recognize her anywhere, mask or not. Her eyes were big blue discs in her crazy head, big blue discs behind bottle glasses. They made her look like ET’s sister or some zombie from outer space. When I finally found her, I’d keep my six-foot distance for sure. I’d use the sign language I’d learned to communicate with her after she was diagnosed with a severe hearing loss, not stone deaf but close to it. They found a tumor in her head which they couldn’t remove or if they did, she’d be paralyzed, a basket case for certain. I’d be stuck with this vegetable to care for. How fun is that?

It was night when I arrived at 7-11. A few beat up cars in the parking lot. I didn’t see her right off, so I went inside to ask the bloated manager if Jana was still working there, stocking shelves in back? He looked at me kinda blank. “Didn’t you know?” he said. “Jana had this fever when she came on her shift. I sent her to the ER to get tested for the virus. She’s probably still there. If you hurry…”

No way was I going to the Emergency Room. I might get infected myself. Let her quarantine down there. I’m going home and take a hot bath. I’ll pour myself some cheap wine and forget I ever had a daughter. But that manager guy came after me. “Hey,” he called, “you her mama, right? Well, some dudes were looking for people may have come in contact with her. You need to go down there and get tested too. Probably quarantine you together. Jana’s already given them your name.”

About the author 

Elaine Barnard's collection of stories, The Emperor of Nuts was published by New Meridian Arts and noted as a unique book on the Snowflakes in a Blizzard website, She won first place in Strands International Flash Fiction Competition. Elaine has been nominated for the Pushcart prize and Best Small Fiction.

Hope

 

by Elaine Barnard

still water 

 She was sprawled on the gym floor next to my favorite stretch machine, a towel beneath her buttocks. Couldn’t she pick a less obtrusive spot to exercise? I used the stretcher at the culmination of my workout. I was usually exhausted and needed that rejuvenating stretch to recover. I was never in a mood to tolerate interruptions in my schedule, in my cool down phase before I drove home to a hot and cold shower, some chilled chardonnay and a dinner of sorts.

          She did not move as I approached. She lay there like she couldn’t her hair a shaggy blonde mess, her skimpy gym shorts revealing several pounds of extra flesh. What was she doing hiding in the stretch room anyway?  This was a gym for God’s sake. Lying on the floor was only acceptable if you could spring back up which she obviously could not.

“Am I in your way?” I asked in my sweetest manner rather than telling her she was in mine, that she was blocking my stretcher. If I used it, I might conk her head, knock her out or something equally alarming.

She stirred. “You’re okay,” she murmured. “I checked. It’s close but we’re safe.”

I’d like to be a little safer, I thought, but said nothing just proceeded to wipe down the bed of the stretcher as a sanitary precaution.  Can’t be too careful in a Pandemic.

 In the process of protecting myself, I couldn’t help but notice the mesh brace on her knee.  “What happened to your knee?” I asked out of habit not really that interested in her knee. I could be here all day listening to knee, hip, and back complaints. I usually tuned them out.

She patted the brace. “It’s holding my knee together, until…” she winced. “Until I-I” … She took a deep breath. “Have surgery. Tomorrow’s the day.”

I climbed on the machine, locked my ankle in place and started to invert the stretcher only half listening to her as my tense muscles relaxed into the reclined position.

“My problem is I-I can’t afford the therapy, home care and everything else that my health plan won’t pay for.” She sat up slowly. “We spent all our money on my son’s knee therapy. He was eighteen. He healed. He didn’t need surgery. But me, just look at me. I’m too fat and I know it. Doctor says that contributed to my knee problem.” She winced again. Sweat stained her shirt. “I’d have to take off work. I can’t afford to take off work.”

I adjusted the lever on the machine. I was up to one hundred now.  It felt good to stretch tight muscles, to relieve the tension that I could never resolve.

“My kids have tried to help me around the house. Maybe they’ll even cook dinner tonight. I mean a real dinner, not a frozen Marie Callender’s or a Papa John pizza.”

Suddenly she doubled over with pain. Tears streamed down her pale cheeks. Against my better judgement, I lowered the machine, slid off and held her. “It’s all right,” I said, knowing it wasn’t.

She calmed a little as she struggled to stand. “I asked my doctor to give me a local. I don’t want to be knocked out. I don’t want to lose control, I told him. He-he refused. ‘That’s not the way I operate,’ he said.”

“Being knocked out isn’t all that bad,” I told her, helping her to stand straight. “You wake up and it’s all over. You’re ready to start a new life.”

She looked at me, her faded blue eyes glimmering. “You think?”

She leaned on my arm. I smiled with reassurance even though I had no knowledge that anything I said was true, but I hoped it was.  

About the author 

Elaine Barnard's collection of stories, The Emperor of Nuts was published by New Meridian Arts and noted as a unique book on the Snowflakes in a Blizzard website, She won first place in Strands International Flash Fiction Competition. Elaine has been nominated for the Pushcart prize and Best Small Fiction.

 

         

 

Mother's Day

 

by Elaine Barnard

lemonade

 

            You’d think I was robbin' the Bank of America, that this was a major heist. They got two squad cars here, four big ass sheriffs with guns and all that crap. I mean fuck, alls I was doin' was waitin' around to grab some old bitch’s bag.

Look at me, just look at me. Do I look like I could pull off somethin' like that? I’m so skinny even my baby sister beats me up. “You gotta get some muscle tone,” my goofy brother says like he was Mr. Universe. He lets me borrow his weights, but it never helps. I is what I is. And that ain’t much.

“Manuel,” Momma used to say.  “You got no smarts. If you had smarts you could stay skinny forever. It’s smarts that matters. Now your brother, he has them. Even your baby sister mother’s has some. But you, Manuel, you…”

            I was gonna show her different. She’ll never guess where I got the money for her Mother’s Day daffodils and chocolate kisses from the mall. “Next year I’ll get you a car, maybe,” I’ll tell her.

            “I don’t drive, “she’ll say.

            I’m not so stupid as to tell her, “Yeah, Momma, I got the money offa this fat ol' lady, older than you even. She looked overloaded.  I figured I’d help her out.” Now wouldn’t that be a dumb confession? No, I keep my secrets to myself. Even Momma would agree I have a few smarts that way.

            So, the cops are still here sweatin in the  sun, pads and pens recordin' my info. “Your name, please?”

            “Antonio Banderas.” He’s a movie star but I bet these gringos will never guess. They do.

            “Address?”

            “Don’t have none.”

            “Were do you live?”

            “Anywhere I can.”

And it went on like this, going nowhere while the bank’s customers stared at my bare feet and shorts. I kept my head bowed so I didn’t haveta see them, didn’t haveta feel the way they were makin me feel which wasn’t so good.

            Handcuffs pullin' my arms behind me, like I could really run somewhere if I was free. Not with these goons after me with their all-powerful everything.

            I’m in the back of the patrol car now. The seat ‘s hard but so is my butt from sleepin' on benches. I tell them it’s fuckin' comfy back here to make them laugh. They don’t. They say I can make one phone call. I got no lawyers, so I guess I’ll call Momma, let her know I don’t forget. “Happy Mother’s Day,” I’ll say. Maybe she’ll smile in that funny way she has like maybe she’s not really smilin' at all. But I hope she will. I hope she’ll say, “Manny, I knew you had the smarts, son. I just knew it.”

About the author 

Elaine Barnard's collection of stories The Emperor of Nuts: Intersections Across Cultures was published by New Meridian Arts and noted as a  unique book on the Snowflakes in a Blizzard website. Recently she won first place in Strands international flash fiction competition and was featured on their webinar with writers from the UK and India. Elaine's work has appeared in numerous literary journals. She has been nominated for the Pushcart prize and Best Small fiction. She was a finalist for Best of the Net. She received her MFA from the University of California, Irvine and her BA from the University of Washington, Seattle.

 

 

 

 

Short Order

by  Elaine Barnard

cola

   When the mortuary called me at midnight I took several breaths then got in my old pickup and drove to Portland. I’d known Trace since grade school. He was my best friend, the only guy I could confide in when I felt really down which was much of the time. And the same went for Trace. We ate our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches together at lunch and hung out after high school until Trace had to leave for work at Gina’s Pizza. He swore he’d be a top chef someday.  He was taking cooking classes on-line. But now with this pandemic Gina’s was closed except for takeout so Trace had a lot of free time. “Hey,” I said when I phoned him.  “Get off your ass and enter this marathon. It’s for disadvantaged kids. You could tote up some points before you enter the pearly gates.”

Trace wasn’t enthusiastic. “Get up? What for? I deserve a rest. Been on my feet all night doing takeouts. Besides I’m still in my pajamas. It’s nice. I think I’ll stay this way.”

“So how’s Sandy gonna like that?”

“Not here. Went home to Seattle. Afraid I might give her the virus.”

“Not a chance.”

“Right. I wasn't in front talking up the customers.  I was in back, isolated, doing my fucking job until now.”

“So what are Gina’s plans?”

“Who knows. She’s on a cruise to Hawaii or some place where it’s not raining.”

“So that leaves you in charge? Great.”

“Not so great. Nothing to be in charge of.”

“How come?”

“Well yesterday this gang of protesters smashed in Gina’s front. Looters took just about everything she had. Lucky I was in back or they may have smashed me in too.”

“Did you call the cops?”

“Like I didn’t?”

"I know you did. So?”

“So nothing. They filed a report. Gina’s under insured.”

“Bad news. Did you contact her?”

“I tried. Never picks up. Never answers my texts.”

“So what will you do?”

“Got any ideas?”

And it went like that. Trace, who never had a lucky day in his life was now stuck with this. Last I knew he lived alone in a trailer. His parents were  in jail again and no lawyer to haul them out. It had been that way since he was a kid. Maybe I saw him smile once when I brought him to my mom’s for Christmas. But he caught hell later from his parents for leaving home without permission. They were  in jail so how could he get permission?

So when I got this call from the funeral home I knew I had to go. No one else would or could. I was his best friend, his only friend. They’d kept him refrigerated. His black skin was sort of pale but aren’t the dead supposed to be pale? He was still wearing his short order outfit, white jacket, checked trousers, black hair in a pony tail.  “Hey Trace,” I said, “they got you big time. Life in short order.”

I didn’t know what to do then. It was like…like something had died inside of me. I had this strange empty feeling like maybe I needed to eat only I wasn’t hungry.  The funeral director, an old solemn guy, put his hand on my shoulder, “Someone dumped him at my door.  I found your number in his pocket, only one he had. Do you know how we could contact his parents? I’m sure they’d like to know.”

About the author:

Elaine Barnard's collection of stories, The Emperor of Nuts: Intersections Across Cultures was recently published by new Meridian Arts and noted as a unique book on the Snowflakes in a Blizzard website. In 2019 she won first place in Strands flash fiction competition. Her work has been published in numerous literary journals. She has been nominated for the Pushcart prize and Best Small Fiction. She was a finalist for Best of the Net. She received her MFA from the University of California, Irvine and her BA from the University of Washington, Seattle.

 

Mask

by Elaine Barnard

coffee 

  I’m a black man on a white cul-de-sac. Neighbors should be neighborly but they’re not. They should bring newcomers cake and coffee but they don’t. Well, maybe they did but I never got any when I moved in a year ago. No Welcome Wagon for me. Not that I missed it. Coffee and cake have never been my thing. However, I did expect my neighbors to wave instead of ignoring me like I didn’t really live here, like I was an interloper or maybe worse, invisible.

                I’m a single guy. If I had kids the barrier would have to break down. Kids are color blind until their parents teach them otherwise. So I guess I looked suspicious to begin with. I noticed the young mothers whisking their kids indoors as soon as I opened my garage. I’d wave and maybe say, “Hi, how are you?” or something equally inane. They looked embarrassed, flustered, unable to do anything but rush inside or walk faster.

                I don’t wear a beard or moustache, no tattoos or anything that makes me look dangerous. I scrub my face every morning to give it that baby shine I still have even though I’m nearing thirty. But now with this pandemic I wear a mask when I’m jogging to protect myself from the virus. This has caused an even greater problem. I try to buy groceries and the manager alerts Security. Didn’t black

bandits always wear masks in the movies, on television or in comics? So they are wary of me, stopping me outside before allowing me to enter. I lower my mask, “Look,” I say, “I just want some salsa, guacamole and a few chips.”

                Security eyes me. “Wait here,” he says.  I wait. Droplets of sweat dampen the mask.

Security returns. “Sorry, but them bean eaters were here earlier. Bought the place out. Not even a tortilla to sell ya.”

As I turn to leave a masked blonde emerges. Her kids munch big bags of chips and salsa. I keep my six foot distance. Next time I’ll phone in early for groceries. They promise to deliver.

About the author  

Elaine Barnard's collection of stories, The Emperor of Nuts: Intersections Across Cultures was recently published by New Meridian Arts and noted as a unique book on the Snowflakes in a Blizzard website. Last year she won first place in the Strands International Flash Fiction competition.She has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best small Fiction. She was a finalist for Best of the Net. She received her MFA from the University of California, Irvine and her BA from the University of Washington, Seattle