Reflections

75-Word Novels

Photo of author in San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico...

75-Word Novels:

There is a deserted houseboat on what appears to be a delta region. Patches of sky are reflected in the unruffled gray waters. There are winding tributaries flowing in different directions, all leading to the Amazon River. Further down, the river gets moving, white water fast, but here in the delta it is meandering and lazy. The tall grasses along the shore are barely moving in a light breeze. A hawk cruises for fish overhead.

“How does it feel to be free of other people’s expectations?” He’d whispered this phrase in her ear many times in the past. Today, she felt her energy expand, displacing the usual need for her lover’s approval. This was different. “Better than I ever expected,” she said as she headed for the door. “Wait a minute!” He insisted, “Where are you going?”
She hesitated briefly, then gave herself the final nudge in the direction of “Good-Bye.”

I remember mornings spent

as a child lounging In damp

grasses bordering our father’s

summer gardens,
studying the magic of bees,
tongues laden with
the sweetest gold.
Satiated caterpillars
twirling by thin threads
off sticky leaves, dizzy with delight.
The language of birds,
Sweet in my ears
Though I could not--

can’t--whistle.
Time, that old Trickster,
was a non-entity
Until dad, who could whistle,

signaled for us to

come in for the Night.

There is a sharp rising of waters that happens on a cyclical basis. That makes it different from an apocalyptic event, but similar in the way that people begin filing onto a boat on the delta in the Amazon Basin. More people arrive than will fit, it seems, but all do make it in. The Captain is not quite content that all are safe. She looks apprehensively toward the shore before the heavy rains begin.

“Love me unconditionally,” he said. Her problem was that their relationship had more conditions than a felon with an ankle bracelet. Sooner or later, she would blow, and that fire he craved in her would eventually burn down the house. When it happened, she regretted it and later wondered if three days a month of good sex and the remaining days of secret communication, lacking any real affection, was worth the cost of her self-respect.

The scene outside the meditation hall played out exactly as in the dream she had on this date in September the year before. The moon overhead - almost close enough to reach up and grab - the flickering fires illuminating the Pueblo Indian singers and drummers on the slopes of their sacred mountain. The all too familiar scene was disorienting. She wondered if the reality caused the dream or if the dream caused the reality.

Social media is one way to meet a lover. Not some perp, who privately messages you that your baby blues are mesmerizing, and by the way, “would you be interested in having phone sex?” Not that guy! Someone of mutual interest you get to know over time. One day, it’s as if no one else exists. All the others on a thread have become bit players and you are looking only to entertain each other.

I’m not feeling good about killing a bear. At some point I see a map--like a digital map, only laid out on the table. It is a paper lay of the land, and I see a bear image, a small iconic symbol in the upper right corner. I put my hand on it. I begin to telepathically tell the bear what’s going to happen and where to hide. I don’t want it to die.

Life on the boat was idyllic. We enjoyed five months of peace before life turned chaotic. Sunrise walks on the beach with our toddler and late-night lovemaking when she was asleep. Cast netting for mullet in the bay, our main staple when we ran out of money for food. Now, the sound of gulls, steady rhythm of waves against the shore, and smell of the ocean bring back embodied memories of that time spent together.

I hope you enjoyed these brief reflections in the form of 75-word novels!

Ciao,

Jenna