Anti-Heroin Chic
  • Home
  • About
  • Blog
  • Music
  • Art
  • Comedy
  • About Our Contributors
  • Masthead
  • Issues
  • About our contributors - 2019
  • About Our Contributors - 2020
  • About Our Contributors - 2021
  • Home
  • About
  • Blog
  • Music
  • Art
  • Comedy
  • About Our Contributors
  • Masthead
  • Issues
  • About our contributors - 2019
  • About Our Contributors - 2020
  • About Our Contributors - 2021
Search by typing & pressing enter

YOUR CART

​

2/7/2020

Half Mast by Sheree Shatsky

Picture



Half Mast


    My brother guilts past my room, a sign he’s up to no good.  He’s wearing my new hiphuggers. The hems drag the shag carpet. The jeans are way tight. The zipper teeth strain half-mast. He bolts and I chase him down the hallway. He splits that zipper he is so dead. He hauls into the kitchen and grabs a dish towel.  Grinning, he helps our mother dry dishes. “Stop running in the house,” she says.
     “But he stole my jeans!” She drops forks, knives and spoons into the silverware drawer, not missing a beat, plink, plink, plink. “Give your sister her pants back.” He strips and hurls the jeans at me.  I examine the zipper (intact) and rummage the pockets for God knows what. Matches. Rolling papers. Twenty bucks stuffed inside the coin pocket. He’s never worked a damn day in his life. “You need a better hiding place,” he says and flips me the bird. 
    He’s along for the ride when I buy my first car, a beat-up white Karmann Ghia. Problem, it’s a standard transmission and I can’t drive a stick.  Somehow, he can. He’s fifteen, has no license, a fact of no seeming consequence when our mother deems him my driving instructor. “Just this one time,” she says and drives off in her Vega.
     We head for country roads. I watch for cops. He revs the engine and pops the clutch at the light, a state trooper in the next lane. The car rocks and stills. He is fearless. We’re going to jail, I think. The signal flips to green. My brother pulls away without (being) a jerk and tells me never rest my foot on the clutch, you’ll burn it out. I adjust the mirror on the passenger sun visor and watch the trooper slip behind us.   
     I hit a deer in that car.  The road was clear and then it wasn’t. I slam the brakes, mash the clutch and throw the stick into neutral. The deer pulls itself up and runs away.  The deputy sheriff examines my gashed hood and said, yup looks like deer damage though he thought most deer in these parts had been hunted down and eaten years ago.  A couple weeks later, I hit a duck. A Muscovy. Flies straight out in front of me. It dies sitting straight up. If I didn’t know better I’d think some redneck lost a hunting decoy out the back of his F-150.  I park and sob and watch the neighborhood kids walking to school stop and pet the dead sitting duck. The Karmann Ghia doesn’t last a year. I loved that car. I think of my brother when I see one. He didn’t last long either,  but I remember him healthy and alive and as confident as the day he handed his fake driver license to the state trooper and asked for recommendations on where best to teach his sister how to drive a stick. 

​
Picture
Sheree Shatsky writes short fiction believing much can be conveyed with a few wild words. Recent work has appeared at trampset, Fiction Kitchen Berlin, Bending Genres, Virtual Zine and New Flash Fiction Review with work forthcoming at The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, Fictive Dream and Saw Palm: Florida Literature and Art. She is twice-nominated for Best Microfiction 2020 by Fictive Dream and MoonPark Review. Read more of her work at shereeshatsky.com . She tweets @talktomememe.

Dad
2/21/2020 06:28:44 am

I asked you not to buy that Gia as is had been wrecked and couldn’t pass inspection. Ha! Love the story, brought a lump in my throat about EV.

Sheree link
2/21/2020 06:52:42 am

Great car. Great brother. :)

Paula Shatsky link
2/21/2020 09:26:59 am

Beautiful encapsulation of an important moment. I remember him as a lovely, if precocious little boy. Congratulations.

Sheree link
2/21/2020 05:16:38 pm

Thanks, Paula. Lots of truth in fiction, for certain.


Comments are closed.

    Author

    Write something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview.

    Archives

    December 2024
    November 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    March 2023
    December 2022
    October 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    August 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.