Best Debut Short Stories 2021
Page 10
He was so calm.
“I gotta get back. Date work ended some days ago, I think. My pop will bug out all loco if he shows up and no one’s there,” I said, swinging my arms in a way I’d never done.
“Mañana?” He smiled at me.
“Yeah. Tomorrow.”
I shook as I watched him walk away, down toward the weak streetlights, to Alex’s house, which was next to the park. I saw him go up on the bare wooden porch that all of the small houses there seemed to have.
It was the only time we kissed.
I should’ve gone with him.
THE NEXT AFTERNOON I walked to the highway overpass. I saw Luis, but he didn’t holler back. He came up to me, too close, and asked, “You even gonna deny it?”
“What?” I couldn’t take a proper breath. I knew.
Luis stuck his face out and said, “Hit me.” I couldn’t move my legs.
He gripped my bleached hair and used it like an anchor, pulling down until I was kneeling before him. He hammered my face over and over with the side of his fist until I heard the crack of my nose breaking. He let go. I flailed on the ground, reaching for something to stop the pain. I’d been smacked around plenty by my apá for not watering his neon-red bird’s beak chiles. I’d let them wrinkle like an old woman’s neck. This was different though; Luis needed to make a point.
As I crawled away from him, I noticed how the fine powdery soil beneath my face was caking into black globs from the blood gushing out my nose.
I could hear a voice. I hadn’t realized Luis was talking to me. He wasn’t yelling or anything.
“Stay the fuck down, maricón,” he said. I could hear his feet pacing in the dirt behind me. “Shit’s for your own good.” It felt like he was talking to himself. I looked up, the crimson tags of Es and Ls and 13s danced. My mouth tasted metallic and salty. My eyes burned, sweat seeping into them.
“Fuck did I just say, hijo de tu puta madre!” The back of my scalp stung, a fistful of my hair in Luis’s hand again. Now he was angry. Over and over, he rammed my face into the black dirt.
WHEN I WOKE I felt the coarse wall of the overpass, a warm can of Coca-Cola in my hand. A group of middle schoolers in their uniforms were staring at me, their eyes like a tribe of goats.
“Hey! You got fucked up,” one of them said.
“Tómale a la Coca,” said another, in a hushed tone, as if he didn’t want to startle a monster.
My face throbbed and sipping the Coke made it hurt.
I needed to be far away, get to the apartment. I felt embarrassed, but a kid helped me stand while the others watched and exclaimed “damn” or “a la verga.”
Every step was like Luis’s hands on me again. I was afraid he, or anybody, would see me so I tried to be quick. But the viejitas at the senior living apartments were glaring at me. They sat inside the small square of shade of their front porches, fanned themselves, or swept the dirt that collected in the corners and knew. They scratched at the flab of their brown sunburnt arms, aware of exactly what kind of person catches a beating like the one on my face.
At home, I sat and shook on the toilet, my wet underwear in my hand.
OUR TOMORROW DIDN’T come. Fermín and I never had more than a head nod between us. We understood the fear in each other’s eyes.
The way I used to see him, as outside my reality, was gone. He was no longer part of another world, but instead rooted down by force into mine.
In a way, Fermín got lucky once Luis put out the word. When some Eastsiders jumped him at Zapata, they could have taken both eyes. It wasn’t their mercy, I heard later, but his futbol goggles that saved his left eye.
IN THE MIDDLE of drives through the miles of crops, and into the death of the desert, he’ll come to me—his goggles on his face, his tousled hair still holding black even after all the years. I hit the border, cross to Mexicali, have tacos al pastor, Chinese food, visit the cousins. Buy my insulin, turn back, always north to the USA, hours’ worth of rows of cars waiting to cross beneath an angry sun. Migra officers that always ask—half paying attention—the same rhetorical question: “Why did you go to Mexico?”
And in my sweaty car I think of his young moustache, thin as if penciled in, styled like the men on my abuelo’s worn trio records. His gentle black eyes; the burn of salt on my tongue.
Alberto Reyes Morgan hails from the Mexicali–Imperial Valley border region. His writings and translations have appeared in Invisible Hands: Voices from the Global Economy; Underground America: Narratives of Undocumented Lives; Solito, Solita: Crossing Borders with Youth Refugees from Central America; Michigan Quarterly Review; Texas Public Radio’s Book Public; and other venues. A graduate of the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College, he has taught in Ethiopia and Spain.
EDITOR’S NOTE
“Re: Frankie” is so many things at once: a fabulously imaginative reconstruction of a literary classic, the zany epistolary of a hapless “waste” collector, an account of unrequited love and online harassment and men who can’t (or won’t) take a hint, and the women who endure them. But, in its illustration of sexism equal parts humdrum and horrible, “Re: Frankie” is also a story about how the banal can be fatal—a story that, in its depiction of a dystopia toward which we sometimes seem indubitably bound, asks an even more troubling question: Are we there already?
“Re: Frankie” represents that which we value most in fiction at Porter House Review: a new voice, a unique and incisive perspective on human experience amid social dilemma, ambition in form and style. We are proud to have published it, and eager to see what Mackenzie McGee will come up with next.
Sam Downs, Fiction Editor
Porter House Review
RE: FRANKIE
Mackenzie McGee
Subject: CONSUMPTION WARNING
Dear Valued Customer,
We recently received a bill showing unusually frequent usage of your home ReJuve Total Self Regeneration™ Unit. In order for your ReJuve to continue producing the highest quality of care, it is crucial to limit your use to THREE CYCLES per seven-day period.
Here are some tips for preventing overuse:
•Consume a balanced diet and engage in regular exercise
•Avoid stimuli that may provoke a hysteric episode, such as excessively sentimental books, movies, music, and people
•Utilize less invasive Revitalization Technology, such as the DeepBreathe™ Oxygen Mask or DeepDive™ Bubble Bath
•After the onset of hysteria, wait one day before using your ReJuve, as hysteria may subside on its own
•Confirm that a hysteric episode is genuine by consulting the Quick Hysteria Questionnaire on the side of your ReJuve Unit
We at ReJuve are committed to women’s health and well-being. Should you notice any repair or maintenance issues, please contact myself or another Biowaste Professional with details.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: YOUR WASTE CYCLE IS CHANGING
Hi Julie,
Okay, so this isn’t actually about your waste cycle, but I think the emails from my personal email are going to your junk folder or something, and I keep getting sent to voicemail every time I call. Anyway, your hairbrush is still at my place. It’s the fancy one your sister bought you in Paris, the one with the boar’s hair bristles and wood handle. It’s a really nice brush.
Don’t go back to that plastic brush I bought from Walgreens when you stayed over the first time. Remember how it pulled the knots down to the middle of your back, so you looked like the girl from The Ring with a bird’s nest at the end of your hair? You joked that a family of owls was living in there and they were overdue on rent. You had to comb your hair with your fingers, and your hands smelled like coconut shampoo all night. Your hair was so long back then.
The brush is safe at my place. Let me know when you want to come get it.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: Re: YOUR WASTE CYCLE I
S CHANGING
Julie,
Listen, I’m sorry for tricking you with the whole fake-subject thing. But it looks like this is a The Secret situation (I finally finished the copy you gave me), because it’s becoming true now. Your waste cycle is changing, so maybe it wasn’t really a lie in the first place. My boss told me that Randy and I are switching our afternoon routes, so he’ll be in charge of your waste from now on. He’ll probably be late more often than not, because he likes to “take his time with the ladies.” That’s how he refers to them. Calls it respectful, the sentimental old man. He still uses individual body bags, if you can believe it.
My boss also told me the reason we’re switching is because you specifically requested that you be put on another biowaste guy’s route. I don’t really know what to say, except that it would have been nice of you just to talk to me and not go to my boss behind my back. You’re the one who said we should stay friends, but I guess you changed your mind, and you didn’t even have the decency to tell me to my face. Or respond to a single email, for that matter.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
P.S. I still have that hairbrush.
Subject: Re: Re: YOUR WASTE CYCLE IS CHANGING
Hello Julie,
I just wanted to let you know that I’m heading over to your place because Randy asked me to. It’s an issue with your rejuvenator unit. I swear I’m not stalking you, just helping out a friend.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: THERE’S AN ISSUE WITH YOUR WASTE
Dear Valued Customer,
This message is to notify you that myself and a fellow waste professional (Randolph Olson) have discovered an issue with your ReJuve Unit’s ability to properly destabilize waste products. We strongly advise you to SUSPEND USE OF YOUR UNIT until the issue can be resolved.
If you experience a hysteric episode in the meantime, DO NOT GO DIRECTLY TO A HOSPITAL. Instead call our complimentary DeepDelphi™ Hotline at the number listed on the side of your ReJuve Unit. A certified counselor will be available to discuss your symptoms. If your counselor deems your hysteria valid, he will fill out documentation certifying your state and forward it to your local emergency medical provider.
A repair team will be dispatched to your home in the next two days during normal business hours. You do not need to be home during this time, as our professionals will be working solely with the ReJuve Asphodel Meadows™ Waste Disposal Tank on the outside of your home.
In case of any gate codes or dangerous animals on the property that are not currently on file, please respond promptly to this email, or call our local office at 952-XXX-XXXX.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: Re: THERE’S AN ISSUE WITH YOUR WASTE
Julie,
This isn’t an automated email. This is Sean. You need to call me ASAP. It’s about your waste. Seriously, it’s important.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: Re: Re: THERE’S AN ISSUE WITH YOUR WASTE
Julie,
I don’t give a shit if you block my phone number, my personal email, my goddamn good vibes, I’m gonna keep emailing you from Biowaste until you respond. This isn’t about us.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: Re: Re: Re: THERE’S AN ISSUE WITH YOUR WASTE
Julie,
Your waste is alive.
There, did that get your attention? Are you happy this is on my professional record? Randy called me to your place because your waste was breathing and her eyes were open and everything.
Here’s what happened. I had two units left when I got a call, and I didn’t answer, because I’m working on Working Hard On The Task At Hand (you always told me I was easily distracted), but then he called me again and again, and so I finally answered. I said what do you want, I’m working hard on the task at hand, and he was all choked up, like he was crying. I figured it must be an old lady’s unit or a little girl’s unit, the kind of waste Randy gets emotional about sometimes, and I was ahead of schedule, so I went over to yours, and there it was. There were two other pieces of waste, facedown and straight-backed, stacked up all neatly in the order they were disposed, dead as they should be. Not dead—deactivated. Except the one on top of the pile wasn’t. Instead, it was curled up in the fetal position on top of two other pieces. This one, the most recent one, was looking around, all calm and a little confused. Like it’d fallen asleep on a city bus and missed its stop.
Randy said that we needed to bring it into the office and take care of it. Then he started bawling like a baby because he hates the old way of dealing with waste, he calls it inhumane (it’s a damn good thing he started after we got Asphodel attachments). He said he couldn’t put it in the trailer with the rest of the waste. I told him to buck up and put it in the cab with him, but he blushed, said he couldn’t ride around with what looked like a bare-naked woman sitting next to him, and besides, he’d already been written up before for being late to drop-off too many times, so he told me to take it.
So here I am, arguing with a grown-ass man who’s got tears freezing on his cheeks, stomping my feet to keep warm. The hatch to the Asphodel is wide open and your waste is looking around like an idiot, and Randy’s looking around like an idiot, and I say why are you whipping your head back and forth like that, and he says he can’t bear to look right at it, that it’s not right, and I say it’s not like you haven’t seen a naked woman before, and he says I’ve never had waste look me in the eye and ask me what time it is before.
I look at your waste because I’m not a coward, and it’s shivering. It’s covered in goose bumps and it’s got its knees pulled up to its chin and its arms wrapped around its legs, and it’s got its face buried in the hair of the waste below it, like it’s trying to keep warm. Randy yells at me not to touch it, but I do, and I jump a little when I make contact, but it feels just like normal skin, like your skin, maybe a little cooler because it was freezing out.
I’m not telling you this to freak you out. I’m telling you this because it’s sitting in my living room wearing your old clothes and playing with your hairbrush, and it doesn’t understand what’s going on, and I didn’t know who to tell about this, but I figured you’d want to know.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: THERE’S AN ISSUE WITH YOUR WASTE
Julie,
I hope my last few emails didn’t scare you. I promise that wasn’t my intention. I figured, if my work is going to send you an automated message about me showing up to your place, I should tell you why, and if I’m going to do that, I should tell you what’s really going on, and it turns out waste being lucid isn’t as impossible as they made it seem in training. So I thought it was common courtesy to let you know what’s going on. I’d do the same for any other customer.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management
Subject: Your Waste
Julie,
Once again, you were right—I’m just a grunt, a cog in a corporate machine, a serial number that clocks in and out and leeches off the company health insurance when my back acts up. What I’m saying is, it turns out that my superiors don’t give a shit about my email, so long as I’m not forwarding spam or sending out nude pictures of myself. Looks like it’s safe for me to keep emailing you about your waste, at least for now.
I told Randy I would go ahead and take her in to waste processing, if he was going to be such a big baby about it, and that got him all mad, but he wasn’t about to take her in himself, so he said he’d finish my route for me if I’d go ahead and do it. He took his coat off, and then his sweatshirt off, and I said I don’t know who you’re putting on a show for but I’m not interested. But he just took off his flannel and gave it to me, and said to give it to her so she wouldn’t be cold at the end, she shouldn’t be so cold. I said we’re supposed to use
impersonal pronouns, and he said she’s too much of a she to be an it. I draped it around her shoulders, and she moved for the first time, lifting her arms to pop the collar up around her neck. I turned to ask Randy if he saw that. But he was halfway to his truck, he had started walking away before he even put his layers back on. I swear he was steaming in the cold.
I was going to bring her in. If paper jumped out of your shredder at work, you wouldn’t feel sorry for it. At least, that’s what I told myself. I thought, I guess Julie might feel sorry for her waste. You could say it’d be easy for her to sympathize. But she’d also say it was gross, it was biomedical waste, shit that didn’t flush.
I was going to bring her in until we were on the highway, and we were driving over the river. I kept looking over, to see what she was doing, hoping I’d look and she’d be dead and I could just pull over and throw her in the back. But as we got on the bridge, the trees dropped below us and the winter sun was shining in the cab, and she looked at me, and her face was red and her lips were puckered, because she was holding her breath, desperately trying to make it to the other side. She failed, like you, Julie, always do.
I swear I’m bringing her in on Monday. The incinerator is off all weekend anyway, and I think it’d be a little suspicious if they opened it up and saw a fleshy piece of waste blinking at them, sitting cross-legged on a pile of ashes. If you want to see her before then, let me know.
Sean Rasmussen
Biowaste Management