NEW FICTION

c/o Andy Warhol

Dinner’s been tomato soup for so long and the red-ringed bowls are piling up in the sink. Santana sits with a green and white checkered quilt on their lap and winds their finger around a tassel. The Victrola is turned off and the light is a dim flypaper-yellow.

It’s Sunday night and they were considering a walk or a drive, something special before the week starts. They want to don their blue newsboy cap, visit the Boulevard to watch the young people sitting on the benches downtown, smoking by the statue of the giant granite head. A cold thought like wet paper towel presses itself against their face and snakes out their eyes.

There are no more creative thoughts inside the dome of their scalp. Before, ideas broadcasted in an arc. Some were neon. On those nights, the inside of their head resembled the Boulevard; there were so many thoughts. Now there are few and they’re all wet paper towel. These weak thoughts slurp around the perimeter of their skull. One shambles to the top of their head’s underside and then collapses like a broken roller coaster. Santana thinks of Rex, who used to rest atop the checkered quilt and chase his tail, clean himself, and curl up.

A red-cold thought crawls inside Santana’s bulbous nose. They search for the neon ones, but those all ran away with Rex. Rex would move from the quilt to the couch and finally to the rocking chair with its mothholey teal cushions, and sleep. And Santana would lie on the carpet to draw him. Sketchpad pointed to the chair, shirt riding up so their bare stomach brushes the rug, one hand on the marker. Sometimes they’d turn on the Victrola to listen to popular vocal music. Santana would draw the lines in Rex’s face. And for the rest of the night, a network of neon thoughts would brood around Rex. What color for his nose? Should it be as red as tomato soup? Santana rises to turn on the Victrola but pauses when they hear, by the door, a faint scratching.

Perry Genovesi lives in West Philadelphia, works as a public librarian, and serves his fellow workers in AFSCME District Council 47. He’s a ’24 Best Microfiction nominee, and his published fiction is forthcoming or has been featured in Eclectica, BULL, Vol.1 Brooklyn, and collected on tiny.cc/PerryGenovesi. Unfortunately for his admirers, he needs to be validated every 5 minutes & told he’s doing a great job or he shuts down. Twitter: @unionlibrarian