Sean Lovelace

This is Literally all the Info I have at the Moment

We came across a sign on which DRUGGED had been painted in crude brushstrokes. There were two of us left, and L opened the sign with some form of lubricated saw. Out fell a blue key. We walked for miles. (I won’t say how far. Impossible now to revisit those footsteps—their odd, alluring rhythm. It took me so long to…well. I know those foot-rises/footfalls were everything. Or let me quote L: “This type of walking worries. I have moments I prefer it to the light, to the water or the very air we breathe.”) L would leave the path, to stagger off into shafts of shadow. Would complain of irritability. Would demand we stop. Why? To install a window in a nearby tree. To vacuum up the snow. (L insisted we were suffocating in snow; simply not true.) To set up a field kitchen or dig a slate-lined vat. I said no. We instead stopped by a tumbling stream for a light meal of yogurt cups. Then discovered the cavern.

Lady Day falls from a door in the ceiling.

Lady Day wipes off her knees, clears her throat, rearranges a wilted gardenia pinned to her hair.

Lady Day sighs. We inhale, and finally sleep.

(You didn’t even use the key!

Oh you. Still not listening.)

[blue]

CP

Sean Lovelace teaches creative writing at Ball State University. HOW SOME PEOPLE LIKE THEIR EGGS is his award-winning flash fiction collection by Rose Metal Press. His works have appeared in Crazyhorse, Diagram, Quick Fiction, Sonora Review, Willow Springs, and so on. He blogs at seanlovelace.com. He likes to run, far.