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Flash Fiction

Alone in the Dark

Published : Saturday, 24 February, 2024 at 12:00 AM  Count : 818
Dan Morrison
His phone buzzed. It was the only light in the room and he couldn help but glance at it. She was asking him to pick up. Shed called twice already, but hed let them go to voicemail. He tried to sit up while the world spun around him and knocked his beer over.
 
She called again and he wanted to hear her voice. Where was he and what he was doing? She asked if he had called his mom today-she had been having some trouble lately. Maybe they could meet for a drink or two, and he knew that really meant four or five. Was she slurring? Just a little but noticeable all the same. It made him nervous. She had this theory that she could lose weight by skipping meals and living off cigarettes.  

"Guess what Im wearing?"

"Coonskin cap."

"Its black and its tight."

"So, not coonskin?"

He didn think she needed to lose weight. She was beautiful just the way she was. Always to him. She took a long drink, and he did the same, switching the baseball game he was watching to mute. Were they going to meet tonight? It would have to be at his place because her husband was home with the kids.

It was a bad idea and he knew it. He was tired of being a secret, but thats what he had to do. Friends couldn see them in public. He couldn tell his mom. Nobody could know. Still, he didn want to be without her. So hed be a fool. For now, hed be her big little secret.  

"Its hard, he said, to her or maybe even himself. "I know you e never going to be with me. Not really."

A couple of nights ago, shed had to sneak into her own home because she forgot her key on his mantel. That was the night she said she never wanted to go home before waking up next to her husband. Of course, he knew shed never leave him. It didn make sense to. It meant hed have to stay a secret, for now. Maybe forever.
 
It didn matter to him that her husband always asked to fuck her on Thursday nights. It was his schedule, and she had to buy a special toy to finish up. It didn mean anything to her anymore. Despite all that, she never went to bed alone. He always did, and it almost always broke him. Finishing what was left of his beer, he wondered if it was a good idea to keep things going or if he needed to move- if he could move on.

"What do you say? Meet me for one?"
He knew if he went, hed never be able to tell her he needed something more. Hed take what she offered him. And be happy about it.
 
"Where?"
"Our usual place."
He said hed go, then went into his kitchen. There was a bar cart there that shed given him last Christmas and he kept well stocked with bourbon. He poured himself one with ice and sat back down on the couch, alone in the dark, and wondered if he would go.

Courtesy: Flash Fiction Magazine



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