“He was a surgical instrument that went out fashion before it could be used, which meant that he was the highest glinting thing in the garbage. He was furniture with opaque plastic slipcovers that robbed him of a clear sense of what he was preserving. He was a lightbulb that promised top wattage but would never be screwed into a socket.” His boss Alan, also his husband, passed by, glanced at the paper, coughed derisively. “Are we having thoughts again?” Alan said. “Delusions of grandeur or even of the opposite can be cured with a meal.” Alan left laughing but came back a minute later with three twenties rolled up and shoved into an empty Doublemint gum package. “The taste that refreshes,” he said, tossing the package on the desk. “Get up and get yourself some lunch, poet. And pick up ink cartridges for me on the way back. I have to print something that really matters instead of that garbage you’re vomiting out. But the highest glinting thing in the garbage.” Alan left laughing again. Marriage was hell at close quarters.
©2020 Ben Greenman / Stupid Ideas
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