Lifeline Sunsetting
Art by Amy Marques
“We are always running out of time…”
Amy Marques strives (with varying degrees of success) to say more using less words. More of her art and words at https://amybookwhisperer.wordpress.com.
Dying to See Oliver
Fiction by Angela Joynes
CW: Mention of Death, Risky Behaviour
Dining room, late afternoon. The slats of the mini-blinds stripe my rented hospital bed and Oliver’s old cowboy quilt. Stripes like the pajamas Oliver wore before jammies were lame Mom, like the louvered closet doors Oliver hid behind in middle school, like the track marks lining his arms before we lost him for good. Did Oliver feel the same skull gush from heroin that I get from this morphine, not that it’s worth much? At fourteen, our silly boy actually thought Bill and I didn’t know he was out in the garage blowing cigarette smoke through a toilet paper tube stuffed with Bounce sheets. But mothers know, at least mine always did.
After I climbed out my bedroom window, Mum popped from behind the hydrangea bushes, blinding me with that LL Bean flashlight. Another time I steeped marijuana Kool-Aid for a party, then she said I couldn’t go. I guzzled it all. Caught with dilated pupils and a cherry-stained chin.
Mum was suspicious, while I wasn’t nearly suspicious enough. She inspected my sandals for signs of forbidden lake mud or sandy silt from Hell’s Eddy Beach. Too much Nancy Drew or Nancy Grace in that woman, or tales from her sister who raised the kind of boys who’d boot stomp ancient Nova Scotian Mi’kmaq petroglyphs after I showed them the secret spot.
I wasn’t remotely prepared for Oliver to rebel full bore and fast. I was a stupid mother, so trusting, so optimistic. Never even twigged when he started hanging with those boys from Maple Leaf Park, not a straight tooth among them. I still blame them for his death. Nothing good ever came from a trailer park anyway. Mum had a conniption when I married Bill and we rented a trailer for nine months while he finished taxidermy school. Not such a bad place though, once we got accustomed. Same for most things in life. I mean, I’m practically used to my sunset-colored catheter bag, the IVs, commode chair, oxygen tank, and the sideboard without china and crystal, only incontinence pads, nitrile gloves, and medical detritus.
Lots of detritus appeared after the 2010 flood. Grocery bags, diapers, and bleach bottles nested fifteen feet high in the trees. And speaking of bleach, Bill’s gone overboard scrubbing again, trying to erase the smells of me, the damned decay of me as the hairy root fingers of an heirloom carrot invade. Funny how you only acknowledge your pancreas when it’s devouring you. When it hurts like a motherfucker, excuse my language, and don’t tell my mother.
And it’s so damned hot here. Why is Bill setting the heat on eighty and piling on quilts? Afraid I’ll freeze to death or something? Actually that sounds mighty good. Go ahead, book me on the next Inuit ice floe.
I’m ready for the beyond, really, I am. If it takes all of eternity, I will find my Oliver. And this time, I’ll keep him safe. This time there’ll be stripes on pajamas but not on his veins. This time we’ll both be okay.
Dining room, late afternoon. The slats of the mini-blinds stripe my rented hospital bed and Oliver’s old cowboy quilt. Stripes like the pajamas Oliver wore before jammies were lame Mom, like the louvered closet doors Oliver hid behind in middle school, like the track marks lining his arms before we lost him for good. Did Oliver feel the same skull gush from heroin that I get from this morphine, not that it’s worth much? At fourteen, our silly boy actually thought Bill and I didn’t know he was out in the garage blowing cigarette smoke through a toilet paper tube stuffed with Bounce sheets. But mothers know, at least mine always did.
After I climbed out my bedroom window, Mum popped from behind the hydrangea bushes, blinding me with that LL Bean flashlight. Another time I steeped marijuana Kool-Aid for a party, then she said I couldn’t go. I guzzled it all. Caught with dilated pupils and a cherry-stained chin.
Mum was suspicious, while I wasn’t nearly suspicious enough. She inspected my sandals for signs of forbidden lake mud or sandy silt from Hell’s Eddy Beach. Too much Nancy Drew or Nancy Grace in that woman, or tales from her sister who raised the kind of boys who’d boot stomp ancient Nova Scotian Mi’kmaq petroglyphs after I showed them the secret spot.
I wasn’t remotely prepared for Oliver to rebel full bore and fast. I was a stupid mother, so trusting, so optimistic. Never even twigged when he started hanging with those boys from Maple Leaf Park, not a straight tooth among them. I still blame them for his death. Nothing good ever came from a trailer park anyway. Mum had a conniption when I married Bill and we rented a trailer for nine months while he finished taxidermy school. Not such a bad place though, once we got accustomed. Same for most things in life. I mean, I’m practically used to my sunset-colored catheter bag, the IVs, commode chair, oxygen tank, and the sideboard without china and crystal, only incontinence pads, nitrile gloves, and medical detritus.
Lots of detritus appeared after the 2010 flood. Grocery bags, diapers, and bleach bottles nested fifteen feet high in the trees. And speaking of bleach, Bill’s gone overboard scrubbing again, trying to erase the smells of me, the damned decay of me as the hairy root fingers of an heirloom carrot invade. Funny how you only acknowledge your pancreas when it’s devouring you. When it hurts like a motherfucker, excuse my language, and don’t tell my mother.
And it’s so damned hot here. Why is Bill setting the heat on eighty and piling on quilts? Afraid I’ll freeze to death or something? Actually that sounds mighty good. Go ahead, book me on the next Inuit ice floe.
I’m ready for the beyond, really, I am. If it takes all of eternity, I will find my Oliver. And this time, I’ll keep him safe. This time there’ll be stripes on pajamas but not on his veins. This time we’ll both be okay.
Angela Joynes (she/her) is a disabled Canadian writer now living in Tennessee. She holds a BA, MD, and a Certificate in Creative Writing. Words in The Ilanot Review, Susurrus, South 85, Hot Flash Literary, Fictive Dream, among others. Nominated for Pushcart, Best Small Fictions, Best Microfiction
X: @angela_joynes BS: @angelajoynes.bsky.social
X: @angela_joynes BS: @angelajoynes.bsky.social
