What Is Your Deepest Intention?

How do you find the wind for your sail when you’re flat on your back on the rug that sheds and smells like puppy piss, the puppy you had to give away rather than put in a crate while you started your hourly job at The Apple Store. It wasn’t the best of times. It wasn’t the worst of times, living alone and wishing for someone to arrive.

She was nearby. I didn’t recognize her and her child for the first few months after we met. We just played tennis with 14 other people. I wasn’t ready and she was never going to be ready, though we had a breakthrough moment just before the virus warped our worlds back together after two dramatic breakups. Of course, the breakups did not have the effect I desired. Nothing changed. The virus came and shut us in the house together, the three of us. Her overlords did not approve. It was a tense arrangement from the first night we spent together.

I woke at 3 am to find a note. She had gone home to be there when her son woke up in the morning. He was eight and with his uncle and cousin. I was alone. I was oblivious to the deeper meaning. But that’s what got us here.

I’m at the beach, giving them a moment to cool off. Well, it was me that was en fuego. Doing well. I’d just landed a new job. And though my mother was struggling in assisted living, things felt like they were heading up.

She was afraid my happiness and momentum would remind me of the dark fracture, where she would never stick up for me with the landlords, next door. Ever.

Read more Short-Short Stories from John.