The Ghost Who is in Love with Your Husband

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Francine Witte

 

       There she is in the campfire. On your let’s-disappear-into-the-woods honeymoon everyone warned you against. Oh, it’ll be fun, you told everyone. I will find a sleeping princess spot, lie down, and my prince will kiss me awake. You told everyone you’ve wanted this since you were twelve.

       But instead, there she is, this ghost woman, this gather of souls you know your not-really-ready-for-marriage husband still thinks about -- girls with blonde feathery hair who lick their lips at him.  He told you about them a hundred times or so. You said let’s get married anyway. We can always work it out.

       The ghost is dancing for your husband in the campfire, slither of flame, all wriggle and crackle and spark. She is anything but asleep. You see her face, her eyes fixed straight at your husband. You are trying not to see it.

       But you get it. Your husband is deep dip of heartbreak hair, and even though you think you are pretty, you know you aren’t dance-in-the- fire pretty.

       You reach into your basket for marshmallows. You somehow think s’mores are the answer, the way they were that summer you were eleven. That was the last summer with your father before his heart attack showed up, poison apple witch that it was. You can still remember him oozing the marshmallow off the wooden stick. He told you “get those chocolate and graham crackers ready, kiddo. We’re gonna make magic.”

       You want this kind of moment for you and your prince-y husband. That magic, that moment you are planning for tomorrow if you even make it past tonight. That moment when you lie down in the grass beside that lake you passed as you drove into the campsite. You will be the sleeping princess. He will find you and kiss everything right.  But when you look over at him now, he is staring into the fire, right back at the ghost.        You can see her light burning up his face, waking him sudden and hard as if he has been very, very asleep.

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       Francine Witte is a flash fiction writer and poet, and the author of the flash collection RADIO WATER. Her newest poetry book, Some Distant Pin of Light, has just been published by Cervena Barva Press. Her work has been widely published, and she is a recent recipient of a Pushcart Prize. She lives in New York City. Please visit her website francinewitte.com. She can be found on social media @francinewitte.  

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       April Lafleur’s distinctive painting style is inspired by German Expressionism, emphasizing the artist’s deep-rooted feelings or ideas, evoking powerful reactions-abandoning reality, characterized by simplified shapes, bright colors, gestural marks and brush strokes. Masters like Kirshner and Marc come to mind when viewing April’s dynamic paintings.

April has earned an AFA at the Community College of Rhode Island, where she had the privilege of studying with Bob Judge, a masterful painter who has worked as an artist for over sixty years. Her studio is located at the Agawam Mill in Rhode Island.

 https://www.aprillafleurart.com/