Details

Instances of detail – cool challenge. This is, maybe, a week or two late in publication, and I should have written three, not two, but I don’t want to let either of those things stop me from publishing.  I like these. What do you think of them?

Monday afternoon.  A woman in which and grey, red scarf. The sunlight outlined the veins in her hand as she fondled her cell phone, a bright spot against the shadows of the brick-walled room. Next to her was a large beige purse, with an extra gold charm of an elephant dangling from the end of one of the strap. I inhale and smell the spicy-sweet milky fragrance from my cup. The sounds of coffee grinding in the background drowned the manic sounds of experimental jazz piano, but during the down beats, I could hear her snippets of her story to her friend.

Everything about his body was moving.  I could see him pacing the bright psychiatrist’s office next to mine, and everything on his body kept moving – his eyes, his mouth, this hands as they twitched and balled compulsively. Dressed in dirty army fatigues and a black stocking cap, the stubble of his black beard, the bags under his eyes and the cut on his cheek from a recent fight all converge to complete a picture of filth. I could hear parts of what he was saying to the doctor, even though the door – painted an obnoxious loud teal painted door was closed. “I substituted it with marijuana every day,” at one point, and “When it’s nice enough to sleep outside, I sleep outside.” Even his words were moving, quickly pushed out of his brain and his mouth in a flat monotone. “I wanna be a horse racer.”