She’s finally made it out the house and that whole mess, and she’s sitting in a Chevy parked out by the shuttered Five & Dime. Her first real crush’s beside her in the driver’s seat and her hand’s on his lap and just lays there while the windshield wipers wipe. With them is her baby brother in the backseat buckled up and wearing Velcro kicks size-L, who all he ever eats is Special K but dry straight out the paper cup, his eyes the deep end of a pool now that he’s half boozed up & calm. Why he’s there is because Mom said so, and when Mom says things she says them as if a soda can’s been shook and popped open. Her hand’s warm where it’s at, and she feels guilty now that he’s so quiet and not always with those questions, her baby brother, like where’s Mom when she’s not here, that show he’s so alive in there, her baby brother, who’s ended up a prayer that didn’t fix what Mom had hoped it would. But it’s nice too, this quiet, because often she can’t hear herself over all the noise and how it’s like she’s raised on sewage & Day-Glo and too heavy a load to ever walk straight, so that sometimes she unglues herself where she’s stuck on with 3M no-slip tape. It’s something in her genes she figures, or the Ohio water maybe or bad luck or sin or just a coin toss 50/50.
“Signal:Noise” is a finalist in the The SmokeLong Grand Micro Contest 2025.
In its third year, The March Micro Marathon will be, as usual, a prompt-a-day whirlwind for 24 days. You’ll exchange drafts of micro fiction, non-fiction, and prose poetry in small groups and gather for a series of online events (all recorded for participants unable to attend live). We’ll finish with 3 competitions, and participants who are not already in SmokeLong Fitness will be invited to workshop with SmokeLong Fitness until the end of April!