IMOGENE’S NOTEBOOK
Whatever’s Coming Is Always Next
A short story
Mama says the dead bird in the cold fireplace is bad luck. The landlord shrugs and pulls a cigarette from a crumpled pack in his shirt pocket.
“You want it or not? I got others interested, too.”
We need to stay out of the system, Mama says, so we can’t live in housing authority apartments, and this is the only advertised apartment within our budget.
Ava and I poke at the peeling branches of a tree that lurks outside the window. The glass is broken, and the branches reach towards us like threatening arms.
“It’ll be cold soon. You gonna fix that window before it snows?”
When Mama crosses her arms and shifts her weight to one hip, the landlord sniffs.
“Yeah, sure. Gotta keep up with the building codes.”
He snickers, and the ash from his cigarette trickles to the scuffed hardwood floor like poison fairy dust. There aren’t any fairies here, but no one knows us, and that’s all the magic we need.
There’s a clothesline hanging between two rusty metal poles in the backyard. Nothing is hanging on it, and I picture Daddy chasing Mama with the line she hung in our bathroom.
