Evensong

by Michael Ramsburg

Inside Spybar it sounds like a million pennies rattling around on a thin sheet of tin. A British girl with fake blonde hair asks if I have any heroin. She has a hotel room. She wants to relax. I tell her, I’m sorry. I tell her, No. Lucas screams something in my ear about burritos, but the British girl pulls me out to the dance floor and we rub our bodies together like sticks trying to catch fire. I get home at 5am and it’s too hard to sleep, so I sit on the couch and watch Harry Potter movies until the phone rings. It’s Mom. She says, Your grandmother passed away in her sleep. I cry until my eyes feel vacuum-sucked. Then, at noon, Adam picks me up and we go to a fundraiser for Barack Obama. 

Haircut

by Michael Ramsburg

It’s the third Saturday of the month, so I go see Carrie for a cut and style. We do that thing where we talk to each other in the mirror. She tells me about a friend from high-school who just committed suicide. She says the girl tied a rope around her neck and jumped off a bridge. I tell her, That’s terrible. Carrie laughs it off and starts trimming my neck with the straight razor. She says, We weren’t that close. She says, The girl pissed on herself every time she got drunk. 

issue 41, 11 May 09