First, a note. There is darkness inside. Sometimes it comes out. That’s what writing does. It lets darkness out so light can keep coming in.

I was listening to PJ Harvey’s “One Time Too Many” and Belly’s “Low Red Moon” when I wrote this quick piece. I’m not sure what it is about, who the man is and or what kind of farmer he might be.

Don’t let this ruin your mood. The moon is beautiful. Our appetites are cruel, but they keep up digging.

***

He digs the hole, deep enough to bury a man. Then he digs the hole deeper still. He works without thinking, pushing the shovel through the crust of ground, lifts each scrape of dirt and rock, builds a pile, a slowly escalating mound as the hole gets deeper and deeper, sinks farther and farther into shadow.

Sweat is running down his face. His shirt and pants are heavy with it. They cling to his arms and legs, weak and trembling from exertion still working and working with the steady, relentless rhythm of an automaton.

The hole is deep enough already. Still, he continues to dig.

He glances over his shoulder once, twice while he works. He wants to be certain this is really happening. He wants to be sure the body is still there.

It lies behind him, nearly hidden in darkness. Only the open curve of the face silvered with moonlight, the eyes staring up at him expressionless.

There is no guilt in those eyes. No accusation.

He is a kind of farmer. Just as his father was a kind of farmer before him and his father before him and so on back too many generations to count. It is what he is. It is what he does.

Farmers dig. They turn over the soil.

He looks down into the vast, empty space between his boots. There are secrets down there if you know where to look. Wriggling, writhing things that move silently through the soil. Unspeaking, voiceless things that wait with the terrifying patience of stone.

The earth is our mother, he tells himself. The earth is our father.

We are made for the earth, from the earth.

The moon is high in the sky, watching with its cold, appraising stare.

The work of a farmer is merciless. The earth gives us to life. We give life to the earth.

Best not to dwell too long with the philosophy of things. There are always ways to cast questions. Philosophy is useless. Best just to dig, hands grip the shovel handle tight. Best not dwell too long with thinking. Thoughts have strong fingers, they can find a niche of doubt, a single moment of uncertainty and pull everything apart.

He has worked too hard to give room for doubt. His father before him had worked too hard. And his father and his father.

The hole is deep. Certainly deep enough to bury a man. And yet, still he works, making the hole deeper, darker. He digs, tries not to notice how the grave yawns, a hungry mouth without teeth that pulls a man to dig deeper and deeper still.

Best not to think, he reminds himself. That is the catechism. Best not think. Keep your eyes at the edge of the hole. Keep the shovel moving. Do not look up. Do not look down.

Try not to notice the way the moon peers over your shoulder, an eager, greedy face.

The ground is hungry. The moon is merciless. There is no respite.

He digs because he is a kind of farmer. He digs because it is the nature of shovels to dig. He moves the dirt with a singleness of attention. He pays no mind to the body on the ground behind him. The corpse is inconsequential. There is no life. There is no death. There is only the work. The soft, steady sound of dirt accumulating. The happy sighs of things that live in dirt.

The shovel moves. Best not to dwell. There is just the work. Nothing but the work. Only the work.

The work fills the world.

The ground is hungry.

The moon is merciless.

Night has its appetite. It swallows and swallows and never is it satisfied.

I like to play around with words sometimes. Just put on a song and improvise a quick story to capture the sense of the music. It is a lot of fun to write this way. I can’t promise what it will be like to read. It is what it is.

Tonight’s song: Ear Parcel by Lamb.

******

Prompt: Ear Parcel by Lamb

He turned the paper over in his hands, his mind grasping for the unknowable numbers on the lost fragment. He had found the paper under the front seat of his girlfriend’s car. Torn, the paper only showed four numerals written in pencil. Four numbers. Three more numbers on the missing piece made it a phone number. Of course, nine made it an ISBN. One made it a zip code.

He wanted a cigarette. He hadn’t smoked in months but right now he wanted to smoke an entire pack. He wanted to light up and feel each disappear into the hot, bright light of his anger.

He wanted to burn the note. If it was a note. Maybe it was just a random scribble. Maybe it meant nothing. He should throw it away. Or put it back under the front seat of her car where he found it. Neither option worked for him.

So he stood outside her car, waiting. Any minute now she would walk out the front door of the office building with a dozen other people. She would see him waiting for her. She would smile. Then she would recognize that impatient, hurt look on his face. She would see the piece of paper in his hand and her smile would slip. In that moment, he would know everything. If he watched her carefully, in that one unguarded moment, he would know.

People were leaving the office building now. Tired faced men and women chatting as they fanned out into the parking lot to gather their cars and drive off to rejoin the parts of their lives they leave waiting for them while they are working.

And that was the worst part of it all, for him. There were parts of her life which he knew nothing about. There were entire stretches of her day which did not include him. There wasn’t even a boyfriend-shaped hole in that space for her. When she was working, he had might as well not even exist. When he tried to call, she was always in a meeting. When he sent a text, the message went unanswered or, worse, the curt reply: can’t talk now.

People were leaving the building. Some of them were smiling. Some were serious and sad-faced. They all knew his girlfriend, all of them. Knew her in a way he could never know her. She was a colleague. A coworker. A manager.

The way these people knew her. The lightness with which they carried that knowledge with them. The smug air they had.

A dark haired man in a nice suit smiled as he went past. Nodded. “Nice day,” he said in a way that made it impossible to tell if he meant it as an observation or an invocation. Either way, the man broke eye contact quickly and shuffled off to his car.

Guilty. That man had looked guilty. The smile was covering his guilt but the boyfriend could see through it. Suddenly, the boyfriend knew with absolute surety that the man had put his hands all over his girlfriend, had rubbed and smoothed and fondled her. Maybe only just moments ago. Maybe she was still inside, smoothing her dress, straightening her jacket, tucking in her blouse.

Maybe, if he could grab the man’s phone and see the last four numbers he would find that they matched the four numbers in his hand. That would seal it. He would know and she would be caught. There would be no escape. There would be no denial.

Except the man was already gone, leaving the parking lot in his sporty gray BMW. The boyfriend felt angry to be standing beside his girlfriend’s navy blue Camry. This was not the life she wanted. This was not the car she wanted to be driving. He was not the man she wanted to be taking home.

He crumpled the paper and held it in his fist. Somedays it was hard not to want to hit something. Everything was so unfair.

He opened his hand, smoothed the note out on his leg. She needed to see the note. He needed her to see the note in his hand.

The doors opened. There she was, leaving alone, smiling. Content with herself for a day’s work well done. Then she saw him and smiled wider. She actually skipped a step or two as she came to meet him. And then she was standing before him, the note unseen. She kissed his cheek.

“Thanks for picking me up,” she said, still smiling and went to the other side of the car.

“Sure,” the boyfriend said, unsure how this was supposed to go next.

“What’s for dinner?” she asked as he opened his door. “I was hoping for Thai carryout. There’s a new place we need to try. I’ve got the number written somewhere in this car.”

All at once, the air in the car was lighter. He felt his fists relaxed. He remembered the face of each person who had left the building and then, one by one, forgot them. They were strangers. They were inconsequential.

“Sure. Thai carryout sounds great.”

A quick work of flash fiction. Tried to write something very different tonight. This came out instead.

*****

Harold had no idea what time it was or exactly how long he had sat staring at the empty white field on his screen. She was gone. He had no idea how long she had been gone. It felt like weeks. He hadn’t heard her go. There was no final closing of the door, no last flip of the switch. She had been there when he was not paying attention and now she was gone.

Harold thought about getting up to look for her. It would do no good. He had called her name five times already, each time expecting her to bound into the room with an offer of help. The right word. Some lascivious whisper. One delicious sentence to get him started.

There would be no more of that. She was gone.

The screen was blank. His eyes ached from the glare. Was he watching the screen? Was the screen watching him? It was hard to know which was which.

He hadn’t heard her go. How long ago had she left? He felt like he should still be able to catch her scent in the room. There must be some trace of her perfume, some phantom tendril to remind him of her. She wouldn’t have been gone that long. She wouldn’t have left him completely empty. She would have left him with something with which to remember her.

He looked around the room, confused and crippled feeling from his time spent hunched over the chair.

Had he slept? Impossible that she had left while he was staring at the screen, not writing. He must have fallen asleep. He must have slept.

Harold pushed away from the desk. He was trying to remember the last thing she had said to him. What had it been? Was there some clue contained inside?

I’m going out. He could certainly imagine her saying that. He could hear the words in what he believed to be her voice. I’m going out. So casual. So normal. She was going out, just like had a hundred times before. She would be back. That was how it worked. She went out then she came back. He tried to satisfy himself but the words sat false. That was not what she had said.

Harold stood up, unsteady on his feet. He was drunk with exhaustion. It was hard to keep himself steady. He walked across the bedroom, ready to grab for balance if needed. The room was moving around him.

The bedroom door was open, a mouth open to the long dark hall beyond. Seeing it made him panic. He had not left the door open. He always closed the door when he was writing. Or not writing. She had opened the door. She had left the door open.

He thought of calling her. Certainly not the first time he had thought of that. The idea was no good. She didn’t have a phone.

What kind of person these days doesn’t carry a phone?

Harold shuffled down the long, dark hallway, feeling like a person in a horror film about to stumble across the dead body. And it would have been some kind of relief for him to find her lying there. Then he would not need to know that she had left him and was not coming back. Dead was better. If she was dead, that was one thing. But she wasn’t dead. At least, she wasn’t dead in his apartment, and Harold was left alone once again with the more awful truth.

She had left him. He had not heard her leave. She was not coming home.

For a long time, my writing has suffered from an expectation that the things I write need to be finished, polished and complete before they are read. Finished, polished and complete are all important. The unspoken corollary is that writing must be perfect before it is read.  That belief has made my writing a lonely, sometimes painful, act.

I am trying to kill that mental habit by writing in public. Posting these unfinished, unpolished snatches of “flash fiction” helps me subvert the belief that the point of writing is to make perfect things. I am practicing with the idea that the point of writing is to be read.

So here’s another piece I wrote last night. I was listening to “Autumn in Our Town” by Dave Brubeck and Ranny Sinclair.

*****

He hadn’t meant to pick up the phone. Dialing her number was sheer mutiny, and yet, here he was, pressing the numbers, his fingers finding the buttons from long lost habit deeper than memory. They hadn’t spoken in years. He couldn’t quite remember why. There had been a reason. A good reason.

The phone was ringing. He closed his eyes, trying to remember the color of her eyes. They had been green. Her eyes were slightly misaligned, though he couldn’t well remember if they had moved more to the left or the right. It was a thing he noticed when she stared at him. She had stared at him a lot, a bit like an idiot perhaps but the remembered impression of that stare was powerfully erotic.

How had they met? Was it in physics class? Had they been lab partners? Or had they met, perhaps, in the library? Maybe it was on the bus? Had he ever ridden a bus? Where would he have ridden a bus?

These questions crowded as the phone rang — once, twice, three times. He was about to hang up feeling foolish for indulging this fantastic whim when the line opened and a voice spoke.

“Hello?” A man’s voice with a British accent. She had always loved men with British accents. She had made him hate his own Southern Georgia drawl, he remembered suddenly. So many things she had helped him hate about himself, he realized with sudden panic.

“Hello?” the Englishman said again with that tone of patient annoyance that must have driven her wild. “Is anyone there?” he asked.

A choking croak rose in his throat when he tried to answer.

“Hello?” the Englishman said again, this time less patient, more annoyed. “Is there someone on the line? Can I help you?”

He swallowed a second croak, which went down his throat like a thing with a hundred legs. The taste of bile. He was dizzy and sweating a little.

“May I speak to Celine?”

The man on the other end grew silent except for suddenly labored breath. There was a moment when the latent sound of telephone wire was the only sound shared between them. And then, the British man spoke, “May I ask who’s calling?”

“I’m an old friend of Celine’s,” he said quickly. Even as he spoke the words, they sounded wrong to him. Even to his own ears, they sounded very much a lie. “Norbert,” he added, realizing he needed to add more information.  “My name is Norbert.”

The British man was being careful now. “Norbert,” he said, as if practicing the name for the first time.

“Yes. Is Celine there?”

The British man sighed. “No. Celine isn’t available. She can’t speak on the phone.”

Norbert pondered the odd turn of phrase. “May I leave her a message? Like I said, I’m an old friend. This is terribly important.”

The man sighed again. “Terribly important.” He said it as if taking dictation. “How long has it been since you last spoke to Celine?”

Norbert sensed a trap. Besides, his mind couldn’t capture how long it had been. Surely twenty years or more. Maybe thirty. Yet standing there, having dialed Celine’s number on his phone, he felt as if he had spoken with her as recently as yesterday. Time was a tricky thing. It folded in on you and doubled over while you were not looking. Things that happened yesterday seemed years ago and things from years ago were as close to hand as yesterday.

“Not sure. Years, I’m sure,” Norbert said.

“Years,” the British man confirmed. “I see.” Now it was a clinical pronouncement, the way a doctor might deliver hard medicine. “Bad news, I’m afraid, Norbert. Celine isn’t well. She hasn’t been herself. For years, I’m afraid.”

“Not herself?” Norbert asked. “Then who has she been?”

“I’m sorry. I really must be going now.”

“Please.” The edge of panic in his voice surprised Norbert. Her eyes had been green. They had tracked slightly to the left when staring at him. She had a spray of pale freckles across the bridge of her nose and her eyebrows were thinner at the centers than at either side. “I need to speak with Celine. It’s very important.”

Another sigh. “Celine isn’t here. She can’t be here. She is in hospital for people who aren’t themselves.”

He waited for the words to sink in.

“A hospital for people who aren’t themselves?” Norbert asked, feeling dense.

“Psychiatric,” the man said, his tone deadly dull.

“I see.” It was the only thing Norbert could think to say. And then, “Still, it is very important I reach her. Is there a number I can try?”

“You aren’t getting this,” the man said again. “My wife isn’t able to take your call. She isn’t able to speak with you. She isn’t able to speak with anyone. She isn’t Celine. There is no Celine. You should forget about Celine. Give up on her. Move on. There isn’t any use in pursuing this line. You will not reach her. She can’t be reached.”

The man was angry. Norbert hadn’t intended to make anyone angry. Quite the opposite. It was quite simple, really. He had only wanted to make contact and explain a few unresolved things from his own perspective. He had only wanted to hear her voice, to remember those crooked eyes and the way her wicked smile had filled him with equal measure of fear and excitement.

The man on the other end of the line had stopped speaking. He had run out of things to say. Norbert tried to hear if he was fuming or crying. In the end it made no difference. Love was a madness that descended where it would, ruining the plans and expectations of everyone it touched. Whether this man, Norbert or whatever other men had crossed paths with Celine. It was no matter. There was nothing to be said. Nothing to be accomplished.

“I am sorry to have bothered you,” Norbert told the man. And he was. He hung up the phone and felt a sudden giddy rush and his incredible good fortune. Love had come upon him, had ruined him with its crushing madness. It was a beautiful thing after all, he decided. No less delicious, however unrequited