Why she was late for dinner…
Digital art ©2015 Michael Dekel

 Why she was late for dinner…

A bag falls to the sidewalk, glass shatters, wine spills—a ghost woke and walked by her, a forgotten moment now scented by shiraz evaporating on hot cement. These days she simply shrugs off such occurrences—hidden minutes pour out along her path wherever she goes, a seam split in a pair of too tight jeans, she supposes, a transcribed protocol. The specter turns, grins at her, a hungry leer that imagines he knows her sexual desires but reveals by its grimace that he remains clueless even about his own fantasies. He would try to turn her brown eyes blue, given the chance to experiment on her. He turned into the middle of the street and disappeared as though around a corner. She looked at the splashes of maroon around her. A painting fell out the window of the third floor of an apartment building, tumbling end over end, revealing Rorschach images in light green before cracking on the short garden wall near the entrance and bouncing to a stop at her feet, where the canvas absorbed the wine stains. Port-wine birthmarks stain her inner thighs just where the smooth skin begins to tingle when she wants to kiss a lover. She picks up the bag, carefully sliding the broken shards back in, and throws it out in a trash receptacle on the corner. With her hands empty, she calls to explain that she will arrive late for dinner. When she enters a liquor store to buy more wine, she meets an old girlfriend. Her friend tells her that she had died in a car accident a few months before and recommends the merlot—mellower than the shiraz. Dinner turns out well, a warm meal with good company and lots of laughter. She doesn’t tell anyone that she sees the past dancing in the shadows, the present always remains a bit out of focus, and the voices speaking to her and only her come from the future. She just appreciates the mellowness.

Wine Bottles 4
Digital art ©2015 Michael Dekel