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fireworks sheldon.jpg

A prayer for fireworks by Evan James Sheldon

November 24, 2020

It’s not that I didn’t like the way the clown looked. Creepy clowns provide a much-needed service to society. I tried to make him understand that, I tried to make him understand so many things.

He was in full regalia, and spinning a sign, like you see on a street corner advertising Taxes done cheap! or Sale. Today. Big. Except we weren’t around any stores, we were just at the park. I was avoiding my father by feeding dried rice to pigeons and hoping. We had gotten in a fight about emptying the dishwasher when it was clean, but it was really about how he wanted me to move out. He loved to do that, to pick fights about inconsequential things, but I always knew what we were really fighting about.

I wondered how long the clown had been there, but I guessed it had been quite a while since his eye paint was beginning to run. I didn’t hold it against him. He was working really hard. The sign practically blurred.

No one else seemed to care about the sweaty clown spinning a sign we couldn’t read. Children weren’t amused. They flicked bits of sand in the air to watch how small things fall. Mothers avoided eye contact like he was asking for money. After a while it became kind of sad, and I told him that. A sad clown is better than a creepy clown. You’re really moving up in the world.

He kept on and his red nose fell off, and then he stepped out of his floppy red shoes. One gaudy suspender broke, then the other. Soon he was just a guy twirling a sign. If you had known he was a creepy clown before, there’s no way you would now.

He was getting tired; I could see him straining. So I went, and in one smooth motion traded the spinning sign for my bag of dried rice. He looked thankful, if a bit surprised, but that could have just been the remnants of his original getup. I spun and spun, grateful for my natural dexterity.

My father, who had been pretending not to watch, came up, chuckling a bit to himself. What are you doing? he asked. I didn’t have the breath to speak really, but I managed to squeak out, trying to get the pigeons to explode. He didn’t chuckle after that. It’s almost as if he wasn’t paying attention, like he couldn’t see the trajectory of an initial action, like he didn’t know that something begun continues even if its form shifts. 

My arms grew tired and the creepy clown left with my bag of dried rice. I looked around frantically for someone to take over the job, but nobody came. I stayed at it until after dark, until the park had emptied except for two lovers necking on the bench where I had first fed the pigeons. My forearms began to cramp. I set the sign down and it was too dark to read what he’d been selling.

 

Evan James Sheldon's work has appeared recently in the American Literary Review, the Cincinnati Review, and the Maine Review, among other journals. He is a senior editor for F(r)iction and the Editorial Director for Brink Literacy Project. You can find him online at www.evanjamessheldon.com. 

Tags Evan James Sheldon, A Prayer for Fireworks, Fireworks, Prayer
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A Refresher by Evan James Sheldon

August 20, 2020

            Dad is watching cartoons, reruns of the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and drinking. I’m supposed to be asleep, but I sneak out of my room and watch from around the corner. He doesn’t laugh or smile while he watches, though his face is lit up from the glow of the television, making him look like a ghost in the dark. I notice that every time they say cow-a-bunga he takes a sip of whiskey, like he’s playing a game all by himself.

            Eventually, I return to my room and pull out my action figures, Raphael and Michelangelo and Leonardo, I can’t find Donatello but he was never my favorite anyway. I don’t turn on the light so my dad won’t notice. I fight monsters turned into outrageous things by ooze, things Bebop and Rocksteady would be afraid of. I always defeat them, except tonight it doesn’t work. I can’t think of what my turtles should do to take down the evil creatures. I can’t picture them winning.

            And I think I understand why my dad plays his own game, maybe he’s forgotten how to take down the evil creatures too. Maybe he needs to watch how it’s done.

            I sneak back out but he’s fallen asleep. I leave Leonardo on Dad’s lap.

Evan James Sheldon is Senior Editor for F(r)iction and the Editorial Director for Brink Literacy Project. You can find him online at evanjamessheldon.com. 

Tags A Refresher, Evan James Sheldon, Dispatch, Dispatches
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Sheldon pic.jpeg

By Any Other Name by Evan James Sheldon

July 21, 2020

Jimson tied herself to the train tracks and waited to feel the vibrations. She figured there wasn’t any better way to get a sense of impending death. To feel it in your chest, starting as a thrum and moving to a buzz, would be the only way to know it fully. At least that was how she imagined it. A lot of people she knew had died; she wasn’t going in unprepared.

            A man came, wearing a long cape and a top hat and he twirled his moustache deviously. What are you doing here? This is my spot. Jimson laughed at him. He was funny, being a cartoon and all. Weren’t cartoons supposed to be funny?

Move along, Jimson said. There’s plenty of track and I was here first. She grabbed a loose bit of rope with her teeth and tightened herself down. 

            The cartoon man swore and swore, and twirled his moustache so furiously that the end became frayed like a cheap paint brush. Jimson wanted to rip it off and create some fake rock paintings of spaceships or one of those geoglyphs of a giant hyena that you can only see from the sky, something hidden unless you knew exactly how to look.

            A cartoon lady arrived, she had rope burns on her arms, but they were healing. What the fuck is this? she said, gesturing to Jimson.

My name means poison, Jimson said. No one knew what to do. 

            They all turned and watched as the train, like a pinprick, like an ever-expanding black hole, appeared on the horizon pulling them toward the inevitable.  


Evan James Sheldon is Senior Editor for F(r)iction and the Editorial Director for Brink Literacy Project. You can find him online at evanjamessheldon.com. 

Tags Evan James Sheldon, By any other name, fiction, flash fiction, micro fiction, dispatch
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