Two Fictions
Barry Graham

Smoke

And so it begins, like this, waiting too long for a lazy train out of West Toledo. Sugar white smoke ascends from the broken window of a nearby tool shed. On the concrete platform couples embrace, preparing to go their separate ways, pretending next time they meet they will pull out a map and choose a place, Ann Arbor or Los Angeles or Atlantic City, and that's where they'll belong, where they'll build a life and live happy, forever, like Shrek and Fiona or sharks or birthday party magic they no longer believe in. And why should they. The train hasn't left yet, but they both look eagerly towards the tracks, anticipating its departure.


The Great Wall

And so it begins, like this, waiting too long for a lazy train out of South Camden. The sky expands, turns lemonade pink along the river line before she departs. I pat her ass and we kiss for a long time but not long enough and I cry when I think she's not looking. Ask the Chinese or the Germans about secrets and revolutions and masonry, I say, and she starts to nod then stops. No need, she says, the French tell me other things. So I nod too, neither of us knowing what we meant. Why she's coming and going. Why the sun sets so beautifully on such occasions.

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