An entire family dressed in black leather walked the open market. Back and forth. My boyfriend walked ten steps ahead of me. He never looked back. A man pushed a woman in a wheelchair. She wore a felt fedora and rolled a lollipop in her mouth. The man stopped to take the lollipop out of her mouth so she could swallow. She groans, deep and scraping and he places it back on her tongue. This happened over and over. My boyfriend spoke English to everyone, while I strained to hear some rhythm to the local patois, made an effort to join in. Sometimes he resorted to elaborate hand gestures and people laughed. The sunglasses I wore were too big for my face, something I regret. I lost track of my boyfriend between the sun-dried tomatoes and the glossy eggplants. The family dressed in black leather walked back and forth without buying a single thing. I thought how hot they must be in their leather. But it was Sunday and everyone dressed to promenade. I wore a sundress with green flowers, lace trim. I carried a string bag on my shoulder, inside four artichokes which we would not eat, but I didn’t know it at the time. Later, in our hotel room, I told him about the family in leather. His eyes traveled around the room, settled on my face avoided my eyes. He held my hand which was cold. He said “baby”, and I waited, then nothing. I told him about the woman with the lollipop, the tenderness of the man with her. He laid back. I pressed my head to his chest which was like a fragile house of cards. I tasted salt I couldn’t see. There were questions I had the right to ask, but never did.
Michelle Reale is an academic librarian on faculty at Arcadia University in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Her work has appeared in a wide variety of venues including Gargoyle, Pank, JMWW, Smokelong Quarterly, Word Riot, elimae and others. Currently she is working on a collection of prose poems featuring the experiences of North African immigrants into the indifferent society of southeast Sicily, where she has witnessed their struggles first hand. She is currently pursuing Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution studies. Her short fiction collection Natural Habitat was published by Burning River in 2010. Her short fiction chapbook Like Lungfish Getting Through the Dry Season is forthcoming from Thunderclap Press in 2011.