Flash Fiction
Hey there, lover. I know you’d rather be doing anything else, but it will fall to you to tell the bees I’m gone. Before they play “Angels” at my funeral because I didn’t think to pick out a song, before the kid with the busted lip wails, “Why do I have to be here?” speaking for us all, before Osiris weighs my heart in a balance and finds me wanting, it will fall to you to knock on their hives, shroud them in black, and tell them I’m gone.
Time’s running out, but I still have days left. Days where I wish you could watch me: my life playing out like a movie on your screen. Days I no longer have to join your Weller bourbon hunt while the Miller Lite cans languish into distant memory, no longer have to stuff my mouth with unspellable charcuterie when we both know you like the chili dogs from the hot-chick deli. The wine seminars you signed us up for are consigned to the dust heap of our history. Imagine a world, lover, where there is no need to stalk my timeline for clues or innocently ask a friend what I’m up to. There’s no need to trim that beard, clip that hair, or groom with an ex-lover’s care. There’s no need to pretend to run into me somewhere with a twentysomething on your arm (fancy seeing you here!) to see if there is still something there. You can turn on the TV—dressed in the shorts you last washed Wednesday, the day’s dust congealed on your face, relish smeared into your beard, mustard running down your chubby fingers—and switch the channel to me.
Don’t gawp because it’s me reading Wuthering Heights and listening to Miley; drinking boxed wine in slacks; yelling “I knew you were trouble …” at the TV. This is no longer the woman who convinced herself to be more you than she needed to be. That woman was nothing but grateful to keep you with her: grateful enough to laugh at your boss’s jokes and not complain about friends who stand too close; grateful enough to laugh off your drive-by cruelty; grateful enough to understand the rules—I’m supposed to like you as you are, and you’re supposed to like me as I am not.
Lover, don’t you worry—I didn’t kill all that was us. I kept the bees (the bees you wanted, whom I ended up mothering). They are the only good we brought into this world: simple, unknowing, thriving. They’re all that will remain of you and me and our commonplace tragedy.
But bear with me as I break the rules, for while there is time left, I have to be me, not who I was pretending to be. I’ve got to get it right in the end: hunched over a pot, music blaring from the speakers, foot tapping to the beat. There’s joy in the air as “Hung Up” shuffles up next on the playlist. Buckle up because I should’ve let loose two years ago when I stood in the kitchen, blasting “Material Girl” from the speakers, desperately wanting to dance but never did. It was the look on your face I imagined—the same look you are wearing now—that stopped me from twirling on the floor and sliding up and down an imaginary stripper pole. Time goes by so slowly, so slowly … Madonna croons, and lover, that’s a damn lie because there isn’t time enough for me. Had I known, I’d have gotten my act together sooner than I did. Tick tick tock, it’s a quarter to two, we twirl to ABBA’s “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!” hook. Endure the embarrassment because it’s revenge for the time we watched “In the Mood for Love,” and you slid your hand under my waistband as I wept to “Yumeji’s Theme”; it’s revenge for the time you said we ought to tell the bees when one of us is gone so we are not alone in our mourning, and I was fool enough to believe you’d miss me. You’ll wake up one day, but it’ll be too late, Madonna says, and I can’t help but wish that someday you’ll regret never knowing me. So slowly, so slowly … the song picks up—I sway my hands in the air, Woodstock-style, and wonder why I’m spending what’s left of time caring what you think of me.
What will you wear? That twill suit you wore for Mom’s, maybe. It’s okay to recycle funeral wear. You aren’t made of money. We weren’t close. We didn’t talk about death, except when we talked about bees and how people felt the need to announce their going. The hive frames are full of honey, but neither you nor I will witness the first harvest. I’m sorry it has to be you, but I’ll be cold in my bed, and I need someone to care if I’m dead. Even if it’s just the bees. Promise me you will find yourself a hive and a tale to tell. Tell them who I was. The version you didn’t know. The version I didn’t have long to be. Lie if you need to. Lie if you care. Until then, if you are watching, hide your disdain because although it’s a little late in the day, I’ll be damned if I let anything snuff out joy again.
Varsha Venkatesh writes from Bangalore, India. She’s been previously featured in The Cabinet of Heed and Moss Puppy Magazine, among others. She can be found on Twitter (X) at @VarshaWrites86.