Reading Faulkner in the Dark

By: Erik Rittenberry

2am and I heard the front door slam.

She stumbled in and tossed her keys
on the counter, lit a cigarette,
and propped her long leg up
on the chair to unzip her
knee-high boots.

I was sitting in the corner
sipping whiskey
and reading
Faulkner.

The ice in the glass made a sound
as I raised it to my lips. It
stunned her and she
looked over.

“What’s the secret to this fucking life?”
I asked her as I blew smoke rings
in the dark.

She rolled her eyes
and with her hair all tangled
and an ornery smile,
shimmied her silk
panties down from under
her short black dress
and flung them
at me.

They smelt like the answer
to it all.

I fired up my last cigar and
sipped whiskey in the dark
to a Chet Baker record
I had lightly playing
in the background.

With her bare feet on the wood floor
and a drunken sway, she slowly
made her way towards me
as she raised
her middle finger
and told me to
“fuck off.”

Faulkner once asked:
“Who gathers the
withered rose?”

Indeed, that is the question.

She straddled me in a clumsily
sort of cute way and then took the
cigar out of my mouth and
dropped it in my whiskey.

She took one last drag of her
cigarette before dropping
that one in too.

The street lights lit her face.
I heard sirens in the distance.
I grabbed her ass tightly
and looked into her
mascara-smeared
eyes.

Faulkner made a thud on the floor
as Chet Baker played on till
dawn.

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