Inklings Fall 2019

Inklings Arts & Letters
april's showers, may's flowers
content warning: drug mention
Shelby Rice
I dread the dentist’s. In the outskirts of Dayton, my dentist’s office is
essentially a shack in the woods; which is to be expected for the opioid
crisis hub of America. It’s three chairs and a sink with water that runs
rusty; a communal set of tools shared between the patients in the office.
Last time I was there, the dental hygienist offered me heroin to dull
the pain of a root canal (my insurance won’t cover nitrous). My fifthgrade
DARE teacher flashed through my mind, holding up a picture of
a woman with her teeth rotted out due to drug abuse. I feel like taking
her up on it’ll cause bigger problems, like how my aunt thinks they put
something in the Kleenex to make you sneeze more.
Here, you can actually buy heroin at the grocery store. Ramona, who
restocks the produce, will hand you a three-ounce bag of the good stuff
for thirteen bucks and a pack of Camels, right there in broad daylight.
The dental hygienist told me she’d give it to me for thirty, out-ofpocket.
I told her I could get a better deal elsewhere.
I went down to the 2 nd Street Market before my appointment. There’s a
stall that makes a heavenly chicken caprese sandwich, and even though
the monotone receptionist warned me not to eat beforehand (I throw
up easy), I can’t resist. The bus taking me out to the suburbs where my
doctor’s shack lies between two fields of soybeans passes the market,
and the smell of Chef Joe’s paninis leads me off the bus as if in a trance.
cucumber salad (hipsters make some weird shit) all while gaping at the
most beautiful woman I know.
I did my budget three nights ago; money is tight. I allocated thirteen
dollars for pleasure this month and I just spent seven on the best sandwich
I’ve ever eaten (which I don’t regret in the slightest). I was planning on
buying a cheap bottle of hooch from the kind Irani gentleman around
the corner from my apartment, whose port is shockingly good for
something certainly not FDA-approved. But the spring air beckons me,
making the ends of her neatly-folded hijab flutter, the light catching
golden threads woven into the soft fabric. Her eyes gleam in the
sunlight and I’m drawn out of my seat as if in a trance.
I have four dollars and change. Maybe some flowers will brighten up
my dingy apartment.
The cart is laden with pastel petals. It’s almost Easter, these chalky
monsters are fashionable to have around now. I’m not a flower person,
but I want bright, loud, unapologetically dazzling ones, not these faintfronded
caitiffs. Fortunately, there’s a bunch of fuschia allium in the
corner, and I reach out for them.
“April?”
The dark-eyed woman across from me pulls her hands out of the
planters and moves in for a hug. “How are you doing? I can’t believe
I’m seeing you, how long has it been?”
Three months, fourteen days, and… I glance at the battered watch on
my wrist. ...a little over eighteen hours.
“A while, I guess. Probably since New Year’s.”
Fall 2019
Dayton isn’t all drug deals and shady root canals. As I sit munching
on focaccia, mozzarella and pesto, the sun breaks through the dusty
windows and I see her. Black apron and cheery smile, you can tell just
by looking she’s the kind of person who’s never had a cavity in her
entire life. She works at the flower stall (ironically the best-grossing
business this side of the Great Miami; the folks moving into the newly
gentrified Oregon District like having fresh flowers on any surface that
won’t bow under a vase). I look down and I’ve finished my chicken
sandwich, and I’ve absentmindedly shoveled down my dill-chickpea-
“I can’t believe I’m seeing you today! You’re going to supper tonight, right?”
I wasn’t planning on it. “Yeah, definitely.”
“Craig said your Gran was going to give him the ring for me.”
I look down at her finger. I’d been pointedly avoiding the plastic
placeholder ring on her left hand, deposited there by my cousin Craig
a little less than a week ago. The rain has started, as is typical for my
namesake month, pattering loudly on the market’s metal roof. Circus
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