Crisis
First published in Right Hand Pointing #144, July 2021. Originally written in April of 2006 (as microfiction, flash fiction, or prose poetry).
My eighteen-year-old son doesn’t know I know he has a piercing. I overhear him on the phone saying his grunge band may get a paying gig. “What’ll you call yourselves?” I ask him later. After he grunts, I ask again. “Not sure,” he says. “Maybe Jesus Crisis.” He grabs the OJ from the fridge. “I kinda liked Smegma, but the other guys thought no one would book us.” He bangs the door to his bedroom. Every year for Mother’s Day he still gives his mother a hand-made card. He plays lead guitar, has calluses on his fingers.