Mistletoe Cacti

short story Sunday

NOTE: I wrote this piece in December 2014, and it was published in a collection of short stories by a small press in Columbus, Ohio that no longer exists. At the time, I never bought a copy of the book. It was around $60, which felt out of reach for me then (and still does tbqh).

I was also never paid for the work due to the publisher “losing my tax information,” and shortly after, my emails bounced back and the press closed. For a long time, experiences like this left me feeling discouraged. It wasn’t uncommon for me to pour myself into a project only for it to disappear, be rejected, or drift out of my hands without explanation.

Recently, I was able to access an old email account and found the original transcript of this story.

Reading it now feels like opening a small time capsule. I dreamed up a delusional yet lucid character that lives extravagantly in his mind and his apartment is a direct reflection of his life. I have a few different stories with his character. It carries a much different voice than my current work, but it is mine, and it still matters.

I’m sharing it here not to be depressing but more as part of honoring my own archive and being transparent about the long, uneven, and very human path of becoming a paid/professional writer. I will continue sharing my short stories as a series here entitled Short Story Sunday. I hope you read it while enjoying a cup of something cozy.

Picking up his legs and raising them six inches above the bed, he held his breath, lifted his legs, and tightened his abdomen.

Thirty-one seconds later, he dropped his legs, slowly releasing his breath.

He repeated this exercise seventeen times.

Then he repeated this exercise seven more times.

He created this exercise on his own and it was the only exercise he knew.

It was the only exercise he wanted to do.

He now felt warm.

He kicked off his blankets that were probably full of endocrine disrupters and swung his left leg over the edge of the bed, yet still laying flat on his back.

“Am I disciplined?” He asked the silence of his bedroom.

He looked at his left leg, at his square fingertips on his left hand.

He imagined a plate of noodles.

He felt limp and old, lying there.

I am a vermicelli noodle on the edge of a plate but I want to be thick and strong, he thought.

He said aloud, “I want to be strong and thick!”

If he saw a single vermicelli noodle about to slip off of someone’s plate, he would push it back nearer to the center, not wanting the last bite of someone’s dinner to be compromised.

Things will slip if you let them, he thought.

“When was the last time I watered my plant?”

He asked the silence of his bedroom.

He thought about the soft edges of his plant, a Mistletoe Cacti.

He thought about his own soft edges. Fat rolls. Wrinkles. Dry skin.

“I value that this shape and skin are mine,” he whispered to his seven dollar pillow from Target.

Even if he was limp and getting old, at least his legs and hands and skin were his own.
Something in this life truly belonged to him. Or did it?

He flung his right leg to the edge of his bed and held his breath.

His torso was sliding slowly off the edge of the bed, both of his feet touched the wooden floor.

He was leaving the softness and warmth of his bed behind, now.

Alex squinted at the plant across the room and then began to stare at his sock-covered-feet.

Floppy, dusty, and gray, like the sky.
When was the last time he looked at his toes?

In the winter, I do not think enough of my toes to really see them, he thought.
“Let’s Have A Look!” Alex shouted to the dark and silent bedroom and flung off his socks.

He looked at his pink and dirty toes and decided he would rather look at his plant.

The plant looked well, as well as an indoor plant in the winter looks.
In reality, the plant was doing yust okay, and wishing for sunshine and warmer days (and to be watered less).

Did he water the plant on Thursday or on Saturday? He couldn’t remember.
He either over watered his plants or completely forgot about them and then they would die.
His sister Michelle gifted him this plant for his birthday at the Cheesecake Factory on October 30th. He had ordered a skinny-licious chicken alfredo.

He liked to touch the plant when he was reading at his desk.
She instructed that he not to water it too much, or even touch it too much, because Michelle told him that succulents barely need any water at all.
”Just ignore it, like you do all the other important things in life, Alex.” She had also told him happy birthday too, but only after he agreed to give her $20.

He thanked his sister Michelle for the plant but always wished he had a plant that needed “round the clock” care.
He needed a plant to give his life purpose.
He wanted a plant that was a diva. An old time beauty. Like Lauren Bacall. Or Gene Tierney. Something complicated and graceful and lacy.
He hoped for something to really sink his time and effort into; something desperately needy.
Maybe the plant would have a singular silky stem and wither-prone whorled leaves. He would sometimes need to cancel his afternoon appointments and meetings, rush home in traffic in order to adhere to its strict watering schedule.
He’d need three humidifiers. At least.

His diva plant would blossom only at night.
It would be a delicate white flower blossoming only during the winter solstice for a few hours and then melts away like a cheese puff on the tongue. Its blossom alternated odors, sometimes smelling of linen and jasmine and MSG.

This was a plant that no one had even yet heard of, but still regarded highly.

The kind of plant that he would have to leave a key to his apartment with his neighbor next door, whenever he could afford to go out of town, with an extensive bullet point list outlining care.
He would write his list of “Plant Get-To-Dos” in a small notebook upcycled from plastic yogurt cups and wine corks. He was sustainable. He was a hero.

When guests would arrive for his semi-weekly ecologically themed dinner parties (and sometimes in-house acoustic concerts), he would tell them The Story about how he found it, and where, and how long this “chlorophyll baby” had been growing with him.

“Yes, I’ve had it for ten brief years,” he would sigh, and those listening and sipping his fair-trade lemongrass ginger tea would marvel. They would ooh and ahhhhh and hang on his every word.

“When I found it, it was only a seedling.
I was hiking and I smelled something utterly fantastic. I was drooling, let me tell you—
I threw my trekking poles to the side, and lo and behold there it sat, laying inside of a dead baby possum’s mouth directly on its tongue— on the central Oregon section of the Pacific Crest Trail, I tell you, it was only a seedling. Two inches thick.”

“And my life was changed forever that day, by something about as big as three or four eyelashes glued together!”

Alex imagined briefly caring for several of these highly desired plants at a time, then building a greenhouse. Then an entire off grid solar powered museum.
He would definitely charge admission.
Maybe it would even be a plant and bald eagle sanctuary.
It would be by the water. Someplace extra breezy, and humid, like the west coast of Florida or maybe Southern California.
Or Big Sur. Wow, Big Sur is nice.
Maybe I should move there, he thought.

Or wherever bald eagles will remain sexually active enough to breed in captivity.

Maybe the blossoms could serve as an aphrodisiac.

He did not feel inclined to learning much about eagles.
I’ll hire someone for that, he thought.

Some plants are extremely finicky and they can have toxic spikes, he remembered hearing that once. I’ll need a lot of gloves.

Alex let himself slowly fall off the bed, his back scraped against the mattress, the mattress pushed his Joy Division t-shirt up.

He walked across his bedroom barefoot, smoothed down his shirt, picked up his phone from his desk and typed, ‘Rhipsalis Water Care,’ into a search bar.

Fingerlike cylindrical branches jut out from the main stem in segments, covered in white hairs that are not spiny, but soft.

“Should be allowed to go dormant in fall, meaning no water or sunlight at all,” he read aloud to the silence of his room.

He was on a break from teaching English 101 classes at the community college.

He needed to create lesson plans for January. It was December 18. It was 6:45am.

It was winter in Iowa. Winter in Iowa is just like winter in Ohio and that’s just like winter in Minnesota and a little like winter in West Virginia. But it’s not like winter in Wisconsin. No, winter there just feels different. It hurts.

“The lesson plans must wait! I have research to do.”

Alex reached for his phone again, looking at his plant.

‘Where do Orchids grow best?’ He scrolled for thirty seconds but then got suddenly very dizzy. So, he flipped his phone screen down onto his desk.

He got onto his knees again, the cold hardwood floor nagging him painfully and he began to feel sharp prongs, sparks and pops in his left kneecap.

He pulled the sheer olive green curtain to its full length from the window behind his desk. He wrapped himself in the curtain as though it was a ball gown and he was waiting for his prince charming to arrive.

Sneaking and stretching up to see out the window, he then pulled the curtain tighter to his body, peeking and pressing his face against the glass.

“It’s fun to pretend like I have something important to do!”

“It’s fun to pretend like I am important.”
But I’m not important. I’m just a guy.
Living in an apartment. In a city filled with thousands of apartments.
Paying taxes. Eating food and then crapping it out.
On a floating rock in outer space. Time passes.
Nothing matters.
Wow. Nothing matters, he thought.

He continued to stare out his window and his breath fogged the glass.

He caught a figure outside his apartment.

“I see you, Woman In A Pea Coat On Earth!”

He tapped hard against the window. The woman could not hear him, but if she heard him she probably wouldn’t even care. He was on the eighth floor.

She was wobbly and the sidewalk was icy. Things will slip if you let them.
She was carrying a large, red poinsettia with both arms wrapped tightly around its base.

She heaved from side to side and the pot glimmered in the distance, its shining gold foil and blood red leaves reminding everyone of its purpose.
A miracle. Good cheer. Celebration.