my passion! (ish)

Hi hello, this is my page full of writings. I like to write fiction the most but I uploaded a volume of some old poetry. I just finished my first semester of a fiction workshop so the following pieces are from that class. The original inspiration for this site was a place to upload my writings that wasn't substack so this was the easiest (opposite actually) answer. Anyways I hope you enjoy and I opened a comment section on each piece if you're interested in leaving any part of you in this more vulnerable space. BTW some of these are a little graphic and/or contain mature content and are not to be judged so critically! so second warning

Penance

a short story, written: february 2025

The summer before college, my parents' close friend came over for dinner and told me I could start working at the grocery store down the road. They all smiled down the table at me as they placed the vocation on my plate. Before I started my parents told me to add an honorific to the friend's name so he was now Mr. Doug. He was a confusingly shaped balding blonde that was more suit than man and treated his office like a teenager's bedroom. His walls were adorned with inspirational quote posters hung intentionally askew and his desk had two as seen on TV water feature. On my first day he gave me a name tag I kept only in my pocket, a uniform vest, a cleaning rag, and stapled pages to sign. I worked with a group of old women with straight lines of lump across their chests resembling one boob. I only ever saw them eat liquid foods. The store was cold and empty most times except weekday mornings that were so busy with mothers and screams from the children they couldn’t get in daycare. Their carts overflowed with cheeses, various vegetables, bloody meat, and even more toddler legs. I thought about their husbands while they fidgeted with their wallets looking for presumably his credit card and nervously laughed at my impatience. I imagined they were over-apologetic during sex as well. The ones with shopping lists probably scheduled sex on the family calendar in between soccer practices, and the rest probably went to bed after cooking, cold and unthanked. I would get lost in my guessing games and forget to give them their receipt or ignore their gratitude. A few weeks in, Mr. Doug pulled me into his office with a whistle and reminded me of the training videos we watched about engagement. He suggested I try making jokes as he bounced back and forth in his wheely chair with his legs propped up displaying patchy leg hair tucked into slightly yellowed hanes socks. Just get one regular doll, he pleaded while he opened the door so inconveniently I had to duck beneath his arm. And don’t stare so much, I’ve gotten some complaints. He patted my head. I was only scheduled for the desolate evening shifts after that.
Most nights I wiped the stained steel register down over and over again until there was no evidence of broccoli or kids snot and I could catch a sight of myself in it. Sometimes I would go looking for stray carts outside the store and come back smelling like too much perfume. The old ladies didn’t really mind me though, after they understood I was not a mature teenager but rather a childish woman they stopped asking me questions. They were really good with the young kids because they all had them at home. I watched them give out stickers and lollipops and even occasionally hug the mothers and soothe them from the stress of having no job. Something about organic fruit must make everyone here soft. I kept the lollipops for strategy and tugged my shirt down as I realized my regular customers would come from a different demographic. I tried my luck on a man with a big face I’d seen before buying two small potatoes, one white onion, and a sprig of rosemary on a saturday at seven o’clock. Misread the recipe? I joked while pulling the cherry sucker out of my mouth. He didn’t look up from his shoes, just let some air out from his nose but it still made his forehead vein swell. He looked like Dustin Hoffman in that Watergate movie, his tie loose and sleeves rolled up, trying to make people believe working in an office was as hard as at an oil rig. I saw his college ID attached to a lanyard hanging from his pocket and figured he was some pompous student. Still a cute one. Do you need a bag for these? I breathed, holding the vegetables out as if the potatoes were my breasts. Still not looking at me he said please, and swiped a flimsy credit card. He left without his receipt and I took it home and stuck it to my wall.
The next evening we closed at six and he came in at quarter of; a problem for Joseph, the neat freak produce guy who wasn’t expecting more sneakers on his floor. I followed him with my eyes turning about the register as he went to only the aisles he needed to. One small quart of half and half, one more white onion, and two carrots. He raced over and asked, Are you open? For you, always. I got a louder release of air from him but still no laugh. I wanted the laugh for my own gratification now, not Mr. Doug’s challenge. Sorry, I know you’re closing soon, he mumbled. You’re really bad at grocery shopping, I said, keeping my eyes on him and my hands on the carrots. I got my laugh and I got him to look at me. With my questions serving as a crutch, he was able to tell me why he came here so often. Though he missed an opportunity to flirt he told me he lives just across the street in that factory turned apartment complex. How come you’ve never talked to me before, I challenged as I began bagging his assortment. You look extra bored today, he responded as he grabbed the bag from me. I was going for pensive, I batted my eyes. That I’m sure you are. I saw Joseph look over at us and noticed I was leaning very far over the counter but it was the only way to take in his smell. A little feminine. I told him I was here most evenings and I’d be waiting to see what he buys next. Don’t think about me too much, he winked. I realized I wanted more than a laugh from him now. I looked to see if any of my coworkers noticed my achievement, I was starting to understand the appeal of this regular thing.
The mid summer heat waves were coming in and because of Mr. Doug’s heavy wardrobe the store gained a cacophony of the humming from the fully blasted AC and complaining customers. Still, I kept my shirts tight and small because I didn’t want to change a single thing in the recipe that secured my regular customer. The man had started offering more words and would browse aimlessly by the registers waiting for me so he wouldn’t get stuck with one of the hags. I learned he was not a student but a professor at the state college satellite campus in the history department. He was thirty four and named John after Denver. Our conversations were pretentious by nature and he started bringing me books on world wars I would lie about reading. I got used to him complimenting my brain, its capacity and its antics, and he got used to me saying I still knew nothing. I reminded him I had so much room in my head because I wanted him to know I was impressionable and begging for his large hands to dent my forehead. After some weeks of this, on a colder July night I told him I was going to study religion and he answered, I believe in you. Like a god or just that I’ll graduate? I laughed. He shifted his weight from his arm resting on the register and didn’t correct himself or flush with embarrassment, he just nodded so I took it as a prompt. Do you ever think of us together, I asked. Sometimes, and then I go to the parking lot. I knew he was lying but I pretended to suggest the idea. Will you wait for me there tonight?
He made me take off my yellow vest before I gave him a blowjob in the front seat of a voyager. The idea of an automatic sliding door with room for so many children turned me off. The fact that he drove a distance he easily could’ve walked made me take a break to study his decisions. I have a wife, he confessed like I was a priest as I studied his hands. They had been gripping my hair and neck and doing what he would consider guiding but they now laid in his lap in a lazy prayer fold that could’ve just been fists. I should’ve bit down on his dick and ran home crying, it was still out after all. Well I don’t mind. Do you ever? He interrupted. My eyes widened as he continued admitting. It doesn’t really matter anyways, she knows about you. He understood my single sentence as compliance and pulled his pants up looking only at his weathered belt. I had never been on the receiving end of a confession so I began thinking of what atonement I could assign him. His guilt was visible in each vein he flexed on the steering wheel. He caught my eyes and asked, Can I drive you home? I told him to drive me to this mansion I always wished I lived in fifteen minutes away. When I turned on the radio it was already on the jazz station. Corny. Classy, he corrected. I flipped through a few until that Police song about little girls came on and he immediately turned it down with a breath I couldn’t decipher between frustration or laughter. He almost said a few things, like if he was about to make the right turn or if I liked that John Jakes novel but the air was too thick of pine tree air fresheners and sin to get a thought out. I wouldn’t know how to answer either anyways. Do you think God can forgive one sin easier than two, or is it all the same? I asked, in an attempt to get him speaking but also to examine his conscience. I think it’s more about the sincerity when you ask not so much what, or how much you did, he leaned over and answered. He was always too impressed by his answers that I practically led him to. Are you going to repent now? I posed as he parked in my alleged culdesac and hesitated. Is this over already? Before I got out I told him not to wait for me to get to the door and asked, What did you tell your wife about me? That dinner will be late. He retorted, already looking for a smile. Seeing I wasn’t satisfied he continued as I started getting out, She knows I find you interesting and bright, more like a student not a, uh, you know. I told her the store started closing later. He was just mumbling twisted compliments and lies waiting for me to interrupt. So let me meet her, I cut in and delivered a joke too seriously. I saw him process the power transfer and the weight of refusing me dropped an answer in his hands. Yeah alright, tomorrow then. He was just happy to be saved. I smiled stiffly and stood in the driveway holding our self-assigned penance.
John came in the next day before close for ingredients and waited for me outside to run down the rules of the dinner. I was not to make any comments alluding to our dalliance or that I was anything but a prospective student. I kept my face agreeable as he explained the made-up game we would play and the expected behavior I had no contract to uphold. She opened the door at the end of the hallway and brought me into a hug, blonde, tall, and too happy. I’ve heard so much about you! I’m Jess by the way, but I’m sure John told you that. He was looking at me from the kitchen with big eyes so I smiled and pretended the name wasn’t foreign to my mouth. Their living room looked like a Marshall’s, the walls with low-brow decor art all hung perfectly straight and the couch a fuzzy circular pit. The two of them took one side of the table and I sat across from them, creating some hierarchy formation. Jess talked about her day as a yoga instructor and a mental health counselor at the progressive middle school that uses a feeling stick. I ascertained John and Jess had nothing in common except age and address. So John tells me you want to study history, she introduced. I looked back and forth between them quickly and decided on agreeing and Jess stabbed her green bean carefully. Well I’m glad he has someone that wants to hear about all that, she alone laughed. I hate her, I mouthed when she went to the bathroom. He laughed but didn’t agree. Jess began washing the dishes and humming something to herself. Nothing strange, just some pop 100 song. John kept explaining some ism to me while I played with the slice of pie she served us. It would have made no difference if I was there or not. Jess knew who her husband was and she had no problem with it. John opened the car door to the backseat as Jess watched. She’s not stupid you know, he eyed me in the back seat. I never said she was, I contested. He was figuring out what to say, how to clarify this was an ethical affair, but I followed by asking if he loved her. I do, he confirmed. You don’t wear a ring though. He said those were just symbolic or something stupid while I imagined him in a few years, driving around her child with brown hair and brown eyes like him. Would he think of my dark features once every five times he thinks of Jess’ recessive ones? She would sit just like I am, legs dangling, watching the houses from the window of the assumptive minivan they drive listening to his rambles of lies of her father. We had sex in the backseat and I watched the gold cross chain he always had tucked away swing by my chest. See you tomorrow? he waved. Sure, I mumbled. I understood then, watching the van disappear and the jazz grow louder, this was all it would ever be. I could not save him, he would never save me. Not over Jess at least. I threw up somewhere along the walk home in front of another mansion thinking about his personal purgatory. I should want to hurt him or myself for committing a sin. I should feel bad. I shouldn’t hate Jess, I should hate myself. When I reached my actual home I scrubbed my hands with a hairbrush until some skin started to pick off. I scrubbed the blisters with soap until I couldn’t smell John’s steak-seasoned fingers. The guilt washed over my hands and stuck itself in each opened crack. In a few weeks a new layer of skin would grow over and seal it all in and I knew then I would never get this feeling out.
I called Mr. Doug in the morning to say I was sick and I had to leave for school in a few days so it’d be best to just quit then. He asked me to return my vest so I waited for the last night before I moved away to go in. He was on the phone in his usual position and waved for me to set it down and blew over a kiss. I walked over to John’s apartment complex with a cigarette and a bag of carrots Jonathan was going to compost but I asked to snack on. I debated beginning a processional down the beige hallways, knocking and seeing John one last time, giving back the books he could tell hadn’t been touched and telling Jess to leave him. Instead, I let the parking lot curb be a kneeler and the distance between their window and my body served as a confessional. Your penance seems to depend on the sins and how tired the priest is. Sometimes it feels like a punishment but I guess it’s a gift. You can do wrong over and over and not just hear you’re forgiven but actually feel it. I could close it all right now if I really felt like I was sorry. I left the carrots to rot along with a few butts and my velcro name tag riddled with lint. The curb started to look like a roadside memorial. When I started to walk away I saw a light turn on and Jess started setting up her yoga mat by the window. I figured John was making dinner or pacing in their bedroom or maybe masturbating in the bathroom. I sort of expected to have had messages to collect from him when I went back to the store. Maybe he wasn’t thinking about me at all, the semester was starting soon for him too. There will probably be another girl that’s better at hiding her guilt or her curiosity and might actually like history. I ran my fingers through my scalp and felt the cavities his fingers created. Jess found her way into warrior pose and I watched her head sit so perfectly still on her shoulders. There’s nothing that could knock her off balance, her head would not mush and form to a pathetic man’s touch. It was perfectly unblemished and uneaten. I could've craned my neck and waved but I didn’t want her last sight to be looking down on me, I know she already does.