KEEP PLANNING – B.R. Yeager

A beer. A cigarette. All I need. No food anymore. I can subsist on smoke and barley and ethanol. There may be a hunger, somewhere behind a wall. But to me it is absent enough to have never been there to begin with. Drain a beer. Let it clatter to the floor. A swig of Smirnoff. Stub the butt out on the hardwood. Climb to our room. Pile atop the mattress. Inhale, sigh, let only a little urine trickle out, down my thighs, into the sheets. Two years, ten months, twenty-two days ago I’m in the same position, on my side, on our bed, eyes to the wall, fingers tracing a carving in the wood panel – a crude triangle bisected by a straight line. Pale tan in the rich ochre. He is across the hall, in the storage room, strumming guitar. But it’s also four years before then, and I’m still in this same position and he is behind me now, arm tossed over, stroking the bottom of my belly, fingers grazing pubic hair. I stroke the triangle, matching the cadence of his fingers. He lifts his head above mine, eyes meeting the carving. “What is that?” “Just some shapes,” I say. “It makes me think of a sailboat.” He kisses my shoulder. “When did you scratch that in?” “I didn’t.” “Yes you did.” “No, I didn’t.” I reach behind and grasp his hip, the ridge of his pelvis. “It’s always been there.” He hums. “I’ve never seen it.” Kissing my neck, suckling my ear. I slip my fingers beneath the band of his underwear. He helps me pull down mine. Wake in the dark. Belly twisted in two. Gagging yellow foam. Fiber glass expanding in bones. Step to floor on swimmy legs, a rock back and forth, room twirling, first slow but accelerating. Gurgle. Hiccup. Belch. Acid up my throat to the back of my tongue. Bends me in half, cough switched to gag. Off to the corner, sputtering, a brief jet, yellow slime, water and tar. Slick blob, mirror shining back. Fiber glass expanding in my skull and another long heave, gag gag, another puke in the bedroom corner. Dogs with lava-filled maws tearing me up from inside. Sway downstairs to the kitchen, hitting walls and door frames, bashing knees and bruising hips. Pull open the fridge. Sick cold odor. Stank, stench. What is that? Another retch, choke it back. Pull the egg carton and slam the fridge door to lock up the smell. Toss the skillet on the stovetop and click the burner to medium, and take the first egg and crack it on the counter, and it’s clear and yellow and . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . blood orange, a tiny fetal hump in the yoke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . yank the skillet, pour the miscarriage down the sink. Crack the second egg, and the moment it splits it bleeds. All red, no decipherable egg inside, only blood, entirely filled with blood, you didn’t think it was possible but here it is in your hands. So you toss that egg to the garbage disposal, and the rest of them too (cursed batch). You throw the skillet across the room, breaking picture frames, denting, singing the wall and spattering blood. You stare at the flame on the stove top. A ring of blue and gold. Lean in, so you can really see. Shivering flame. A nervous dance, wanting to become something else. Becoming a familiar message. God taking a mask off and beckoning. His fingers. Click off the burner. Touch the metal grate with the side of your forefinger. It bites—just a bit to singe. In a few days, after it puffs and subsides, the wound will harden like leather. You still need to eat. Back into the fridge. Fucking gag. Pull the drawers. Our meats, our cheeses. A baggy of cold cuts. Lift it to nose. It’s blistered innards. It’s unwashed dick. It beckons the gag. Toss it back. Pull the provolone. Rancid plastic. Mold-devoured. Even the crispers. The fucking crispers. The cauliflower, the squash, the grapes and apples—limp, bruised, turned. Earthy rot. It’s all a box of rot. Get rid of it. Pull it all out. Carry it to the sink. Start with the meats. Open the bags and tip, letting them slime down the drain. Drop down the cheese. Run the tap and flip on the garbage disposal. Growl. Grinding clang. Metallic chewing, down beneath the sucked meat. A dancing clang. Then flash—black and silver. Launched up from the drain, past my eyes, reaching high, scraping ceiling. The shape, the object—it descends just as quick, clattering back to sink. The disposal growls on and I just stare at the object. Black and silver. An edge like a smirk. Our paring knife, spat out and returned. Grip all chewed from the blades in the drain. I switch off the disposal. I pinch up the knife from its tip, then drop it back down the hole, blade up. I lean my face just over it. Staring straight down into the black and silver. Flip the switch. The knife dances, thrashing side to side. Wait … but it remains in the drain. Switch it off. Back on. The knife clatters and dances. Wait … but it remains. Switch off. On. It bobs like step dance, but never reaches out to me. I switch off the disposal and carry the rest of the food to the front door, throwing it to the grass with the other scraps strewn from the Shiva bags. *** B.R. Yeager is the author of Negative Space, Burn You the Fuck Alive, Pearl Death, and Amygdalatropolis. 01 May 2025