Competition Thirty Highly Commended: Sap by Stuart Cavet
Despite her potent breath, many multiples of morning breath that make me wonder how long she’s been there, I’m captivated by the tale of her talking plant. At first it seemed a joke, then a bizarre anecdote, but it’s now clear she’s in deadly earnest. I’m inexplicably attracted to her, for some time hanging back, observing, hovering, circling before, almost against my will, sitting down, and find myself fixated on the mouth from which issues this phantasmagorical miasma of words. And more than the smudged lips and the stained teeth it’s the tongue that fascinates: broad, succulent, fat-veined and thick-stemmed, with all the contours and colouration of an exotic leaf itself, yet capable of articulating these real but improbable words. The bar lights bestow a chlorophyllic complexion upon her which completes the effect, though it’s perhaps the last drink that truly deserves credit. She persists with an invitation to see the talking plant, and to hear it, of course, and I can hardly resist. I feel obliged to see her safely home in any event. In the closeness of the cab her aroma is crippling. She smells like she’s soiled herself, and in a way she has. Compost, she slurs. Bloody manure. Under her nails. In the weave of her clothes. Clogging the roots of her hair. Entering her flat she calls out, Clarice! Clarice! but there’s no reply. In the sitting room she indicates an open window and says, I guess she’s doing the rounds, and sheepishly shrugs, explaining that the plant is normally right where she’s standing. She extends her vine-like arms and draws me towards her. The smell is too much. I’m giddy, light-headed, almost delirious. We kiss, inevitably it now seems. And I feel that tongue, and I feel my insides dissolving. Is this love?
Stuart Cavet was previously an international lawyer, living and working across Asia and the Middle East. He now lives and writes in London. His flash fiction has placed second in the QuietManDave competition, and has been shortlisted for the Bridport Prize and longlisted for the Bath Flash Award and various other prizes. His debut novel, Something Kind Of Strange, is published through Amazon and available here…
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