"MOTHER OF INVENTION "
by Dow Ford
Jazz hadn't smoked a cigarette in years, and he wouldn't now. But he was thinking about torching a long one. A Taryeton, or perhaps a Viceroy. He drummed his fingers on the plastic of the restaurant table top and looked across at Beth, his wife of nineteen years. Things might get complicated in three, two, one: “I need to tell you something that could change everything,” he said. Beth just looked at him.
“I’ve come to this on a long winding road. You need to know that. It’s not a sudden thing. But I’ve known the destination of the journey since I was a child.” Beth blinked. He had her attention now, but she was as still as a portrait.
“Go on,” she said.
“I am a woman trapped in a man’s body.” He let that sink in, but not a second too long. When the thought cork bobbed, he snatched it. “I'm not considering changing anything physically--no surgery, no hormones, none of that. But, I just can’t live this way any longer.”
“A woman?” Beth's eyebrows arched. They need a pluck and a splash of bleach, he noticed.
“I still love you,” Jazz said. And he did, perhaps more than ever.
“Is there a chance that you are a lesbian?” she asked.
Outside, an eighteen wheeler ground up the hill in the ancient battle of friction and gravity.
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Dow Ford lives in Poplarville, Mississippi. We published one of his stories here the other day.
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