By Gwen Goodkin

Excerpt from “Just Les is Fine”

After lunch with Naomi, I called Lynn and told her I was sick, to cancel all my appointments.

“What’s wrong?” I heard the shock in her voice. Never in all my years had I canceled an afternoon of appointments.

“Food poisoning, I think.” I stared at Naomi sitting alone at the table. Then I lowered my voice. “I’ve already been to the bathroom twice.”

“Oh,” said Lynn.

I went back to the table and said, “Come on. Let’s play hooky.”

Naomi looked up at me. “What do you mean? Don’t we have to get back?”

“I have to buy Joan a gift and I could use your help.”

“Okay,” she said. “What kind of gift?”

“A piece of jewelry,” I said. “What do you think?”

She lifted a shoulder. “I think she’d expect that.” She stood and we went toward the door.

“You know,” I reached the door first and held it open for her, “she could use a new car.”

Naomi stopped and turned. “Now that’s unexpected.”

We went to Boyd’s, the only car dealer in town. Boyd himself came out when he saw us strolling between cars.

“Doc,” he said, shaking my hand. Then he turned to Naomi, scanned her up and down. “Carla? Wow, you’ve grown up.”

Naomi smiled, gave me a nervous look. “I’m actually Naomi, Carla’s friend.”

“Ope,” said Boyd. “Sorry about that.” He studied me for an explanation and got none. “What can I do you for?”

The heat rose off the blacktop. The air was so thick I felt like I couldn’t fully catch my breath.

“Tomorrow’s my anniversary,” I said. “I’m thinking about buying Joan a car.”

Boyd clasped his hands together and rubbed his palms. “I’d say you’re in the right place.” He smiled. “What kind of car are we talking about?”

Naomi lifted her hair off her neck and fanned it.

I stared. I imagined how soft her skin was, like a newly picked nectarine. “A convertible.”

“That narrows things down then,” said Boyd. “We only have two.” He led us to a pair of Sebrings. One red, one silver.

“Which one?” I asked Naomi.

“Well, it’s your silver anniversary,” she said. “So . . . red.” She threw her head back and laughed and there was her neck again. Boyd and I were in a trance. If she’d’ve told us to stand in the middle of oncoming traffic, we’d have asked, “Northbound or southbound?”

“I’m going to need a test drive,” I told Boyd.

“Sure thing, Doc.”

While he went in to get the keys, I opened the passenger door for Naomi. She slid into the leather seat and ran a hand across the glove compartment. Boyd passed me the keys and asked me not to take it over sixty.

“Wouldn’t think of it,” I said.

Boyd came over to my side of the car to explain how to get the top down, but I stopped him. “Already have it figured, Boyd. See you in a few.”

He backed away and I put the car in drive and floored it. I saw the shock on his face in the rear view mirror and laughed. Naomi looked at me and the laughter cracked out of her. She tried for a few moments to keep her hair from flying everywhere, then gave up and lifted her chin toward brilliant sky. I steered us onto a country road whose only obstacles to speed were an occasional tractor. I passed one like it was nothing more than a pothole.

She rose out of her seat and stood, holding onto the top of the windshield. Her hair went wild. “Know what I just decided?” she shouted.

“No . . . what?”

“I’m going to break up with Jim.” She closed her eyes. There was her neck. Tan legs.

We were approaching a set of railroad tracks. I didn’t want to slow down. I wanted to keep driving, never stop, just go. The seats were a warm hug. The car glided over the new pavement. We were almost at the tracks.

“Les,” said Naomi. “Slow down.” She sat and reached for her seatbelt.

The tracks sat atop a small hill. I knew we’d bottom out at best. I drove faster.

“Les!”

The front of the car scraped bottom on the way up, then lifted off the ground when it hit the tracks. The landing on the other side was a slam and we both jolted forward in our seats. Loose gravel made the road slippery as ice and we fishtailed. I did the worst and hit the brakes and we spun. The car tipped like it was about to turn over, but righted itself at the last second and dropped to a stop.

We sat in silence for a moment.

She spoke as if she were just waking. “Why did you do that?”

“I’m sorry,” was all I could say. “I lost myself for a minute.”

“But . . . why did you do that?”

I turned to her.

“You’re bleeding,” she said.

I felt like I needed to blow my nose, then looked down and saw my shirt. A red bloom of blood covered my chest. I took it off and held it to my nose. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said. “We should probably move to the side of the road.” Then, “Can you drive?”

“Yes.” The car drove fine. I started back toward Boyd’s. “I’m going to tell him a deer ran out in front of us, but I managed to avoid it.”

When I got to Boyd’s, he said, “What in God’s name?”

I told Boyd about the deer and that I would pay for any damage he found, though I was pretty sure there was none. He was angry, but what could he say?

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Gwen Goodkin writes fiction, non-fiction, screenplays, teleplays and stage plays. Her short story collection, “A Place Remote,” will be published by West Virginia University Press in 2020. Her essay collection “Mass for the Shut Ins” was named a finalist for Eyewear Publishing’s Beverly Prize. She has won the Folio Editor’s Prize for Fiction as well as the John Steinbeck Award for Fiction. She has twice been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Gwen’s novel, “The Plant,” was named a finalist in the Faulkner-Wisdom Novel-in-Progress competition. Her TV pilot script, “The Plant,” based on her own novel-in-progress was named a quarterfinalist for Cinestory’s TV/Digital retreat. She won the Silver Prize (Short Script) for her screenplay “Winnie” in the Beverly Hills Screenplay Contest. She has a B.A. from Ohio Wesleyan University, an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia and has also studied at the Universität Heidelberg. Gwen was born and raised in Ohio and now lives in Encinitas, California with her husband and daughters.