By Linda McMullen
As an eighteen-year-old in the New American Republic, I had complete freedom to marry the diseased thirty-nine-year-old sybarite who selected me to bear his children. After the service, Anna adjusted my stainless veil, slipped me a rigid tube of opalescent, medicinal gel. Contraband.
“How—”
“My friend Mary. Canada. Read the instructions…beforehand.”
“I—”
Jacob conveyed me to the antique B&B, mauled my zipper…I pantomimed tooth-brushing. He acquiesced.
I deciphered minuscule print: “Monitum venereus. Indications immediate.”
I coated my palms. Returned. Submitted. Jacob sprang. I touched. A neon alert spread upon him…His horror.
My pelting footsteps receded into the night.
At first I saw similarities with “A Handmaid’s Tale” but then I got lost.
This was novel and interesting. I thought the story was self-contained and sybarite isn’t a word I come across every day 🙂
This was great. One of the few that gave me an audible laugh out loud. My only worry is what happens to her hands?