This writing was accepted for publication in the 108-page perfect-bound ISSN#/ISBN# issue/paperback book “The Way She Was” cc&d, v317 (the January 2022 issue) Order the 6"x9" paperback book:

Order this writing in the book Unfinished Business the cc&d Jan.-April 2022 magazine issues collection book		get the 410 page Jan.-April 2022 cc&d magazine 6" x 9" ISBN# perfect-bound paperback book:

Red Juice Stains On a Rayon Blouse

Miranda Yearwood

    She sat watching the soap operas at lunch time wondering how the women could afford such fine jewelry, designer clothes, the time to fix their hair so bouffant. Obviously they didn’t work a job that required collared shirts with sewn name badges or plastic gloves, but whatever job they had they definitely made some serious moola. They all had the most flamboyant lives, good looking sons, and well-polished silver. She wanted all of that plus more. In fact, the women could keep the high drama if they just gave her the rest of their daily lives.
    At night when she watched the nightly news her heart went into palpitations. She worried that the person a hundred miles away stalking the streets would break down her screen door and jerk her out of her bed. A hundred miles he would come, just for her. By morning she was watching the news again, this time to find out what the weather would be like, just before getting dressed for her day.
    The people she worked with would discuss the latest CNN headlines over lunch, and their boss would erupt from his closed office to make big announcements as they came over the air of the 24 hour news network. Sometimes the group of workers would get angry, laugh or break out stories of their past based on the latest news. Whatever was happening in the world meant something, even if just a little something.
    By the weekend, old movies were on the air, and she would watch, daydreaming about the lives of the people on the screen. She picked up clothing styles, haircuts, and lines from movies to carry over into her own personality. If she watched a movie that had a particularly moving message, she felt like God himself had sent that particular movie to her at that very moment to use as a prophetic venue in her life. It was meant to be.
    She took the meanings to heart. If Johnny left Sue because she was too ugly or smart, that meant she would be left if she were too ugly or smart, so she steered clear of those paths. When a movie featured skinny women who got their way while the fat ones were the butt of jokes, she knew she should be skinny. Movies about wild lives, drug use and partying were glamorous, and she thought everyone wanted to be glamorous. Because they did it on the TV.
    She never saw people on TV read, but she sure saw them pleasing others, whether it was sexually, emotionally or mentally. People who let others win would get their day, eventually, or they would end up dead and become martyrs. Her favorite sitcoms showed skinny, dumb women playing up to men to get anything they wanted, only to make fun of the men behind their back. Politics? Well, this was limited to the six months before a Presidential election, and only every four years, thank God. The History Channel is where she learned things, like how to shoot a Civil War era musket and who built the pyramids.
    When she had the TV on, she didn’t just watch it, she absorbed whatever was on. TV was her hobby so she didn’t knit, doodle, or do the Sunday crossword while she sat plugged into the tube. The glow from the screen engulfed her own aura, soaking its rays into her pasty skin. If she wasn’t watching the TV, it was still on, like a comforting friend always there for support. Her mind wandered quite often, especially when the movie or show playing at the time bored her. But still she watched, making mental connections between herself and the people.
    She moved on from spending her waking hours in front of the small screen to sleeping in front. Not intentionally, but after plopping down in front of the screen after a meal from a fried chicken bucket and sloppy gravy she became comate. Her legs propped up, her feet covered with a fleece blanket she picked up for a dollar at a Black Friday sale. Recliner dipped back and her eyelids tried to hold her front side down.
    This went on for a few months until she gave up and started making the recliner more comfortable. Her new bed needed extra padding to hold her rump up so her back would stop hurting. She made more cushioning and soon slept like a baby, forgetting about her queen-size cherry sleigh bed down the hall.
    One morning she woke up to find red juice stains all over her button-up rayon blouse. She didn’t remember drinking juice before she went to sleep, but her brain didn’t tell her a lot these days. Most of the time she had a hard time remembering to piss before she woke up, and even pissed in her recliner a couple times. Had she not noticed the puddle, she would not have known about it at all, since her smell had given up its ghost when she was nine. Right after her dad ran over her with his 1944 Chevy pickup, and then backed back over the fat lump before realizing it was her. He knocked her sniffer right out of her skull. She changed blouses and picked out her permanent before tacking on her name badge and heading out to the factory.

This was previously published as a Wattpad flash fiction story, previously titled as “TV Zombie Lady.”

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