“Can I get 12 of the ooey-gooey bites?”
“um…you mean the Cinnabon Delights?”
“yes.” My father doesn’t falter, or lose himself
as I giggle. The bag they shoved our dinner in was warm
on my lap. A damp thermal blanket that smelled of sugar,
beef, and various sauces. I remembered not long after
how a man close to my father’s age said
taco bell gave him food poisoning, lying
in bed unable to even produce a bulge pic. I think of
narrating this to my father, censoring
the bulge, age, maybe not even give him a name.
Make him a friend that lives
an hour away instead of a stone’s throw
down the road. The kind that doesn’t
say in a southern twang: “Damn you’re sexy boy,
I’d love to be lying on top of you!”
Make him minute, just an instance,
an embellishment that melts on your tongue
with sweet cream filling.
James Morris is an Appalachian writer, who recently graduated from Marshall University with a bachelor’s in creative writing and literature studies. When not writing about old men he’s probably playing video games. His favorite taco bell order is mini chicken quesadillas and stealing his boyfriend’s frozen Baja Blast.
Taco Bell Quarterly 