My friend, the poet

by Chris Callard

I ran into Craig, a Facebook friend from, well, Facebook in line at a coffee place.

“Hey. Nice to meet you in the flesh. You probably don’t –”

“Hey. Um …”

“Robert. From Facebook.”

“Oh. Hey!” He pumped my hand. “I recognize you. I’ve got 700 friends, but I remember you. That great re-post about Trump the other day.”

I laughed. “I should never get into politics. It’s a no-win situation.”

“No, I liked it. In fact, I’m sure I ‘liked’ it.”

“You did, thanks. Anyway, congratulations on your poetry getting published.”

Craig brightened. “Thank you. I so appreciate that. That you noticed and remembered.”

A customer sitting at a table yelled “No!” at his laptop.

“I think it’s amazing that someone I know is being published,” I said.

We moved forward in line. “You don’t know the half of it,” he said wearily. “It’s been a long road.”

“This your first acceptance? How long have you been writing poetry?” I recalled that the job listed on his FB page was pharmacist.

He tensed. “Why do you ask that?” Then he relaxed, a little. “I started in high school. But I could’ve started last year. It doesn’t matter how long, it matters how committed you are.”

I studied the menu board and half grinned. “Of course. Stupid question.”

He cleared his throat. “There are no stupid questions. Just stupid … how does that go?”

I closed my eyes and crinkled my nose like I was thinking before smiling at him. “I don’t remember.”

“So do you write, too? Got the curse?”

“God no. I can barely do a grocery list without misspelling coffee.”

Craig wrinkled his forehead. “How would you misspell coffee?”

“Huh? Oh. Um, maybe leaving off an ‘e’?” I chuckled artificially, or artificially to me. “Or an ‘f’”

“That’s a funny line, though, misspelling coffee,” Craig said, then thought for a moment. “That’s wit, man. Maybe you should consider real writing, really writing. You may not know it, but wit is scarce these days.”

“Nice of you to say.”

We were about to reach the counter. He perused the menu. “I found this website that publishes local poets, people who live in the city or nearby. So I took my top three poems, worked and polished and rewrote. And lo and behold.”

“That is so fantastic. Glad I saw your post. And ran into you here. Let me buy your coffee.”

“Hey, that would be great, because poetry doesn’t pay much, that’s for sure.”

“I’ll bet. But …” I said without thinking, “aren’t you a pharmacist?”

He examined me like I was one of those kids selling magazines door to door after dark. “Well, yeah. What’s that got to do with it?”

“Nothing.” I shrugged. “It doesn’t.” I considered saying, oh, damn, forgot my wallet in the car, be right back. “So when will it come out?”

“They. When will they come out,” he instructed. “All three were accepted.”

“Excellent. Outstanding.”

“But.” He frowned. He put his hands in his pockets and rattled his keys while bending his head to the side. “I was a bit, ah, premature with that post.”

I thought about ordering an iced tea, passion fruit, herbal, even though it was 55 degrees outside. Coffee would take too long to cool and drink. Of course, I was panicking, and would order to go.

“They did accept my poems,” he said distinctly. “We were all set. Then I kind of messed up, I guess.” His eyes widened while looking unfocused into the distance.

“Messed up?”

“Big time.” Then he added, turning to me, like divulging a family secret, “I asked for $200.”

“Oh.”

“Per poem.”

“Ah.”

A strange gurgling noise came from his throat. “More like demanded.” After coughing three times, each time a bit louder, harsher, he continued, downtrodden. “Now … now they’re not going to publish nothing.”

I studied the board desperately as we stood in silence. Then I said as casually as I could, “Man, do those websites usually pay?”

“No!” he shouted at me. “They don’t!”

I flinched. “Hey.”

“Sorry. But they should pay. They’re using my work, my sweat to make a buck.”

We were one customer from the front when I stepped aside and Craig stepped out with me. “Don’t you want coffee?” he asked.

“Sure. I was planning on trying something new, though, and not sure what. I need to think about the menu.”

“I always get the same thing.” He stared into the refrigerated case.  “You know, these websites are big business. They make you pay to submit your poems, you know? They make enough to run the sites and pay their editors. You think the editors work for free?”

“Maybe it’s a passion. Like you writing poetry apart from your regular job.”

“My regular job should be writer, I hate filling prescriptions,” he said sincerely before bowing his head then looking at me like I was an authority figure. “It’s not fair. They’re always taking advantage of us artists.” He put his hand on my shoulder.

Finally, I said: “Well, it’s been great seeing you. Meeting you.”

“They’re always trying to screw us, bub. What do you do, by the way?” he asked earnestly. “Did you say you wrote, too?”

“No. Except for the groceries. Remember?”

He rummaged for the memory. “Yeah, you work at Albertson’s. I saw that on your page, when you posted that Trump thing. That was great. Thanks for being friends. I’ve got, like, 700 followers and 700 friends. Isn’t that something?”

Bio:
Chris Callard lives in Long Beach, California, USA. His poems have appeared in Ariel Chart, Cadence Collective, One Sentence Poems. His short fiction in Ariel Chart, Gemini Magazine, Flash Fiction Magazine, A Story in 100 Words, and ZZyZxWriterZ. His work has been nominated for Best of the Net and Best Small Fictions.