by Lori Cramer
Melinda decided her living room needed improvement, so she chose Colorado Rockies purple for the wall color and asked an old boyfriend to come over and paint. The vibrant violet hue exceeded her expectations, but something wasn’t quite right.
Her old furniture clashed with the new color. She scoured the internet for a black velvet sectional sofa, then contacted the old boyfriend again to haul away her outdated couch. The fresh décor delighted her, but something was still off.
Alone in her redecorated room, Melinda finally pinpointed the missing ingredient — then called that old boyfriend’s number one more time.
Lori Cramer’s short prose has appeared in Ellipsis Zine, Flash: The International Short-Short Story Magazine, Riggwelter, and The Cabinet of Heed, among others. Her story “Scars” (Fictive Dream, February 2018) was nominated for Best Microfiction 2019. Links to her work can be found at https://loricramerfiction.wordpress.com. Twitter: @LCramer29.