Lillie’s Room, 1975

The living room was Lillie’s domain. In fact, they referred to it as Lillie’s room. Back then, they’d been so very desperate to name things that Lillie even named the mustard-colored sofa. Ginny, she called her. She gave her an origin story, too. She would say that Ginny was born breathless from the coupling of shag carpet and Virginia Slims ash with just a dash of gin and tonic spilled from her highball glass. She called Ginny catalog chic, stylish. Back then, there was nothing ironic or Scandinavian in sight. The deep well of IKEA hadn’t yet been dug.

Ginny herself stood mute, her back against the grass cloth wallpaper. From inside Ginny’s tight, zipped plastic, her cushions barely breathed. Lillie knew that Ginny would turn brittle trapped inside like those lilies stuck in the vase by the tiny, never-opened window. He always said she couldn’t care for them or anyone else for that matter.

He would be home soon. He’d walk through the door, past Lillie’s room and the flowers that were left to wither, past the sofa that sat suffocating in plastic, past the suitcase that waited by the front door. 

He arrived. I got you something. He tossed a plastic flower on the counter and sat down at the kitchen table.

Dinner was set out for him. He didn’t bother to look up as Lillie stuttered then stopped her speech. A silent moment passed, then she turned toward the window, lit a cigarette and headed toward the front door. She picked up her suitcase and stepped outside, breathing in the fresh air. 

Elisa Subin is a writer whose work has appeared in The Account: A Journal of Poetry, Prose, and Thought, The Inflectionist Review, Not One of Us, 34 Orchard Literary Journal, CCAR Journal: The Reform Jewish Quarterly, and many others. She won an Honorable Mention in the Reuben Rose Poetry Competition and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She writes from Ra’anana, Israel.

A Song for Elisa