North Carolina Miscellany
N C L R ONLINE
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to mark their mutual survival of the dizzying ride, because her gut revolts. She’s sick, re-tasting root beer she’d managed to sip, before, too nervous to eat in his so-craved company. Swallowing, she hopes he does not notice. They dismount, and she, drained and woozy, yearns for that previous partial embrace. But the evening ends. He takes her to Gate B, where she will meet Charlene, who’ll drive her home. COURTESY OF THE ARTIST
Eventually, of course, she learned he had some other girl – a fiancée, maybe – back in his hometown. Someone, meaning to be kind, revealed that ugly truth. “That’s her problem,” she’d said haughtily. But of course her downfall was the unknown rival. He never visited or wrote. And of course she lived to feel most degrees of sexual heat, after that lewd, undelivered promise in the barn, the kiss of never-to-be. As this hot afternoon drags toward evening, she feels oppressed by musty scents, the longing in the bleating of lambs. She lifts the little girl into her arms, as if to shield her former self from all that was to be. “Let’s go, sweetheart,” she says. “I’ll buy you cotton candy and a big blue balloon.” “No,” the child says, certain. “Pink. Pink is what I want.”
Looking Back (acrylic, graphite, glazes, oil stick, and graffiti paint on linen, 48x36) by Krista Harris
A graduate of ECU, KRISTA HARRIS received her BFA in Painting in 1977. Since that time, she has gone on to a career as a professional painter whose paintings are represented by galleries across the country, exhibited in International Art Fairs in Chicago, New York, Miami, and Palm Beach, and hang in numerous private and corporate collections, including Duke Cancer Institute in Durham, NC; Ingenious Corp in London, England; Mesa University in Colorado; Ritz Carlton Hotel in Grand Cayman Island; and Northern Trust Bank in Chicago. See more of her work on her website.