And the Dish Ran Away with the Spoon by Debra A. Daniel

Red Hen loves myth and fairytale. We were built on the story of the Little Red Hen, so we fell madly in love with “And the Dish Ran Away with the Spoon.” It’s got thrust and song of secrets and drama, the heft and pull of transgressive love, a swirl of joy as dish and spoon find each other’s sweet spot on the road.
—Judge Kate Gale on LAR Flash Fiction Award winner “And the Dish Ran Away with the Spoon” by Debra Daniel

All day the cutlery drawer clattered with rumors. The forks are in a tangle, heads together, tines crisscrossed. The Knife’s friends say he’s keeping a stiff upper lip, but, in fact, he’s inconsolable, won’t try to cut, not even the butter. He spent last night drowning his sorrows in the sink. Should’ve seen it coming, he said.

The Spoon was beautiful as sterling, not gangly like those iced tea ladies, but shapely on top, slender all the way down, with that graceful curve he admired. He knew when he lined up with her she had an eye for better things. She’d never be satisfied with a stainless life. Hadn’t she spent her days dipping into sugar, diving headfirst into exotic coffees? Caffeine made her jumpy, ready for action. You don’t glide through that much ice cream without craving the sweet ride.

And then along came Dish – moon-faced, bigger than life – Dish, who lived in a roomy upper cabinet, not a tight, narrow drawer. He was a dresser, had a design distinguished blue border, never without a flower. He’d been around.

He was no stranger to candlelit dinners for two. He had touched the private underside of a folded swan napkin. And oh, he had stories, stories to stir desire in a spoon. He knew secrets about the dark inside of the refrigerator, details on how to survive the microwave’s heat, the scoop about the night the platter cracked.

Where’s the happy couple now? No one knows for sure. The Soup Ladle saw them heading down the driveway. Dish on his side, rolling easy and free. Spoon already struggling to keep his pace.

Debra A. Daniel is the author of the novel Woman Commits Suicide in Dishwasher (Muddy Ford Press) and poetry chapbooks The Downward Turn of August (Finishing Line Press) and As Is (Main Street Rag). She was twice named SC Arts Commission Poetry Fellow, won the Guy Owen Prize, and was a Pushcart nominee. Her work has appeared in such places as Jasper Magazine, Smokelong Quarterly, darkskymagazine.com, Kakalak, Emrys Journal, Pequin.org, Inkwell, Southern Poetry Review, Tar River, and Gargoyle. She lives in Columbia, SC, with her musician husband with whom she sings and plays cardboard box percussion in an eclectic acoustic band.