I got to get us married.

He remembered a place on the other side of the river, down in the defunct riverside town of SoulPort where drunks or just plain stupid folk could get themselves hitched fast as a dog can stop running to lick its butt.

LEAVING SOULPORT BY JEFFREY FLANNERY 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 35

I got to get us married, he said. But how was the goddamn question. Couldn’t go to the courthouse. No, that option was out. One look at her vacant, unknowing eyes and the magistrate would figure rightly something was wrong. He remembered a place on the other side of the river, down in the defunct riverside town of SoulPort. It had been years ago, but he recalled a small chapel over there, a shack really, where drunks or just plain stupid folk could get themselves hitched fast as a dog can stop running to lick its butt.

He sat there and picked through her jewelry box, wondering if he had already pawned her old wedding ring. He found a pair of onyx earrings which he thought she should wear, and then, with s…