Microfiction Monday – 205th Edition
Slow Decay
by Sandra Plourde
The curtains and walls have a yellow tint, the smell of cold smoke locked into soft furnishings.
My mother had not smoked in years.
The air is stale, I can taste dust on my tongue.
The cupboards are full of duplicate purchases, unopened.
In the bathroom many used and unused bottles of dry shampoo.
The mantel in the living room is a shrine of family photographs and letters.
The armrest of the sofa facing the TV shows a dark stain where her head rested.
The doctors say my mother died of cancer.
I know she died of loneliness.
The Worst That Could Happen
by Jennifer Lai
One drop per day, the instructions read; she’d applied twelve. What was the worst that could happen? Her lashes become too long? Too luscious? Pfft. Already, she could picture her date’s face, Hollywood handsome, when he commented on her beauty. Stop, she’d gush, waving him off. Had she read the fine print, she would’ve realized the telltale symptoms. Blurred vision. Light sensitivity. Unrelenting eyelid itchiness. Instead, she blamed allergies, the dry air. Before their meals arrived, he cupped her hands, told her how beautiful she looked—a smile on his face, no doubt. A shame she could barely see it.
Swan Song
by Linea Jantz
Shrunken jack-o-lanterns squatted on the porch steps, gaping smiles sinking into their gums. Joe stood awkwardly on the doorstep, hands unsure where to rest. He and Frank had known each other for decades, since marching band back in college. But he hadn’t spoken to Frank’s wife since the day the flutist made her choice…and it wasn’t Joe. He wanted to pay his respects after the death of his closest friend, but now he wondered if he should have just sent flowers. He shifted uncomfortably as he heard the lock flip open. How long do memories keep their teeth?
Retirement Day
by Karen Walker
On retirement day, the yellow gerbera daisy on Carole’s desk blooms.
Although the day has come years early, Carole tries to be as sunny.
The manager presents a cheque and a card. “Travel, indulge, enjoy, grow: retire!” The new hire—a little rosebud ideal for a company that’s downsizing—wows at her nearly twenty-three years.
On the bonus for retiring early, Carole will survive until winter. On the balcony, the daisy until winter.
Then, it’ll be 8 to 3 every day at a big box garden centre and, for Carole, every day in a dirty north-facing window.
Bryan Regan’s Oath
by JS O’Keefe
An avid hunter but not a violent man, Regan has sworn if he ever raises a gun on another person he’ll never touch a firearm again.
Still when he sees the other guy looking exactly like him, raising his Browning at him, Regan shoots back with his own Browning. He doesn’t feel the bullet slamming into his forehead – he is dead before hitting the ground.
The police find a large mirror at the other end of the clearing and figure out it’s some idiot’s stupid prank, but since Regan shot at his own image they declare it a suicide.
Microfiction Monday – 168th Edition
Fear-Umbrellas
The beach was dotted with fear-umbrellas, fear-bathing suits, fear-Coors Lights and fear-cigarettes, fear-children from fear-marriages on fear-vacations, sitting on fear-beach blankets or playing fear-beach ball. “I’ll take the fear-risotto,” the fear-husband ordered later at the fear-restaurant, “and a double-fear Manhattan.”
“That sounds good,” the fear-wife said. “I’ll have that, too. And two fear-grilled cheese fear-meals.”
Through all of dinner, the fear-kids never looked up from their fear-devices and their fear-vacation Dr. Peppers, except once to say, “Can I have another fear-refill, please?”
On Painting…
by Dr. Vaishnavi Pusapati
Some people want to know. I don’t know why, but they do. They want to know what I do for a living, how much I make, whether my Gucci bag is a real Gucci bag. When I tell people I paint for a living, they either think of students recreating Vermeer or the kind of painting rendered less wanted by the advent of photography or the modern art that they say they could have made and so could their kids who haven’t walked yet. I then tell them I paint nails, and most ask for a discount.
Search and Rescue
by Jennifer Lai
At a wilderness first-aid class, I’m slathered with faux blood and bruises before instructed to head into the urban forest out back and hide. My role as a victim is to await rescue from a fellow classmate who’ll pass if I’m found and given proper first aid. Bodie arrives within seven minutes—amazing, given he’s only here to satisfy his outdoor enthusiast parents. He gives me a once over then lights a joint. After a long exhale, he offers me a hit. “What are you doing?” I say, bewildered. “Chill, dude,” he replies. “It’s medicinal. You’re going to be okay.”
Corroding Bond
He jet-washed, waxed, and buffed for hours. Drifted fingertips across the coolness of the frictionless bodywork. That was Saturdays. Sundays, he would join the other petrolheads at yet another show and shine. No one else ever brought their kid along.
“Let him be a teenager,” his wife said.
“It’s father-son time. Besides, he loves it.”
They drove for three hours to the next one, listening to Top Gear podcasts. His son looked down, huffing, thumbs tapping.
“Aren’t you going to get out,” he asked the boy when they got there.
“No,” his voice coarse like rust.
Microfiction Monday – 140th Edition
Practically Asking For It
Nadine is shopping for a new boyfriend – she’s looking for a two-takeaways-a-week, comes-with-his-own toothbrush type. She doesn’t have the budget for anything else.
In aisle three, there’s been some kind of spillage. A muscular man labeled Colin is clearing up. Watch out love, he says and points at the luminous Hazard, Keep Clear.
In court, Colin will say she stepped out anyway, right into his path. The judge will smirk. Silly Nadine. Too dumb to read the signs.
Assisted Living
by David M Wallace
A thin stream of drool traveled from the corner of his mouth. It hung off his chin like a translucent strand of whitish fish eggs. His lips moved silently as he swayed back and forth. Gently tossed on an invisible tide. The beads of his rosary slipping through his fingers.
At the Hardware Store
by Jennifer Lai
A couple considers paint swatches: Desire Pink, Sleepy Blue, and Lauren’s Surprise. “Lyin’ Eyes” plays in the background while “Special assistance needed in the tools area” blares overhead. I’m wandering aimlessly when an employee asks if I need help. Her tag says Ask Me Anything. I want to know why my best friend hasn’t returned my calls in over a week and why my boyfriend broke up with me last night. Instead, I ask for the bathroom. She gestures left, right, then left again.
“There’s signs along the way”, she says, “but they’re easy to miss if you’re not looking.”
Unreading
by H. A. Eugene
Michael couldn’t afford new ideas. So he regurgitated the words he’d read and presented the book to the librarian, closed; a good-faith gesture meaning the ideas within remained uncomprehended.
“I am choosing not to learn,” Michael announced, walking backward through the library’s entrance.
He continued, carefully placing one foot behind the other until his backside arrived at home, where he resolved to remain until such time that change may not feel so expensive.
Microfiction Monday – 137th Edition
The Silence
by David Henson
This time we let the silence lie between us. It rolls onto its back, lolls out its tongue, invites someone to scratch its stomach. When no one does, the silence sits, whines, pumps its paws, stands and chases its tail. Neither of us reacts, so the silence scampers into another room, comes back squeaking, drops its playfulness between us. Still ignored, the silence stiffens, ears back, tail erect, hackles raised. Its lips curl, and rising snarls lather its jaws. The silence eyes your throat, mine. I take my chances, bite my tongue.
Bucket List
by Mikki Aronoff
One night I had a dream. I watched a blue whale slap its tail on the calm ocean surface, saw green anacondas slick their way through the steamy Amazon. I ambled along the Left Bank observing painters painting lovers, drove a car through a hole carved through a giant sequoia.
When I awoke, I thought this meant I was going to die. I went to my desk and filled my fountain pen to write my will. It skittered and scratched and blotched the page blue until I relented and replaced it in its stand.
Deep In The Woods
Summer weekends were spent in the old farmhouse. My brother and I sitting in the glow of the fire, our parents reading The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the smoky aromas of dinner lingering, cricket-song punctuated by the snap of escaping sparks. We’d found a tin box of toys which we gripped as we listened to the story of the lost little girl. When the fire and comforting smells receded and we were tucked in, I listened to the scratch of mice in the walls, drip of rain seeping through musty beams and wondered if the dark might swallow us up.
Away
by Jennifer Lai
After the divorce, her heart turned to stone. He said she was dead weight who kept him from his dreams. From becoming the astronaut he was destined to become. She argued she was his rock, her words heavy like gravity. But he was light-years away. Silenced into a cosmic void. Years later, she saw him on TV. Orbiting in space on a broken shuttle. Outside he went but forgot to tether in and drifted away. Fast and light like a plume into the obsidian expanse, with no one around to keep him grounded.
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