short stories

Lost and Found

/ legreene515 / 1 Comment

I wrote this story for Terrible Minds, yet again! The assignment only had one requirement: must contain a map.

Lost and found

(873 words)

Harlan didn’t trust GPS. The first time he used it he had ended up somewhere in bum-fuck-Egypt. At that point, he had been infinitely grateful for the stacks of fold up maps stuck in his glove compartment. Back then, everyone had maps. Most people used them. People understood geography and how routes connected to state highways, interstates, connecting all the states to make us somehow unified even from thousands of miles away. Now they summoned Siri and asked her to take them to a location. How did they know she’d comply? That’s what Harlan wanted to ask them.

Cheree thought he was ridiculous. A few years after GPS came out she’d bought him a TomTom. It sat in the box under the wilting tree for a few days. Then one day it magically appeared in the front seat of Harlan’s car, still in its box. It sat there too, until Cheree had to borrow Harlan’s car because hers needed an oil change. When she came back from work that evening the TomTom had been installed. Harlan had never so much as pushed the power button.

Which is why at this point, he was ticked off. The map open in front of him did not show the road he had been driving down. He knew he had made a wrong turn somewhere, but he couldn’t figure out where. And he sat, air conditioner blaring, needle precariously close to Empty, on the side of the road with his finger on an empty space in the middle of nowhere where clearly, in real life, there was an actual road. The TomTom glared at him, willing him to push the little power button. But he felt in this predicament the TomTom would have no idea the road existed either. Plus, it might drain his gas reserves even further. And it was the principle of the matter after all. All these years, the maps had always been right. This was not the time to change his firmly held beliefs, damn-it.

He turned off the engine and stepped out of the car. The heat beat down on him with its blaring desert-force. He kicked the tire to his 2009 BMW, because that was helpful. He stood in the breakdown lane with his arms over head and sweat stains spreading out on the new Oxford shirt Cheree bought for him. The heat played in dancing waves over the desert surrounding him.

He walked around to the other side of the car, opened the passenger side and took out the stack of maps. Nevada. He had two other maps for Nevada. They looked older than the one he had been using. He opened one up and laid it out on the hood of the car, then planted his hands on the black paint before realizing this was a mistake. The sun-heated metal burned the palms of his hand.

“Shit,” he said, shaking his hands in the dusty air.

He stared at the map, placing his finger at the location that looked like an undeveloped piece of land in the middle of the desert. He looked around, and sure enough that’s what it was, with a goddamn no-name, no-route road running through it that he’d been lucky enough to turn onto somehow.

Cheree would be worried by now. He knew she was sitting at the bar at the Bellagio having a gin and tonic and checking her iPhone for the time. God, he wished he had one of those too. Then he could call her if he could get reception out here. They had tickets for Cirque du Soleil at 7 PM. He knew he’d never make it if he didn’t find his way out of this place. He just couldn’t remember if he’d taken a right or left, then another right or left, and it was a horrible time for his memory to fail him. Or his sense of direction.

Cheree always joked that for someone who loved maps he got lost an awful lot. He always smiled and nodded when she said it in front of other people, but in reality the statement pissed him off. But now he knew she was right and that if he didn’t find his way out of this nowhere road he’d die of thirst and hunger in the middle of the desert.

“Stupid no-good maps,” he said.

He folded them up, stuck them in the glove department, slammed the passenger’s side door then walked around to the driver’s side. He started the car then powered on the TomTom. His first thought would be that it would need updating, and he’d still be lost, but to his surprise it had been updated and there were even addresses loaded into the machine. God love, Cheree. Always there for him. He pulled out his notepad with the address scrawled on it—3600 Las Vegas Boulevard South—and plugged it into the machine.

The little dots swirled around in a circle: Calculating.

And sure enough the road appeared. Continue for 35 miles, take a left. Clear cut directions on a road that did exist even though every single map he owned said it shouldn’t be there.

Maybe Cheree was right after all. GPS had its benefits.

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The Last Push

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Disclaimer: This is where I tell you that this story deals with adult themes and language. Do not read it if you don’t want to know that your daughter, aunt, mother, friend, whomever I am to you writes about adult themes.

I wrote this for Chuck Wendig’s Terrible Minds. The assignment was to start with a BANG. I started with a banging.

The Last Push – 880 words

Banging her. Again. He looked out the window as he gyrated his hips. He couldn’t care less about this girl. She was loud in bed too. That drove him nuts. He just wanted to put his fucking hand over her mouth and tell her to shut-up.

Out the window the leaves had turned orange and red overnight. He pushed into her, and she squealed like a goddamn magpie. He didn’t like that. He wanted it over, but unfortunately they’d been screwing so much this weekend his stamina had improved. He pulled out and moved off of her.

“That’s it. You came?”

“Does it look like I did?” he asked, waving his hand toward his still erect dick. “On top.”

She obliged. He closed his eyes so he didn’t have to look at her face as she started moving and moaning on top of him.

On Saturday, he’d woken up and realized he’d spent the night. He kind of liked her smell. Melon—fruity—something like that. At the breakfast table, she poured a bowl of cereal and sat next to him. He ate his Cheerios and looked at the box, reading the words, but her loud chewing distracted him. Then she started talking. He thought they always ruined it with the talking.

“Next weekend my friend is having a birthday party. It’s going to be, like, this big blow-out. And you should come, Daniel.”

He should come. Like right now, come. He looked up at her, a mess of blonde hair in front of her face. He put his hands on her hip and adjusted how she sat. She thrashed about on top of him and made noises like a dying whale.

He’d known her exactly two weeks. They’d met at a party. He’d never invited her to his place. And for those two weeks all they’d done was spend time under the covers. He couldn’t talk to her about anything. She didn’t even know who Tolstoy was. “Is that one of your friends?” she asked when he mentioned the Russian author in conversation.

But she had a nice ass. And was a good lay except today with his mind on overdrive thinking about all the shit that made her so totally wrong for him. She looked nothing like Florrie. Maybe that was the only good thing about her. He couldn’t stand girls who looked like Florrie. He’d seen girls with short hair and that straight nose with the little upturned tip, and he’d run in the opposite direction.

And so he’d ended up with May. For the last two weeks. And he put in minimal effort. I mean, minimal, minuscule, the tiniest of tiny efforts. But she called him, texted, and sent him silly memes. He texted her too at like 10 PM every night to ask if he could come over. And then he’d come. A lot. And he liked that part. Well mostly, except moments like this when it felt like it would never end. When her groans were loud and annoying. When he knew implicitly that she wasn’t and could never be Florrie.

He pushed her over onto her back again. He needed to think of something, but Florrie’s face kept coming back to him. Once, a few years after he and Florrie had ended things, he’d been in the heat of the moment with a girl he actually liked. A girl he thought could maybe be more than just another fucking hookup, and he’d said Florrie’s name. The girl had freaked out. She beat his chest with her fist like some douchey cartoon character and demanded to know who Florrie was.

“Nobody,” he said. But the guilt of that statement stuck with him. Because she was somebody. Somebody he couldn’t forget or let go of no matter how many girls he’d been with since.

That girl had never called him back and since then he’d floated from one mattress to another. He’d seen purple sheets and pink sheets. He’d seen girls with OCD-clean rooms and disastrous clutters. He’d seen almost every size and shape one could think a woman could come in. Pear shaped, hourglass – that was his favorite–curvy. He’d seen girls who took care of themselves meticulously, and unfortunately, girls who didn’t.

And now he was here, in bed with May, wishing for an ending.

With May on her back, he began tracing her face with his fingers. He looked at her. He transformed her face into Florrie’s. He imagined the smile lines. He pretended she had Florrie’s deep set blue eyes. He erased May’s long hair with his eyes and transformed it into the short pixie haircut Florrie always wore. He saw the way she always bit her left lower lip toward the end of sex. He saw her face, and he began to move in a rhythm. May looked suddenly serious, but all Daniel saw was Florrie. He saw her on the summer day when they sat surrounded by dandelions in the middle-of-nowhere field where they stripped down naked and made love surrounded by picnic ants. Like some fucking Nicholas Sparks book. He saw all of the faces of Florrie on this girl in front of him. And he felt so turned on imagining her below him.

He put his head down on May’s shoulder, taking in her scent and pretending she smelled like Florrie. He felt the moment of explosion and his whole body shook with the last push.

One final release. He came. Goodbye to May. Bang over.

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The Boy

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I wrote this piece for a Chuck Wendig Terrible Minds flash fiction challenge.

 

The photo I used can be found here: http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=3003524

I’m trying to write more recently, and flash always gets me started so I can focus on longer works. I hope you enjoy.

The Boy

Found: Small boy. Won’t sit still. Speaks no English.

He bit my hand when we found him. Sitting on a school chair in the cave near the river where we fished. A baby really, but wild like an animal. I don’t know how long he’d been there and whether his behavior indicated he’d been raised by wolves or simply abandoned by the people who were supposed to care for him.

I’d read, in the old days, deformed babies or unwanted babies were left out in the elements to die. But he was neither. Blonde hair and blue eyes set in his head like a china doll. He was perfect looking but for the layer of dirt so thick it had turned his skin the color of a darkie. He squealed and clawed at my face when I tried to put him in the tub.  Jeffrey had to take over, and he seethed so much with anger I thought he’d drown the boy. When I pulled the baby out, his skin looked red and raw from being scrubbed so hard with the lye soap. The water in the tin tub looked as black as the soil on the land we farmed.

“Wild animal. Can’t live here,” Jeffrey said, as the boy ran around the room screeching and hollering.

He posted the signs around town. Went out on horseback and listed our address below the words. But no one wanted a castaway and so the boy stayed. For months. And the baby growing inside me began to make its presence known.

I tried to teach the boy English. I pointed to the bump on my stomach and said, “Baby.” I labeled all the objects in the cabin, pointed to the words and said the names.  He moved his mouth but only pathetic animal sounds erupted from his lips. In anger, he projected his small body onto the floor kicking up dust and dirt until I had to walk away.

“We have to get rid of him,” Jeffrey said.

But I shook my head. I did not agree.

Jeffrey and I lay under the quilt in the oak bed as the boy, or the animal as Jeffrey called him, slept on the pallet on the floor kicking and screaming in his sleep. Jeffrey reached over and rubbed my belly. The baby didn’t move for him.

“This is our child. That’s not,” he said pointing to the boy.

Weeks of arguments as the baby inside me grew. And the boy seemed to become more wild.

“Cannot be tamed,” Jeffrey said, sitting at the kitchen table wiping the sweat and the dirt from his brow.

And the whole time something grew inside me. Guilt, fear, and anger. On the inside I began to take on the feelings of the boy. A wild rage Jeffrey couldn’t understand swelled up like a hurricane within me. A wild rage threatened the humanity inside of me. And Jeffrey began to turn his back upon me. At night, the gulf between us grew. He’d touch the small of my back, and I pulled away from the roughness of his fingertips. And even as the chasm widened, I became closer to the boy. I felt he was a part of me. I felt I understood his pain. I felt he had given it to me to share. Something inside, deep down, told me not to give up on him.

The boy began to take my hand. He would roll his hand into a fist and push it against my open palm. His cries ceased, and he became silent. His silence permeated me, and I began to speak less and less. He put his grimy little hand against my belly, and the baby inside me squirmed and moved under the softness of his fingers.

In one breath, I let go of the rage, and Jeffrey inhaled it, filling up his whole body with a palpable anger. He shouted at me and the boy. He spent longer days in the field away from me. Away from the boy. When the shouts didn’t work he filled our house with an unthinkable void of sound. The silence sat at our dinner table like an uninvited guest.  The tension took on a personality filling our souls with hatred.

And then one morning, I awoke to find the boy gone. Jeffrey sat at the table with a pocket knife, sharpening a branch.

“Going fishing. Want to come?”

I shook my head but didn’t utter a word. I felt alone and abandoned stuck within myself, but Jeffrey’s terrible anger had fled with the boy.

Jeffrey had been gone a few hours when the contractions started. I knew from watching my mama give birth that labor wasn’t quick. But there were other plans for me. The boy clawed his way out of me as quickly as he could. The pain felt so intense that all the rage and loneliness of the last few months escaped through the bestial screams coming from my lips.

The baby stared up at me with blue eyes. He opened his mouth to cry, but instead the boy’s animal sounds spilled out of his throat. I held him to my nipples, and I whispered into his ears, “Now you’re mine forever. No one can take you away. I will never abandon you again.”

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Wind of Change

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Today, because I’m still not ready to review my current Southern Fiction book, Cold Sassy Tree, I’m putting up a piece of flash fiction I wrote for Alissa Leonard’s Blog the other day. I took Special Challenge winner on this piece (a prediction had to be included). And I had a lot of fun playing with voice in this story. Enjoy!

Wind of Change
499 words
@laurenegreene
Special Challenge accepted

The seller of marmalade arrived just after the tornado. In fact, Grandpa’s house had been smashed to bits and poor Lily Blue’s body weren’t even found yet. But don’t worry your pretty little head about her. She was just a cat.

Grandpa had predicted it would be a big ‘un, and he was right.

“Right as rain,” he said, stroking his whiskers.

I rolled my eyes, because everyone knows rain can’t be right.

The marmalade man must have thought we had a boat-load of money, because he showed up and set up a wooden stand packed with jars of jelly. Sign said: 2 for $0.10. But Grandpa’s cash was gone with the house. Grandpa said I should have said Gone With The Wind, on account of it being a tornado and all. I ain’t read that book, and I probably never will ‘cause I hear it’s for girls.

I took to standing ‘round the marmalade man as Grandpa hammered nails and tried to fix us up some shelter.

“You from these parts?” I asked.

“No. I’m from New York.”

Darn Yankee, I thought, but I had ‘nuff sense not to say it.

“Do people buy marmalade?” I asked.

“More than you think.”

“You travel ‘round the world selling this here stuff?”

“Last year I sold Bibles, but then those Gideons started giving them away for free. Imagine that.”

“I’ve lived here my whole life. Just me and Grandpa,” I said.

“Where are your parents?” the man asked.

“Up’in left when I was just a babe. Grandpa says, ‘Good riddance, never needed them nohow.’”

“You have the world in your heart, I can tell,” the seller of marmalade said.

I looked at him real funny-like, cocking my head to the side. “What’cha mean?”

“You look like a traveler. How’d you like to be my sidekick? The road gets awfully lonely.”

Grandpa done predicted that I wouldn’t stay in this here valley town my whole life. I looked over my shoulder at him, and I picked up a jar of marmalade running my finger ‘round the silvery-looking top. Grandpa was busy nailing two four-by-fours together. He wouldn’t live forever, and there weren’t much for me in the pile of wood that remained.
“I think I’d like it right fine. When we goin’?”

“Tonight. You be here by the light of the moon.”

The marmalade man packed up his table and jams quicker than you can say, ‘my dear aunt rose,’ and all but disappeared. The thought of the world filled my ‘magination as I worked beside Grandpa. By the time the sun set, we had a shelter.

“I reckon I was right and you’ll be moving on.”

“How’d you know?”

“I’m smarter than I looks,” Grandpa said. “You go on and git. Nothing here but a dead cat and a pile of bones. But never forget where you came from, you hear.”

By the light of the moon, I left. Like Grandpa always said, “Storms be bringin’ the wind of change.”

What do you think about the main character? Did I do his voice justice?

Don’t forget No Turning Back is on sale for $1.99 until August 21st! You can pick it up at Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

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A Tale of Two Elvises

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I haven’t participated in much flash fiction over the last week. Edits came back, and I’ve been forcing myself to work through them. Edits are to writing as cleaning is to my house. I just hate doing it. I know they’re a necessary evil, and they have the ability to make “The Devil Within” such a good book, it’s just, “ughh..I don’t want to do them.” I’d rather be writing.

Anyway, today I wrote for Micro Bookends. I wasn’t enthused by the prompt, and again writing a whole story in 110 words still is almost impossible for me. I can’t get the jab in, the beginning, middle, and end. I think a lot of mine fall flat, but at least they’re letting me practice my craft while I procrastinate editing.

I hope you like Elvis:

A Tale of Two Elvises
@laurenegreene
110 words

Old Father Benedict stepped into the sunshine of the day and inhaled a deep breath, before looking down. He had seen everything in his 96 years. So, he wasn’t surprised at the naked man snoozing at his feet, wearing only sunglasses. A star studded collar peeked out of the paper at his feet.

Father Shaw came up behind him.

“Another bum?”

Benedict nodded, “Heartbreak Hotel was my favorite. You think he’ll sing for us?”

“The real Elvis has left the building,” Father Shaw said.

“Huh?” Old Benedict scratched his head.

“Overdosed on drugs. I doubt the bum can croon the way Elvis did, not in this day and age.”

The Fortune Part III

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Over on Terrible Minds, I’m taking part in building a collaborative 4-part story. Each week, I choose a story to continue. This week, I chose “The Fortune.”

The first part was by Jwrapa and can be found over at the blog phrasework. I’ll also include both parts below for ease of reading.

The second part was completed by John Freeter.

So here we go.

Part I

Margaret drew the curtain back slowly, taking care not to pull too hard on the thin, slightly musty fabric. The worn beading crinkled beneath her fingers and she took a step inside the tent. She paused a moment for her sight to adjust, blinking back the bright specks of the sundrenched day still lingering in her eyes. Behind her the buzzing of the hurdy-gurdy man she had passed just moments ago mixed with the sharp squeals of a group of children as they ran towards the games of chance on the far midway. She brushed a patch of dust from her skirt as she glanced nervously around the space, taking in the threadbare rugs that lined the floor, their oriental patterns clashing garishly with the many tapestries that hung around the small tent.  Margaret took another step towards the lone wicker chair set up in the center of the room and looked around her.

“A fortune for the lass?”

The voice was quiet and lilting, and she jumped a bit as a man slipped his slim frame into the room from behind one of the larger tapestries. He smiled at her and gestured with a gloved hand towards the chair.

“Uh, yes,” she said quickly, looking back and forth once again. “But isn’t there….”

The man laughed softly, opening his arms to encompass the room as he followed her gaze. “Yes, I know. Not quite what you were expecting.”

He began to pull one gray glove off, finger by finger. “I don’t work with those tricks you’ve read about. No crystals or smoke and nonsense needed.” He moved on to the second glove. “And I am no old gypsy woman, either, sorry to say.”

She laughed nervously, for indeed she had expected it to be like in a book. This man was perfectly average. Middle height, thin, with a brown beard and hair of all one short-trimmed length. He wore a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles that seemed to be slightly off-center. If she had passed him in town that day, she would never have glanced twice.

He had finished removing his gloves and tucked them into a pocket on his waist coat. He gestured to the chair again, and she noted his now bare hands were worn thin and speckled with age spots, his nails brittle and yellow.

“I have only these to work with,” he said. “And if you are still willing, we can begin.”

Margaret paused, meeting his gaze. He had a gentle openness about his face, and she took no fear in it. After a moment, she gathered her skirts and sat on the chair.

He stepped forward to stand behind her. “I will touch your temples, and nothing more. Don’t be afraid, now. It will help if you close your eyes.”

She nodded, resting her hands in her lap and letting her eyes fall shut. His fingers touched her temples lightly, just barely brushing against her skin. She could feel the warmth of them as his coarse skin pressed closer to her head. She stifled another nervous laugh and a thought flitted past. This is nonsense, really.

“Quiet now, luv.” His voice was barely more than a whisper, and it seemed to come from right behind her ears.

She tried to push the thoughts away and breathed in deeply and silently through her nose. As she began to exhale a wave of dizziness passed over her, beginning from points on her temples where he held her and moving swiftly down to deep within her chest. Suddenly her bodice felt tight, a great crush of fabric, and even her sleeves and bootlaces seemed to constrict upon her limbs. She tried to breathe in again but it stuck in her throat and her eyes flew open in panic. She felt as if the air itself was strangling her, pinning her down where she sat.

Just as suddenly, the press was gone. She slumped forward with a loud huff of breath as the man released his grip, falling to her knees from the chair. An anger rose in her as she turned back to the man, ready to rail at him for his poor treatment. But just as she moved she saw that he, too, had fallen to the ground. The rage died in her as quickly as it had appeared. The man was shaking as if with palsy, his hands curled in to themselves as he clutched them to his chest.

“I did not know,” he whispered raggedly, his face turned down to where he gripped his own hands together. “I’m so sorry luv, I never would have…”

At that he finally looked up, and the look of sorrow upon his face seemed to sink into her belly.

“What?” she said. She realized she was whispering as well, so she repeated it louder. “What was that?”

He shook his head, avoiding her gaze. “No, no.”

She got up on her knees and reached for him, grabbing his dusty coat by the shoulders. She was angry again, if only to fight the fear that was beginning to grow inside her.

“What did you see?!”

He flinched away from her shout and seemed to gather himself. His trembling slowed and she let go of his coat. “Please tell me.”

He met her eyes once more, the same sorrow still filled his gaze. He reached up to touch her again but pulled his hand back just before her cheek.

“It was your death, luv.” his voice was gentle, calm.

“No,” she said with a shudder. “This is all too silly. You’re just a con man, then, scaring women!” She rose, brushing off her skirts and turned to leave.

“Meg, wait.” He stood as well, reaching towards her.

She stopped, stunned. She had never told him her name.

“Tell me,” he said softly. “How long have you been dead?”

Part II

Meg held onto the tent’s worn curtain, her legs buckling under her. Dead… dead? No. She couldn’t be dead. Meg felt her heart hammering against her chest. The loose strands of long black hair dangling over her face bounced in synch with her heavy breathing. The sunlight bathing her neck warmed her chilled skin. She couldn’t be dead.

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir,” Meg said, brushing back her hair, “but if you think you can take me for a fool, then you’re sadly mistaken.”

The man took a step towards her. “It’s all right, luv. I can help you.” He reached out to her with his thin, speckled hands. “Now close your eyes, and try to remem—”

“No!” Meg swatted his hands away. Upon touching them, her chest tightened and she staggered back, overcome by a new wave of dizziness. “Get away from me, you… you charlatan!”

She spun away from him and fled from the tent, back to the bustling fairground. The noise of laughter and conversation aggravated her dizziness. Her vision turned into a swirl of colors, and Meg tripped on her skirts. She threw her arms in front of her as she plunged face-first into the ground, breaking the fall with her palms. Pain shot through her body as she scraped her skin and banged her knees. She knelt on the ground, rubbing her reddened palms. Tears welled in her eyes. She gagged, and barely had time to push her hair away when a thick stream of hot, salty vomit poured from her mouth, drenching her skirts.

Meg wiped her mouth with the back of her trembling hand. She slowly raised her eyes, dreading the looks of confusion and disgust from the people around her, but no one paid her any mind. Couples strolled by without as much as a glance, and children ran squealing around her as if she was invisible… as if she was ghost.

“Please, for the love of God, someone help me!” Everyone went on their merry way, oblivious to her cries. Meg got to her feet, cold sweat streaming down her face, the taste of salty vomit saturating her mouth. She dashed towards a plump lady in a bright yellow dress, who was shielding herself from the sun with a frilly parasol. Meg grabbed her hands. “Please, madam, you must help me! I… I…”

The woman shivered and closed her parasol. She blinked a few times, touching her temples. The color drained from her skin, becoming as pale as Meg’s hands. An older gentleman walking by gently placed his hand on the woman’s shoulder.

“Are you alright, ma’am?” He asked, his brow furrowed with concern. “You seem a bit peaky.”

“Oh, yes. Thank you. Must’ve been an errant draft.” A reddish hue tinged the woman’s cheeks. “I feel quite better now.”

“Is that so?” the gentleman asked. “Still, I believe something sweet will do you a world of good.” He offered the woman his hand, which she took gladly, and they both strolled away towards one the many vendors dotting the fairground.

Meg looked at her hands. Had they always been so pale? She couldn’t recall. Warm tears fell upon her palms. It can’t be. It can’t. A gloved hand took the tip of her fingers. She slowly turned her eyes towards the fortune teller, regarding her with his honest yet sorrowful expression.

“Come on, Margareth. Let’s go.”

***

Sitting back in the shade of the fortune teller’s tent, Meg sipped on a hot cup of sweet tea. The awful salty taste in her mouth was gone and her trembling had abated. Even her dizziness melted away as the tea’s warmth spread through her body.

“So, luv. How long have you been dead?” The fortune teller twisted the end of his lips into a grin, but his eyes—dark and soulful—remained fixed on her.

“I… I don’t know.” Meg looked down at her teacup, unable to hold eye contact with the fortune teller. “I remember my childhood, growing up in Croydon, quite clearly. Everything else is something of a blur. I don’t understand. It’s all so strange.”

“Yes, I see… it happens sometimes,” the fortune teller said, pacing the room.

Meg set down the tea cup on the carpet. “Sometimes? You mean it’s not the first time you’ve met a… someone like me?”

“Oh, it’s not an everyday occurrence, but a few errant souls have made their way to my humble establishment.” The fortune teller looked at his hands. “Comes with the territory, I guess.”

“What’s your name anyway?” Meg got off her chair and took a few timid steps towards him. “Who are you?”

“The name’s Oliver, and I’m… well, I’m a fortune teller.” Oliver took off his gloves and raised his thin, aged-speckled hands towards her. “I’ll help you, luv. I promise.”

Meg closed her eyes as Oliver laid his bony fingers on her temples. Her chest tightened. Her throat tightened. She couldn’t breathe.

“It’s all right, Meg. Just a little longer.”

Oliver’s voice failed to soothe the dreadful feeling. Meg opened her eyes. It was no use. All she could see where thin dots of sunlight, as if through sackcloth. She soon realized she actually was inside a sack as the rough fabric scratched her hands and cheeks. She flailed her arms and legs to free herself, but they’d been bound together. Meg tried to scream, but only managed to gurgle—saltwater pouring into her throat. Her clothes became heavy, drenched with water.

“Just a little more, luv.”

Meg squeezed her eyes shut. The drowning sensation receded. She was sitting down now, but the seat trembled beneath her. She opened her eyes. The tent was gone, and the sun’s rays fell upon her. She rode on a carriage, Dover’s white cliffs to her right, the endless ocean spreading further ahead. A man rode next to her, but it wasn’t Oliver. He was a tall, blond man. She knew that man.

It was her fiancée.

“George?” she whispered. The man turned towards her. A broad smile spread across his face.

“Beautiful day, isn’t it, luv?”

Part III

Her thoughts swirled, and she heard the fortune teller’s voice swimming in her mind, “Stay there. There you will find answers.”

The castle rose up before her, and peasants ran alongside the carriage. George swept his hand knocking them out of the way, even as their shouts for just a sixpence reached Meg’s ears. They passed the castle, where she was sure they were going, and the road twisted to the right.

The carriage stopped in front of a church, and as she walked arm and arm with George she realized she was attending her own wedding—something that had happened in the past, a window to what her world had once been.

“Meg, baby, peace be with you forever,” a bearded man said to her, and he kissed her forehead.

Father, the word resonated within her, even though she was not sure how she knew.

A woman with a sweeping skirt and a dirty apron grabbed her hand. She could see the fortune teller’s eyes staring back at her. She shivered as the woman’s claw-like hand tightened her grip.

“Run, far away girl. There is no happiness for you here. Only fear and DEATH. He is the devil,” she said, pointing a bony finger at George.

She stared at George, his smile filled up his whole face, as he held out his hand for her to join him. Meg broke away from the tight grip of the woman, but her shouts filled her ears.

“DEATH, I say. Horror. Drowning. He—” But the woman’s words were cut off, as someone dragged her away, placing their hand over the woman’s mouth to prevent her screams. Meg stared back at the church scene, and it suddenly swirled away from her, a dream of the past, not something she could change.

She was on a bed in an ornate room. A clocked ticked away on the mantel. Her stomach seized up with pains. She looked down to see she was pregnant and in labor. Women rushed in and out of the room. There was too much blood, she could see it seeping from underneath her staining the mattress. The pain filled her own body, and she thought maybe this would be how she died. She fought to escape the pain but the fortune teller’s voice filled her ears, “Stay there,” his words echoed in her head. The pain in her stomach was overwhelming.

The midwife came to check her, shaking her head as she lay a hand on her stomach.

“This one is gone too.”

“That makes three,” the woman dressed in a green emerald dress spat. George’s mother.

The pains gripped her again and the midwife told Meg to push. She did, the feeling making her shudder, and soon she felt the head emerging. When they pulled the baby out he was completely blue, no life left in him, and she let out a howl of anguish, intense grief filling her soul.

“Boy or girl?” George’s mother asked.

“Boy, number three. The bleeding is heavier this time,” the midwife said. “If I can’t stop it she may never bear another child.”

“Does it matter?  She only births dead boys anyway. I will go tell the Duke. He will not be happy. Get this mess cleaned up, Ursula.”  George’s mother left the room, slamming the door behind her.

Ursula pressed against Meg’s stomach, trying to stop the bleeding.

She grabbed Ursula’s hand and said, “The old woman at the wedding was right.”

“You’ve lost too much blood. You’re delirious,” she said.

“No—the old woman was right.  He’ll kill me Ursula, if I don’t give him a child. It’s all he wants, someone to follow in his footsteps. But my womb,” Meg said, hitting her stomach with her fist and clenching against the pain as a red clot escaped from her traitorous body. “My womb is cursed against me. A black flower, dying and decaying, and it will only issue death not life.”

“It’s silly talk. You will see. You will have a live birth. It will happen,” Ursula said, as she kneaded Meg’s stomach and the blood, an endless river of red, flowed from between Meg’s legs.

At the dinner table, time had passed. Silence permeated the grand room. Candle lights flickered. Meg looked down, and her stomach was big with child again, but there was no movement. The baby has already died, and she knew it but she was keeping it from him. The sound of the forks and knives clattered against the plates in the tomb-like room.

A page came in, and whispered something to George. He slammed his fist down against the wooden table, the plates clattered too loud in Meg’s ears: the sound of her dead child within her womb screaming to be freed from its watery grave.

George’s eyes were dark and full of anger, and she thinks of the hopes and wants of the man who walked down the aisle with her. She placed a hand on her stomach willing the decaying child in her womb to live, an impossible feat. She knows in just a few days or hours her stomach will seize up with contractions and the baby will be expelled. George will be angry. He will come to her room and shout at her, curse her to God and the devil, and he will tell Meg she is a good for nothing wife, one who cannot even produce a child, an heir for him.

As the midwife wrapped up the slight body, died in the womb so long ago that the skin had started sloughing from her tiny body, George burst into the room.

“Another dead baby.” He cackled. His voice was too high pitched. “And to think…I had loved you.”

He slammed the door and walked from the room. His words, “I had loved you,” reverberating in her head reminding her of a time not yet arrived when there is too much water in her mouth, and she is drowning. And the last thing she hears before everything goes black are his words, “I had loved you.”

 

Fly Me To The Moon

/ legreene515 / Leave a comment

I had fun with this one today, and it’s actually put me in the mood to maybe write something more. The prompts came from Flash! Friday. There are a lot of super talented flash writers who write for Flash! Friday, and I love to go out and read what they have to say after I finish my story. So here’s mine:

Fly Me To The Moon
@laurenegreene
210 words

Sitting on the corner of hope and despair, chin resting on her hands, suitcases loaded to the brim beside her, Charlotte looked up at the moon. The clouds passed in front of it, in and out, changing the shadows around her.

She knew Tad was up there, somewhere, bouncing around on the new settlement. She wanted to see him. She looked back at the door behind her, hoping against all hope it wouldn’t open. It wasn’t the first time she’d thought about leaving, and it wouldn’t be the last. She kept telling her mom she wasn’t a child anymore. Twenty-Six years old and married.

“To a spaceman, yar?” Her mother chuckled the words out beside the cigar that was perpetually stuck in her mouth.

Charlotte stared at the moon, imagining Tad hoeing away at a garden in a biodome, stuck in space. She hadn’t heard from him in months.

“Probably screwing some space chick,” her brother had said.

The taxi cab pulled up.

“Where to?”

“Fly me to the moon?”

“Can’t go that far,” the man said, scratching his beard.

“Take me to Plasco Station.”

“You might get a pass,” the driver said. “I heard they were opening it up to civilians again.”

That’s what she’d been hoping to hear.

The Lily

/ legreene515 / Leave a comment

I’m sorry this is so sad. I wrote it for Mid-week Blue’s Buster over on The Tsuruoka Files.  It’s what came to mind, and it’s a little heartbreaking. This particular flash fiction site uses music as a prompt. I’d never heard this song, Faded Flowers by Shriekback.

Here’s a video of it, if you’re interested:

And here’s the story:

The Lily
578 words
@laurenegreene

The petals from the lily in the red vase had fallen to the table. Marcie knew she should get up and throw it away, but the lily reminded her of the fragility of life. She could feel the disease spreading through her body like a vine, and when she looked at the flower she thought about the night out with Brooks.

Only a week ago, they had gone out to dinner and it had been just like old times. Before the slammed doors, before the separate bedrooms, before the silence had crept up between them like a plague. Her heart hurt for the way things used to be between them, and that night she had felt a little of the old spark return.

She had planned the dinner. It had been her intention to tell him what the doctor had told her.

“Colon cancer. Metastatic.”

“How long do I have to live?”

And he had just shook his head, and then droned on and on about treatment options. In that moment, she had a desire to set things straight with Brooks. An affair was an affair, right? And she could forgive him for that. We’re only human, she thought.

At dinner, he’d slid his hand across the table and grasped hers, and she felt the long lost flutter fill her with a longing for him she hadn’t felt in so long.  She wanted to go home and crawl into bed with him. She wanted him to hold her tight all night long to comfort her and tell her everything would be alright, even when she knew it wouldn’t.

He bought the flower from the vendor in the courtyard outside the restaurant, one of the petals brushed off into the snow: white on white. And so she thought with the kindness of the night, they would go home and make love. The babysitter would have already put the kids to bed.

But when they came home they went their separate ways. She curled up in the middle of her bed and the tears ran rivers down her pillowcase as she thought about what little time she had left and everything she still wanted to do. She wanted to feel Brooks’ arms around her, she wanted to cuddle into him, but more than that she wanted to fix what had gone wrong in the first place: whatever that was.

So she hadn’t told him, and a week had gone by. She hustled the kids off to school in their winter coats every day and watched Brooks walk out the door. Slowly, the petals began to drop from the flower, one by one, dying as she was.

He came home early one day, and he was shocked to see her there.

“I thought you’d be at knitting club or something?”

“I have something to tell you,” she said.

“I have something to tell you too.”

“You first,” she said.

“I don’t love you anymore,” he said, as he sank into his chair. “I want a divorce.”

She stared at the petals resting on the table. The words stung, but they’d be nothing compared to the words she could throw back at him.

“I’ve been googling.”

“Huh?”

She focused on the flower petals curled up, browned at the edge, laying on the table and did not look at him. The pain in her chest was unbearable.

“I wouldn’t go through the cost of the divorce, if I were you. I’ll be dead in six months anyway.”