In the Cafe Littéraire

This was where the writerly types hung out. If Julie couldn’t absorb some creative vibes here, she’d quit.

She hoped she’d feel a surge of inspiration as she entered, that her fingers would tingle in anticipation. But she didn’t feel any of that.

She ordered a coffee, chose a table, opened her notepad, and looked around. A young man stared into the street; an older man gazed blankly at the floor; a scruffy woman scribbled frantically, scratching out as she wrote, and sighing.

First, a sip of coffee. Yes, it was good—that was encouraging. She selected her lucky pen and clicked it open, and as she did so it slipped and clattered to the floor.

Julie jumped up to retrieve it, sending her chair crashing, and knocking her coffee all over the table and herself. She was mortified.

Nothing for it but to run. Three pairs of eyes followed her out the door.

Then the young man began to write—a poem about shame. It won first prize in a prestigious competition. The older man drafted an essay about the emotional effects of sudden, unexpected loud sounds. It was accepted into a scholarly journal he’d been submitting to unsuccessfully for years. The woman began a screenplay about a girl searching for her place in the world. It became a box-office sensation.

Julie ran home, convinced there was no place for her in the creative world, and settled into a boring but secure job in an insurance company.

***

After several weeks of my writerly well being as dry as dust, here I am again with a 250 word story for The Unicorn Challenge, hosted by Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr.

Going home – Glasgow 1941

It’s only a short distance. You’ve walked it often—home from Granny’s where you’ve held her hand and reassured her that morning will come, that the bombs won’t land here. Never in our street.

So you stay, despite Mam’s warnings about the blackout, the fog. You stay until you convince Granny and yourself you have to go, and when you step outside you know you shouldn’t have.

Because you step into nightmare. You know about blackness. You’ve lived it for over a year. But this is different. This is blackness that breathes. This is blackness with a body that wraps cold, wet arms around you and absorbs you. 

You creep along, feeling your way along walls, mindful of obstacles you’ve memorised, holes and ridges that would send you tumbling.

Then you realise something’s wrong. This wall’s wrong. The footpath feels different. You are lost.

In panic, you cry, shout for your mother. Your voice ricochets off bricks and blackened windows.

Between sobs you hear an answer. ‘Maggie, where are you?’ 

‘Mam,’ you cry. ‘What will I do?’

‘Be quiet now,’ she says. ‘Listen to my voice. I’ll talk you home.’

And she does.

But still you sob, and cry, and the voice you hear isn’t Mam’s. ‘Maggie dear, be quiet now.’

And someone else holds your wrinkled hand, then wheels you to an open window where you see a garden, a light-filled morning. You breathe it in, and decide that here’s where you’ll wait, until your mother calls you home.

***

This 250 word story is for The Unicorn Challenge, hosted by Jenne Gray and CE Ayr.

Click on the above picture or here for some information about the bombing of Glasgow in World War II. My mother grew up here, and my story is loosely based on an experience she had at that time.

Going on

Just another morning walk. Nothing special about this one. The sun? Weak, but trying. The weather? A little too windy for her liking. The path? Soggy from last night’s downpour.

Her mind was full of the usual preoccupations—bills to pay, overdue library books, the funny thing her son said at breakfast.

She planned to walk just to the crossroad. Enough to work the kinks out and then on with her day. She didn’t do that. For once the highway traffic was light and she could cross easily, so she did.

And then turned off into a laneway she’d never noticed before, a gravelly path that dwindled to a narrow track through woodland, growing thicker as she progressed.

Briefly, she wondered why she’d come this way, and nearly stopped, but something made her continue. Crazy, she thought. Nothing’s making me go on, but I’ve come this far, I’ll just see what’s ahead.

So she walked on. Until the trees thinned, and she was in open fields. Until she came to a fence, with cows clustered there, and she stopped, and looked. She’d never considered before how cows can stand there in stillness and look back at you.

She stayed a little longer, then went home, to deal with the things she needed to deal with. 

So her bills got paid, her library books returned, her son kept making her smile.

But now she knew how cows can just stand and look, and she started doing that herself, whenever she could.

***

I do love cows. This is my 250 word story for this week’s Unicorn Challenge. Thanks to Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr for the great photo prompts and for hosting the challenge.

A matter of perspective

‘Look at that. Driving like a lunatic. I’m gonna zap him.’

‘Ok. What then?’

‘Then he’ll learn that he’s not the centre of the universe.’

‘And then?’

‘He’ll mend his ways. Develop a little empathy. See the bigger picture.’

‘Really?’

‘What’s with the third degree? Aren’t we on the same side?’

‘Are we?’

‘Well, we’re sitting here on the same cloud, so I figured … ‘

‘Same location, different viewpoints.’

‘Look! Another one. The highway’s full of them – aggressive, self-destructive morons.’

‘I know.’

‘Well what are we doing about it?’

‘Just sitting here, mostly, trying to get their attention. Sometimes it works.’

***

Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields for hosting Friday Fictioneers. This is my contribution to this week’s link-up.

Initiation

He knew they’d be hiding, watching, listening. He tried to move soundlessly, placing his feet gently, breathing calmly.

He wasn’t afraid of the graves, or distant owl-hoots, or the sudden cold wind that brushed his cheek and lifted his hair. He wasn’t afraid of the soft rustling and slithering coming from the overgrown greenery alongside the path. Just bugs, or lizards, he told himself. 

What he was afraid of was what they’d do to him if they caught him. His task was to make it through the cemetery at midnight, without a light. They’d be waiting to pounce. Only the bravest, the strongest, the most resourceful made it into the brotherhood. They were ruthless. 

The path ahead turned sharply. He’d checked in daylight, identifying potential ambush spots.

More grassy scurryings, and a strange sensation in his feet, like a current. Weird. Must be some kind of stress thing, adrenalin, fight or flight. He kept going. Careful, quiet. So light-footed it seemed his feet weren’t even touching down. Yes. He was hovering, higher, faster, along the path.

And there they were, in front of him, staring as he zoomed towards them, then, screaming, they ran.

As he settled again to earth, the rustlings and cracklings emanating from the grass, no, from the graves themselves, built to a roar, then softened to a purr, a whisper.

He turned, and around each grave he saw a glimmer, that faded quickly, leaving him alone in the dark silence, afraid of nothing, afraid of no-one.

***

250 words for The Unicorn Challenge, hosted by Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr.

Storage

It happens most nights. Timmy Johnson  lies in silent terror until he no longer can. He cries out then and mother comes, bringing a box. 

She searches—under his bed, inside cupboards—and in that box she collects all the monsters. She puts the boxes in the basement, and Timmy settles to sleep. 

‘Monsters always obey mothers,’ she explains. And he believes her.

But that doesn’t explain the greenish glow coming from the Johnsons’ basement, that neighbours sometimes notice if they’re up, needing water, or feeling restless. 

They recall their own childhood fears, and tell themselves to stop imagining things.

***

This is my 100 word contribution to Friday Fictioneers. Thanks to Rochelle for hosting, and to David for the photo prompt.

For a change, this week I’m starting with an introductory comment. The photo for this week’s Friday Fictioneers led my thoughts to this old story, and because I’m trying to be a bit freer in following the leadings that pop up, I skipped away after them. Then when I was finished and had my hundred words on the page, I followed another train of thought about the same children’s story. Couldn’t shake that chicken out of my mind.

So, I’ve doubled up this week. Please forgive me, and if you only want to read one, that’s fine by me. (They’re both a little weird anyway, but George Saunders says that’s ok.)

Thanks, once again, to Rochelle for hosting Friday Fictioneers, and to Dale for the photo.

***

Another boring day

They said grade two would be better, but it’s just like grade one with more homework.

I’m supposed to be reading, but really I’m window-gazing. Using my imagination. I watch people outside and imagine where they’re going and how they’ll end up.

This stupid book is boring, about a chicken who worried too much. I mean, really.

One thing though, that chicken had a good imagination, like me. He imagined the sky was falling. I wish it would. Right on this boring old school. Then we’d all get to go home.

I wonder how this chicken will end up.

***

Learning to read the signs

Bob is at the shop. It’s an old shop. Bob sees lots at the shop. Bob sits down on the grass. Bob likes to sit and think on the grass. 

Bob sees the roof. The roof is bent. Bob gets up. Bob sees the man at the shop.

‘Why is the roof bent?’ Bob asks the man. 

‘The sky fell,’ the man tells Bob.

Bob thinks about the roof. Why the sky fell. Then he thinks some more and he looks at the roof and it’s not bent. Bob unbent the roof. Just by thinking.

‘Thanks,’ the man tells Bob.

***

Selection

‘What about those two? I know them from my last mission.’

‘Maybe. Let’s check their dossiers.’

A screen materialised, a glowing square in the otherwise featureless room.

‘The male perhaps. The female has less potential.’

‘Why do you say so? Look at her profile. She’s had several opportunities. Someone’s recognised potential.’

‘Exactly. But nothing’s changed. What’s she waiting for? What’s the saying here? Don’t throw good money after bad?’

‘Pragmatist eh?’

‘Takes all kinds. They say that here, too. At least some do.’

‘You have done your research. I’m impressed.’

‘It’s called survival. Of the fittest. Not that I’m in favour of that dog-eat-dog approach. But let’s get back to the case at hand. I say the male’s our best option.’

‘I take your point, but she’s so close. Look at the last report. She was about to open up but took fright. A wolf howled or something. Broke the continuity. Let’s not give up on her yet.’

‘Okay. Your call.’

Down below, as Jim and Joanie strolled, small dots in the vastness of earth, sky and sea, trying to ignore a dune-buggy full of sand-churning rabble-rousers ripping the silence with their roaring machine, a tiny spark flashed above them.

‘Did you see that?’ said Jim.

‘I didn’t see anything,’ said Joanie. ‘I’m suddenly tired and my head hurts. Let’s go back.’

And they returned to the comfortable, familiar, crumbling old cottage they called home.

‘Told you so,’ said the pragmatist. ‘Lost cause. Next time, we’ll try Jim.’  

***

My 250 words for The Unicorn Challenge, with thanks to Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr for the weekly photo prompts and for hosting the challenge.

Vanished

Nobody knew what he was doing there, on that road he never travelled. Had there been a need for respite, or an agony of indecision at a crossroad? Or a dispute with some other, where the only way through was time apart, and the moment of separation was harrowing, with loose ends dangling and doors not properly closed behind them?

Everybody had a theory. The cynics said it was a set-up. You wouldn’t have to investigate too hard and you’d find some devious motive. Friends and family soul-searched. Was it my fault? they wondered. Officials compiled dossiers and filed reports. Media types scoured dark corners for juicy morsels, laid down crumb trails to lure the hungry public into speculative fantasies. And, it had to be acknowledged, they were surprisingly successful at uncovering useful morsels tucked away in his private life. Who’d have guessed?

But the facts were, the indisputable ones, one day he was there, and the next he wasn’t. That was definitely his car abandoned by the roadside. He’d left for work as usual after breakfast. He hadn’t arrived. And that was all they could say for certain.

Thinking of them all scurrying around, wondering, he felt a gentle tingle of satisfaction. How simple it would be to ignore the voices urging him relentlessly forward, reminding him of promises, and the long, gruelling miles ahead. How simple to just let go.

He slammed the door and continued on, re-entering the traffic’s flow, following the same old highway, for now.

***

250 words once again for The Unicorn Challenge, hosted by Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr.

And yes, there’s a little Frostian channeling going on in this. (Here and here.)

It was beautiful

When it ended she wasn’t surprised. Bereft, but not unprepared. She’d known from the start that such a fragile thing could never endure.

She’d striven for harmony, knowing that perfect symmetry was impossible. He’d been more naive, seeing only flaws and failure where she saw variety, the imperfections lending a pleasing texture to an otherwise smooth, predictable surface.

The end had been painful. The tendrils that had tangled them intricately together tore apart. The budding possibilities she’d imagined lay lifeless around her. When that delicate structure fell, the splintered shards lay everywhere, piercing her already wounded flesh at every step.

***

Another 100 word story for Friday Fictioneers. Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields for hosting this flash fiction link-up each week.