The Envelope

The envelope was hidden behind the fireplace mantle for decades. Somehow, it had fallen down a narrow crack where the mantle had pulled away from the wall. It was found when the new homeowners, Peter and Jessica, tore out the old mantle in preparation for having a new one put in.

The house was a Victorian cottage that they’d purchased at auction. It was badly neglected, but still had most of its gingerbread trim. Her mother was concerned it was a fire trap, but Jessica could see its potential through the decay and knew she and Peter were just the couple to give it the T.L.C. it needed. They hadn’t just wanted a house, they’d been looking for an adventure. Perhaps the story of the envelope behind the mantle would be the first of many charming anecdotes about things they found in the house while renovating.

The handwriting on the envelope was faded, but when Jessica held it up to the sunlight she could just make out the word “Rose” on the envelope. The letter was still sealed, so whoever Rose was, she never had a chance to read it. “What if it’s a love letter? How sad she never got it.”

“Or it could be something boringly normal, like a receipt from the plumber,” Peter said, as he went to the kitchen and came back with a knife. He reached for the envelope, but Jess held it up high, just beyond his reach. “Hey, hold on! It isn’t polite to open someone else’s mail,” she said. “Isn’t it, like, illegal even?”

“Seriously?” Peter’s eyebrows shot up towards his hairline. “Jessica, whoever Rose is, she’s probably been dead for decades by now. We don’t even know her last name.”

Jessica gave in. She handed the letter to Peter, who made short work of slicing it open. She wrinkled her nose at the musty smell of dust and old paper as Peter handed the envelope back, saying “You may do the honors.”

Jessica felt a little shiver of excitement as she carefully held the envelope open with two fingers and peered inside. “Oh!” She looked up at Peter in surprise, then upended the envelope and poured a small pile of seeds into her palm.

“The letter isn’t to Rose, it is a rose! Rose seeds, anyway,” Peter laughed. “I didn’t see that coming.”

The back garden was still mostly a wild tangle of weeds, but together Jessica and Peter cleared a small section of flower bed near the back wall of the house and carefully planted and watered the seeds. “Can seeds still grow after so long?” Jess mused as she watched Peter watering the small patch of earth. “We’re about to find out,” he replied, tipping the last of the water out of the can.

Jessica went to bed that night still thinking about the envelope and the seeds it contained. Were they actually roses, or had the seeds been gifted to a person named rose? She couldn’t wait to see what--if anything--would grow. 

That same night, Jessica dreamed of roses. But not just any roses; these were huge, the size of cabbages with showy peoneyesque blooms. But even more impressive than the size and beauty of the blossoms was their fragrance. The luxurious velvety, musky scent of roses, stronger than any perfume, permeated the dream. 

The scent got stronger, and stronger, until it woke her up. Her eyes popped open, blinking at the ceiling in the dark. She knew she wasn’t fully awake because she could still smell the strong floral scent of the roses from her dream. She sniffed once, then again. Her brow furrowed. Was she still asleep, dreaming of being awake? Or was she really smelling roses? She reached over and shook Peter awake. “Babe, do you smell that?” 

Peter sat up, confused. “Huh? What?” 

“I said, do you smell that?” Jessica said, sitting up too. They both sniffed the air together. Peter’s eyes widened, and he leapt out of the bed. “Oh my God! Smoke! Jessica, the house is on fire!” He grabbed Jessica by the hand and dragged her out of bed with him. He ran to the bedroom door and felt it carefully. “Crap, it’s hot.” He walked in a tight circle, muttering to himself. “We’re on the second floor. What do we do? How do we get out?”

Jessica ran to the window, her heart in her mouth. She, too, now smelled the smoke, but it was still strongly overlayed by the scent of roses. She opened the blinds, then gasped at what she saw. “Peter. Look!” She heaved the window upwards, allowing the moonlight and the even-stronger scent of roses to wash into the room. 

The whole back garden was covered in a tangle of rose bushes. The blossoms were the size of dinner plates, silvery under the moonlight. The coiling vines had grown right up the side of the house, around the window to their room. These vines weren’t the tender green shoots of a newly sprouted plant. Rather, they were thick woody old-growth vines. 

Peter and Jessica hurriedly climbed out the window, using their hands and bare feet to find purchase on the sturdy vines. They climbed down to safety--covered in scratches from the thorns--where they stood, huddled together, in the one patch of grass not covered in roses and watched the flames dance over the roof of the house. 

It seemed like forever, but it wasn’t long before the fire trucks arrived. The fire department wrestled the fire under control, containing it to one area and eventually extinguishing it. A bedroom at the front of the house, and part of the living room under it, had sustained extensive damage from not only the fire, but from smoke and water as well. 

The firemen had to hack through the woody roses to reach Peter and Jessica in the backyard, and make a path for them to walk out. The fireman who broke through into the clearing where they stood paused to lean on his ax and catch his breath. He pushed his helmet back and looked up at the house, then back at Peter and Jessica. “Damn! You wouldn’t have made it out, without all this overgrowth. Looks like years of neglect back here might have saved your lives. Crazy, huh?”

Jess and Peter exchanged glances, but didn’t say anything about the roses appearing overnight. They were still trying to understand it themselves, much less explain it to someone else. 

After a lengthy insurance battle, the damage from the fire was repaired and renovations on the rest of the house resumed. 

Bringing the cottage back to its former glory was every bit of the adventure Peter and Jessica had hoped it would be, and they had many anecdotes with which to entertain visitors over the years—but the story of the envelope, and the mysterious roses that grew over night, was never one of them. They could never quite bring themselves to speak of it, even to one another. 

Yet every June thereafter, when the air was heavy with the perfume of the gorgeous antique roses that sprawled across the back garden, Jessica cut lush bouquets for the house and said a silent thanks for the mysterious envelope, and the magical seeds it contained.

#MagicalRealism

#Fantasy

#FlashFiction

The People, United.

“THE PEOPLE, UNITED, WILL NEVER BE DIVIDED!” Lainey got chills as the megaphone crackled to life and the chant rippled across the crowd. Everywhere she looked, up and down the intersection, people waved flags and held up signs, just like she and her mom were doing.

The white vans with tinted windows had started showing up not long after the election. They came early in the morning, when people were on their way to work or school. They had taken the dad of one of Lainey’s friends right from the school drop-off line.

As cars drove by many honked their car horns or cheered in support. Others ignored them, and one person flipped them the bird. Lainey wanted to do it back, but her mother hadn’t let her. “When they go low, we go high,” she said.

The white vans had taken many people since those first frightening weeks. They were sending people to camps, or to prisons in other countries. Some claimed it was because they had broken the law, but the laws kept changing, becoming harder and harder to comply with.

The atmosphere crackled with energy as the crowd continued to grow, eventually spilling off the sidewalk and into the street. Lainey’s pulse thrummed in her ears as traffic came to a halt. Not far away from where Lainey and her mom stood, someone dressed as the Statue of Liberty was trying to reason with an irate motorist.

The crowd began a slow surge down the street in the direction of the Statehouse. An unfamiliar sensation percolated in Lainey’s gut. It wasn’t fear, it wasn’t excitement. It was something new, something she didn’t have a name for.

A police line was forming ahead, officers in riot gear standing shoulder to shoulder behind heavy shields. Some held tear gas or batons, ready to use them on the crowd. Behind them, scores of white vans stood waiting.

Lainey looked around her, perplexed. Everyone was chanting in time with the drumming that was coming from somewhere at the back of the crowd, shaking their signs. She didn’t see anything bad happening.

Lainey’s mom saw the police line, too. She looked at Lainey with a worried frown. “Maybe we should go.”

”No, I want to stay,” Lainey pleaded. She took her mother’s hand in hers and squeezed. “We need to stay. Please. For Brisa, and her dad.” Their eyes met as Lainey’s mom searched her face for fear or uncertainty. Finding only determination, she nodded. “Ok. We’ll stay.”

The chanting got louder, everyone’s voices rising together in sync with the drums. The eerie wail of a lone bagpiper coiled around the beat of the drums, tying it to the voices of the people. Lainey felt the hair on the back of her neck begin to rise as a new surge of energy moved through the crowd.

The first street light to bend was almost over Lainey's head. She gasped at the pop of sparks as the metal gave way and the wiring within twisted too. All along the street light poles were bending into new shapes.

Up ahead, the men in riot gear looked at one another in surprise as their shields began lifting into the air and taking flight.

Throughout the crowd people began dropping their signs to grasp one another’s hands as they continued to chant.

One by one, the white vans began to sink slowly into the street as if the asphalt were hot lava. A cheer went up from the crowd as the drivers of the vans stumbled out of their vehicles and took off running across the sticky pavement.

The police line fell apart, with some of the officers blending in with the crowd as they, too, joined the march.

Hand-in-hand, the community pushed past the abandoned vans and surged up the steps into the Statehouse to demand change.

Lainey squeezed her mom’s hand, the strange energy fizzing all around her. Tears prickled in the corners of her eyes. For Brisa. For her own family. For everyone. As they climbed the steps, their voices rose together, “THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE!”

A Little Luck Goes A Long Way

Lily had the ability to see other people’s bad luck coming.

When her coworker, Glenda, was about to knock her favorite coffee mug off the desk with her elbow, Lily heard the echo of breaking crockery in the near future and moved the mug just in time.

The following week the smokey smell of gears burning tickled her nose just before the intern fed far too many sheets of paper into the copier at once. Lily put a hand on his arm, stopping him from jamming the papers into the chute. “Oh, no, hon. That’s far too much. Just send them through one at a time.”

But she was unable to see her own bad luck, until it was too late.

She didn’t see the extra step until she’d tripped over it.

She never noticed the pot about to boil over until the spaghetti came bubbling over the side along with the water. 

And, she never saw the other car coming, not until it T-boned hers in the middle of the intersection. 

The accident wasn't her fault, the other driver ran the stop sign. But Lily couldn’t help but think if her special talent worked for her, too, she might have been able to prevent it. Not for the first time, she wondered why it worked this way.

After her car accident Lily had to take the bus to work for a few days while her car was in the shop. While she was standing at the bus stop a man gently took her by the elbow and steered her a few feet backwards. Before she could comment, a car sped past right through a large pothole filled with water that she hadn’t noticed. The spray of dirty water landed right where she had been standing.

Lily swiveled around to look at the man who had saved her from going to work drenched in muddy water. He was reading a book, seemingly unaware. Lily’s left eyebrow arched knowingly, but she said nothing.

The next day, Lily observed the same man put out a hand, while still reading the book he was holding in his other hand, and pull a baby carriage back from the curb just before it rolled into the street.

The day after that, Lily noticed when, still reading his book, he reached over and steadied the arm of a man in a suit who was about to sneeze and spill coffee all down his front.

Lily got her car back that evening. The next morning, she drove by the bus stop on her way to the office. As she approached the bus shelter she slowed down and pulled over. The man with the book was the only one there.

She rolled her window down. “Honey, the bus is going to get a flat tire halfway to your destination. Get in, I’ll give you a ride.” She smiled knowingly.

The man lowered his book. He met her gaze with a grin of his own. “This must be my lucky day, then. Thank you,” he replied as he climbed into the passenger seat. “But make sure you avoid Elm Street, there’s about to be a sinkhole.”

Lily laughed out loud as she pulled away from the curb. “I think this might just be my lucky day, too.”

Now Departing, Last Dryer on the Left

Pablito was lying on the long fiberglass bench under the front window of the laundromat. The air was thick with the smell of detergent and bleach, and the morning felt as if it would stretch on forever. 

It was no fun being the only kid at the laundromat.

There weren’t even any interesting people to watch today. In fact, the only other person in the laundromat this morning besides Pablito and his mom was an old man he didn’t recognize sitting on the adjacent bench.

The man didn’t seem to be washing any laundry. He was just sitting there, patiently, like he was waiting for something. Pablito swiveled around so he was hanging upside down with his feet on the back of the bench and his head near the ground.

From this angle, he could see the man’s feet. He was wearing a funny looking pair of boots, rubber ones that came up to the mid calf. They looked like they were meant for walking through water and didn’t match the brown suit he was wearing. Other than the odd boots, he was dressed like he was going on a trip.

As Pablo hung upside down the man checked his watch and stood up. Pablo assumed he was going to leave, but instead of walking to the door, he walked to the back of the laundromat and opened the last dryer in the row. As Pablito watched from his upside down vantage point, the man climbed into the dryer and closed the door behind him.

When the man didn’t come out again after a few minutes, Pablito rolled backwards off the bench, scrambled to his feet and ran over to his mom where she was putting another load into a washer. “Mama, did you see that man?” he asked her. She finished shaking powdered detergent from the box into the machine, then turned around and looked over her shoulder in both directions. “What man?” she said.

“The man who was sitting over there,” Pablo pointed. His mother clucked her tongue dismissively. “Que hombre?” she said. “There was no man. We are the only ones here, mijo.”

Pablito flopped back down on his bench in a huff. When his mother was busy, she never listened. Martians could land on the laundromat roof and she would still be annoyed with him for telling her about it.

Time continued to pass in slow motion, with only the rhythmic slosh and hum of the machines, and the sound of his mom on the phone with his Tia, sharing their usual endless buzz of gossip.

Pablito made a decision. He walked to the back of the laundromat. The door on the last dryer was still closed. He could see it was empty through its little glass porthole, but the reflection on the glass wasn't of the laundromat. He felt a shiver of excitement as he reached out and grasped the door handle. He took one final glance back as his mom, still talking on the phone and folding laundry, then he opened the door and climbed in.

#Flashfiction

#Fantasy

#MagicalRealism

Messy Magic

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Gilbert and his little brother, Troy, were supposed to be cleaning their room. Instead, they were pretending to be wizards, casting spells.

“Presto magico!” Gilbert shouted as he spun around and pointed at Troy. Troy, who was standing on the bed, bounced off onto the floor where he grabbed two handfuls of mismatched socks and threw them into the air. “Pretend the socks are flying monkeys,” he ordered.

Gilbert threw himself to the ground and rolled away from where the socks had landed. “They almost got me!” He panted, scrambling up and ducking behind the dresser.

Troy opened his mouth, about to describe what should happen next, but before he could say a word they heard their mother clomping up the stairs with the vacuum cleaner, “That room better be getting cleaned,” she called. “I’m vacuuming my room, then I’m coming in to do your rug”

The boys looked at one another wide eyed with panic. They hadn’t actually gotten around to doing any cleaning yet. Before the flying sock monkeys, they’d made a “potion” that required half a tube of blue glitter, five crushed up crayons and a dribble of water from the fish bowl. They’d mixed it all up in Troy’s batting helmet, but somehow, some had gotten on the rug. And on Gilbert's bedspread. And on the dresser and one of the curtains, too.

Mom was going to be mad. BIG mad. Not just about the mess, but about the fact that they’d been playing wizard in the house again.

The vacuum switched on in the room next door; They were running out of time.

Gilbert smacked his head with both hands. “Think, think, think,” he muttered. They needed a real spell, fast, before mom saw the mess. He liked playing wizard, but just pretend; His grades in actual spell craft were atrocious.

“Ok, ok, I think I’ve got it." Gilbert looked nervously at Troy as he began: “Tick tock goes the clock, it’s time to clean, there’s no time to lean.” Gilbert took a deep breath and continued, “Flippity flop, here comes the mop,” The bedroom door flew open and the mop hopped into the room and began wiping away the stains left by their play spells.

Troy jumped into the air and did a fist pump. “ You’re doing it! Keep going!”

Encouraged, Gilbert added another verse to his incantation. “Clean up, fast and swift, with a tidy room our spirits lift!” This time the bed sheets rose into the air like ghosts and hovered over the beds.

“No! Not that kind of spirit!” Gilbert howled in frustration before trying again: “Clean up, fast and fun, no more mess, just get it done!” he finished the spell just as the dull roar of the vacuum in the other room stopped.

The bed-sheet ghosts immediately folded themselves around the beds, terminating in tight hospital corners. The socks crawled like inchworms into the closet, while stray Legos rolled across the carpet, racing matchbox cars and mini skateboards to the toy box.

“Alright, kids, here I come. You’d better be ready for me.” The bedroom door bumped into the wall as their mother came in dragging the canister vacuum. She looked around the tidy room with an expression of pleasant surprise. “Well done, boys!”

As their mother plugged the vacuum in behind the dresser Gilbert saw a stray sock come inch-worming out from under Troy’s bed. He pointed to it with a silent grimace and Troy stomped on it just in time.

“Why don’t you boys watch TV downstairs so I can vacuum?” Gilbert was about to heave a sigh of relief when the mop came hopping out from behind the curtains.

Mom’s glare pinned them where they stood. “I think you boys have some explaining to do.”

#FlashFiction

#MagicalRealism

#Fantasy

#Magic

Lucifer Gets His Own Back

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“Remember, wherever you go, the stars are watching over you!” Louella paused after saying her last line of dialogue, eyes glittering with tears, then took a deep bow as the auditorium exploded in applause.

Louella and the rest of the cast did two more curtain calls before their adoring public would let them go. I waited in the shadows, as I always did when it was time to settle a debt. I saw Louella glance sideways in my direction as she took her final bow, but I knew the glare of the footlights prevented her from seeing me.

Alas, in the end, everyone must pay the piper and the piper, in this case, was me. I was waiting for her outside the stage door, sitting on top of a trash can, grooming my sleek black tail.

Naturally, Louella didn’t recognize me at first. She might have been expecting an imp, not a regular old alley cat. But I wanted her to realize I could be anywhere, at any time, waiting for my pound of flesh.

Louella made the usual mistake, trading something for fame and fortune. She begged me the day of the auditions, “I’d give anything, absolutely anything, to get this role!” She went on to explain how she’d had to sneak out of the house to escape her religious fundamentalist parents just to audition—as if I’d care about that! But she had a steel will and fire in her eyes, so I had given her what she asked for, in the end.

For some reason, they always thought they could outsmart me, but it never works. I always get what I am due.

I yawned and kicked over the trash can with a resounding crash as I leapt off it and sauntered over to her. She glanced down, then did a double take, my identity revealed by my glowing eyes.

Louella stopped in her tracks, “For heaven’s sake, really? You could give someone a heart attack doing that.” She rolled her eyes and folded her arms, one hip cocked, as she met my stare with a glare of her own.

Well, now. That wasn’t exactly the reaction I expected, but ok. “I’ve come to collect.” My voice came out in more of a screechy tone than a hollow terrifying one, but oh well. I was an alley cat, not a tiger.

Louella glanced in both directions, making sure we were alone in the alley before she squatted down on her heels, the hem of her dress trailing on the ground.

“Lucifer,” she purred, “Don’t you already know what I gave up?” She clutched my chin in her hand and looked me straight in the eye, an amused expression on her face.

I struggled to get free of her grip, but she abruptly grabbed me by the scruff with her other hand. Before I knew it, she had thrust me into a basket I hadn’t noticed her carrying and slammed the top shut.

“Silly kitty, I gave up my self-doubt and reliance on supernatural creatures.” She chuckled. “I got that role because I’m good, and I deserved it, and you and the other one upstairs have no power over me anymore.”

I hissed and scratched madly at the basket, trying to shape-shift into something more terrifying, to no avail. Dammit, she was right! Her lack of belief in me made me irrelevant!

“Where are you taking me?” I sputtered. There was an unmistakable smile in her voice as she said, “To the vet, of course. Snip, snip!”

#Flashfiction

#Fantasy

#FaustianBargain

A Friendly Favor Gone Wrong

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"I will not release crickets in the classroom," Mitchell wrote, for the one hundredth time. He put his pen down and shook his hand to release the cramp after so much writing. 

"If you've completed your task, you may go." Miss Gibbons said in her sonorous voice. "Let this be a lesson to you, young sir. I expect no further hijinks going forward."

"No, Miss," Mitchell mumbled, hurrying to put the stopper back in the inkwell and gather up his satchel and his books. 

Outside the schoolhouse the wind was picking up, blowing fallen leaves and bits of twigs and dried grass in tiny tornados along the path home. Mitchell plodded along, following his usual circuitous route that wound from behind the schoolhouse through the orchard, around the churchyard, and across his father's fields to eventually come out behind the family farmhouse just beside the well. 

It was this well, or rather, the Sprite that lived within it, that had gotten him into trouble in the first place. It was waiting for him now, perched on the edge of the stone well. Mitchell dropped his eyes, hoping he could sneak past it unnoticed, but it spotted him and launched itself into the air to flutter around his head like an overgrown butterfly. 

"Hello, friend!" It chirped, settling on his shoulder companionably. Mitchell stopped walking. "No," He said, his voice sulky. "You're not my friend! You and your swarm of crickets got me into terrible trouble today with the school teacher." 

"But, I thought you said you wanted school to be more lively, less boring?" The Sprite cried, feigning surprise, although Mitchell was sure he'd heard it try to quash a giggle.

"Well, yes, I did say that. But dozens of crickets emerging from my satchel wasn't what I meant, and I think you knew that."

This time the Sprite chuckled audibly. "I did, Friend. I'm sorry, but I simply couldn't resist! I won't do it again, I promise."

Mitchell made an exasperated noise and shrugged the Sprite off his shoulder and resumed walking. 

"Let me make it up to you, Friend." The Sprite fluttered around him in a looping circle. 

"No, thank you!" Mitchell said firmly, as he ought to have done the first time the sprite offered to do him a favor.

Sprites might be friendly, but they were definitely not friends, he knew that unequivocally now. He'd let the sly creature trick him once, but not again. He continued on into the house and firmly closed the door on the Sprite’s pleas.

The next morning Mitchell was relieved to see the Sprite was not at the well when he left for school. With any luck, it was busy taking care of domestic tasks in its watery abode and didn’t have any time or attention for bothering him today.

Mitchell played crack-the-whip in the schoolyard with the other boys until Miss Gibbons rang the bell, ushering them inside. He took his seat, still red cheeked and breathless from the intensity of the game, and unbuckled his satchel to take out his reader.

As Mitchell opened the satchel a bright blur of movement exploded from it. Before Mitchell could react, he saw the naughty Sprite grab Miss Gibbons’s parasol from behind her desk and begin whacking students with it randomly. He already knew, from painful experience, that only he would see it was the sprite. Everyone else would say they saw him doing it.

Mitchell slid down in his seat, but not before Miss Gibbons pinned him with an angry glare. He could already feel his writing hand cramping in anticipation.

#MagicalRealism

#FlashFiction

Food for Dragons

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Gina pulled her apron down from the hook on the back of the door and put it on. It was heavy-duty, made of canvas and almost ample enough to wrap around herself twice. She pulled the strings around to the front and cinched them into a neat bow.

Gina placed her hands on the wooden workbench and dropped her head in a silent plea. Oh please, she thought, let today finally be the day they eat. After taking a deep breath, holding it, then slowly letting it out, she got to work.

Gina pulled vials of spices down from the shelves over the workbench and cut snippets of thistle, rosemary and thyme from the potted plants under the long row of mullioned windows, mixing, measuring and weighing ingredients. Herbs and unique vegetable preparations were her specialty.

Not long ago, Gina had been a culinary student, excited about beginning her internship. The restaurant she’d been placed at was small, housed in an odd brick tower located in a back alley in the historic part of the city. It was very old, and very, very exclusive. Or at least, that was how the Chef explained it when Gina questioned the unusual architecture and lack of customers.

That first day Chef Zorelio asked Gina to fetch a few more potatoes from the root cellar in the basement. She hadn’t been able to find any, just carrots, parsnips and a few malodorous onions. “No, no! They’re at the back, all the way in the back. You didn’t go far enough in.”

Obligingly, she went back down the narrow stone staircase, Chef Zorelio stomping down the steps behind her. He ushered her back into the root cellar, poking her between the shoulder blades with a gnarled finger to urge her forward.

The root cellar was long and narrow, and there was no light other than what came through the open door, so it seemed reasonable that perhaps she’d just overlooked the potatoes the first time, but surely they couldn’t be so very far from the entrance or the other vegetables?

Just as she was about to turn and say this to Chef Zorelio, a trap door opened and she found herself sliding down a metal chute into pitch blackness. She must have hit her head when she landed. When she awoke she was here, in this wretched tower that resembled the restaurant, yet was worlds away.

The circular room looked like the restaurant dining room, but here it was the kitchen. It was lined with windows that looked out over a vast valley full of trees and vegetation, with no signs of human life for as far as the eye could see. Not only that, but for as far as she could see through the brass telescope mounted on the windowsill as well.

Chef Zorelio was, in fact, not a chef at all. He was a breeder of Dragons in a world parallel to her’s. After a blight killed off the ubiquitous vine that was the dragons’ primary food source, he brought her here in the hope that with her knack for creating unique, flavorful vegetarian meals she could devise a recipe that would tempt them.

Zorelio was desperate, and desperate men were dangerous. He made it known in no uncertain terms that she would remain captive here until her task was complete, or else. Now the clock was ticking and she didn’t dare think about what would happen if she failed.

Dragons could only survive a week or so without eating. But so far nothing Gina concocted had appealed to the picky flying reptiles. Day after day she mixed, whipped, roasted and braised to no avail. Each new preparation was roundly rejected, leaving her more and more discouraged.

The sound of vast wings displacing massive amounts of air in the distance, like muffled thunder, caused Gina to look up from the pot she was stirring. On the horizon, she could just barely make out the shape of the dragon pack, coming closer by the minute.

Making haste, Gina poured the thistle stew into a pail and hauled it to the windows. She threw open the window pane before putting her eye to the telescope. There were three dragons today, two adults scaled in sleek orange, and a smaller one whose scales shimmered with the iridescent undertones of a juvenile.

Gina hefted the pail up onto the sill and stepped back as the dragons swooped in, their leathery wings stretched wide. The adults hovered just beyond the window, plumes of white smoke curling from their nostrils, while the baby dragon came to rest on the window ledge. Gina’s throat constricted; she could see the poor thing was weak from hunger.

The little dragon craned its long neck towards the food, head cocked with curiosity. “Come on, baby,” Gina coaxed. “Just take a bite. I promise you, it’s good.” As the dragon extended its long tongue, Gina hardly dared breathe. Both their lives depended on what happened next.

#flashfiction

#magicalrealism

Time Travel with Uncle Charlie

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The book was in a carton of other tattered old books that Ginger’s mother got at an estate sale for a quarter. The books were to be re-sold at the flea market, but her mother allowed her to pick one to keep. "Are you sure you don't want one of the nicer looking ones?" Her mother asked, watching her drag the book from under the others, digging for it as if she'd known it was there somehow.

"No, thank you. I like this one." Ginger held the book up to take a good look at it. At first glance it didn’t look like much. It was a thin volume bound in frayed brown fabric. The words “Uncle Charlie's Travels” were embossed across the front. She felt a little fizz of excitement, the way she always did when she got a new book.

Ginger took the book out to the front porch and curled up with it in her favorite spot, the porch swing. The July heat still simmered, but a cool breeze heralded the coming evening. The shrieks and squeals of the littler kids running through the sprinkler in the backyard punctuated the drone of a lawnmower down the block as Ginger settled in to read.

The book was written in a charming, old fashioned style. At first Ginger thought it was a storybook, as Uncle Charlie’s niece greeted him after his return from an international voyage. But as she turned the pages, she realized it was actually a text book that hid lessons about geography and culture in clever little stories of Uncle Charlie and his travels.

In the first story, the niece, Violet, serves her uncle a cup of coffee, leading him to tell her a story about how coffee beans were cultivated in far-off Colombia, weaving in facts about the country and its history.

The book was published in 1889, exactly one hundred years earlier, so the stories described a world that only faintly resembled Ginger’s own. 

Ginger felt the power of her imagination drawing her back in time. Just as she was about to lose herself in it, her father's voice broke through her reverie. "Ginger, dinner!" 

Ginger slid the book behind the bib of her overalls on her way to join the rest of the family at the picnic table in the back yard. The twins, Marilyn and Jonas, were still in their bathing suits, dripping water from the sprinkler over the table as they vied to be the first to reach the charred looking hotdogs their father had just taken off the grill. "Ew! Don't get water on me." Ginger leaned back, away from the twins. 

"You two behave, or no 'smores after dinner," their mother admonished. Properly motivated, the twins settled down and the family began to eat. 

"There were a couple of other things in that box, if you want them." Ginger's mother said, as she squeezed yellow mustard onto her hot dog. 

"Sure, I'll take them." Ginger quickly agreed. 

"Don't you even want to know what they are, first?" Her mother laughed, but Ginger shook her head emphatically. "I'll take them." She loved cool old stuff, and already knew she would like whatever it was. 

"It's just junk, mostly." Unlike Ginger, her mother didn't subscribe to nostalgia. If the items she picked up at garage and estate sales to re-sell didn't have monetary value, she wasn't interested. "I think there was an old tea cup, a tin whistle and some kind of a map. It's practically falling to pieces, I almost tossed it."

After dinner, while the twins were jostling to each be first to toast marshmallows over the cooling coals in the barbecue, Ginger helped her mother carry the extra paper plates and the condiments inside. Her reward was the extras from estate sale box, which her mother had left sitting on the kitchen table for her. 

Ginger sat down and slid the book out from its hiding spot. She set it down next to the tea cup, picked up the map and carefully unfolded it. It was a world map, but with countries she had never heard of, like Bulgaria and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. She smoothed it out over the table top, then picked up the whistle and looped the cord around her neck. The cool metal in her palm made her think of the child who may have once played with it, trying the patience of a long-ago parent.

Lastly, she picked up the tea cup. It was made of thin porcelain, with a delicate blue and white floral motif; it was a miracle it hadn't been broken. She imagined a woman in long Edwardian skirts sipping tea from it, possibly with the long-ago occupants of this very house.

Ginger re-opened the book and spun the whistle absently on its cord as she read. The yellow pool of light over the kitchen table and the peals of laughter out in the garden from one of the twins as a sparkler fizzled to life faded into the distance.

Ginger was far, far away, spinning through time, listening with Violet as Uncle Charlie recounted looking up in awe through the steel lattice of a brand-new Eiffel Tower at the 1889 Worlds Fair as dozens of hot air balloons lifted off into the Parisian sky. 

#FlashFiction

#MagicalRealism

#TimeTravel

Meet Me at the Carousel

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The town of Brantley Beach waited all year for the carnival to come to town. It was a highlight of summer for residents young and old alike. When the evenings began to be fragrant with roses, everyone knew the carnival would soon arrive.

There was something special about the brightly colored striped tents, topped with flags adorned with the carnival’s mascot, a luminous pale green Luna moth. The smell of popcorn and fried dough, and the sound of tinny music from the midway added a touch of magic to the air, officially ushering in the long, lazy days of summer.

When Elmira Beedle was a young girl, her favorite part of the carnival was riding the carousel. She loved the carved wooden animals, with their shiny bridles and polished wooden flanks. Her brothers preferred the games, knocking over milk bottles to win prizes, but for her it was all about the carousel.

As a young woman the carrousel remained special to her after she met her husband, Hank, when both were rushing to claim the same dappled gray steed. Their eyes met over the carved mane and it was love at first sight.

Each year Hank and Elmira took their small children to the carnival, reliving their childhood memories through the eyes of their little ones. And they never skipped a ride on the carousel, not even when those small children grew to be sulky teenagers who preferred the thrill rides.

Eventually Hank and Elmira shepherded their passel of grandchildren through the side shows, games and rides whenever the carnival came to town, indulgently shelling out money for endless lemonades, funnel cakes and cheap souvenirs. But they still always closed out the night with a ride on their favorite, the old carousel, even if they now rode on the brightly colored high-backed benches instead of clambering onto the wooden horses.

On one of their many rides together, Elmira confided in Hank how she always daydreamed about running away with the carnival when it left town. She assured him it wasn’t that she wanted to leave him or the children, but just think of all the places the carnival must go! How she longed to see them all. How much fun it must be to be part of that special carnival magic.

There was only one year that Elmira didn’t go to the carnival, couldn’t even stomach the thought. That year the scent of roses in the air drove her to her bed, where she stayed until the carnival left town. But the following year she let her daughter coax her into going, even if she couldn’t quite bear to ride her beloved carousel without Hank.

On a recent warm June evening, Elmira sat on her front porch in the gloaming, inhaling the perfume drifting from the rambler rose that grew along the neighbor’s fence. In her pocket was an envelope containing an anonymous note that had been left on her steps that morning. The envelope was striped like the carnival tents, and had been sealed with a stamp in the shape of a moth. Inside were instructions to follow the lanterns at dusk, and to tell no one.

Elmira patted the envelope in her pocket and smiled as a shiver of anticipation ran up her spine. Oh yes, there was most definitely magic in the air.

#Magicalrealism

#FlashFiction

#Carousel

#M

The Seafarer

 

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Roddy knew he wasn’t supposed to take the dinghy out without a grown up-- his father had told him so many times. But, his track record with following directions being what it was, it didn’t take him long to give in to temptation.

At first, rowing the dinghy around the cove was just as much fun as he’d expected. The sun was warm on his back and the salty sea air was invigorating. The water was a beguiling blue-gray, and the spray kicked up by the oars was refreshing on his face.

Roddy rowed, moving steadily towards the small island just past the edge of the cove. He’d seen it from the back seat of the car the day they arrived, and had known immediately that he wanted to explore it.

As islands went it wasn’t particularly large, but large enough to have a small stand of trees looming over a narrow strip of sandy beach. Roddy envisioned himself grilling hot dogs on a fire he made himself, then napping under the trees before rowing back across the cove, ultimately getting back to the bungalow before his parents returned from the farmers market in Orleans.

That was the vision--but in actual fact he’d forgotten to bring the hot dogs and it had taken him longer than expected to get the hang of moving the dinghy in anything but a wobbly circle. But at least he would get to say he'd explored a deserted island, and that was still something.

Roddy paused his rowing to look around and take stock of his progress. The sun was high overhead now, and the dock he’d started from at the end of the garden looked tiny in the distance. When he looked in the other direction, however, the island didn’t seem much closer.

Roddy frowned, perturbed. His shoulders were starting to ache in a less than pleasant manner and the warm sun that had felt so good on his back earlier was starting to burn his neck.

His enthusiasm dulled, Roddy resumed rowing. He gritted his teeth and put his best effort in for what felt like an hour, but turned out to only be fifteen minutes when he checked his father's heavy watch, which he'd borrowed for the occasion as it had a compass in it. To his horror, the island now appeared further away than ever. He tilted his wrist left and right, trying to read the compass, but the needle on the little dial just swiveled around meaninglessly. 

One thing, however, was clear. Somehow, in that last frenzy of rowing, he’d gotten himself turned around and was going in the exact opposite direction. This was a problem because now he was a good ways out from the mouth of the cove. The current out here was much stronger, and in fact was pulling the dinghy out into deeper waters.

Roddy hated to admit defeat, but his island dreams were rapidly slipping away. He knew he needed to figure out how to get the dinghy turned around and headed back to the dock. He dipped the oars back into the water and got to work trying to spin the dinghy around. Despite a lot of thrashing and heaving--and a little bit of cursing--the dinghy was still drifting in the wrong direction. 

Realizing he would probably die, and his parents would never know what became of him, Roddy flopped down in the bottom of the little boat and threw an arm over his face. He wasn't one for crying, much, but tears were leaking from the corners of his eyes and dripping uncomfortably into his ears. He supposed dying would be horribly painful, and a shudder went through him at the thought. 

Abruptly, he sat up, having remembered there was a life vest under the seat. He dragged it out and shrugged into it awkwardly. It was a size or so too large for him, but wearing it made him feel safer. Guiltily, he realized he should have put it on before he even left the dock. But if he did die, at least now they would find him wearing the life jacket and his mother would not be able to say she told him so. 

At some point, the sunlight on the water and the rocking of the dinghy must have lulled him into a doze, because the next thing Roddy knew someone was yelling to him from across the water. He startled awake, surprised to see a large lighthouse looming over him and what appeared to be the Lighthouse Keeper waving at him from the jetty. 

Roddy grabbed for the oars and started rowing frantically. Luckily, this time he was able to move the dinghy in the direction he wanted to go--away from the rocks, toward the little stripe of beach at the base of the jetty. 

"Ahoy there, young man!" The Lighthouse Keeper waded into the water to grab the rope trailing from the front of the dinghy, then started trudging back toward the sand, towing the little craft behind him. "You ought not to have gone out on your own, I'm sure you know that. You're lucky the tide was turning, else you'd have been out to sea." 

The man helped a very sore and sunburned Roddy out of the dinghy, then escorted him up the beach to the base of the lighthouse, where he sat him on a bench in the shade and brought him a bottle of water. "I'll need to call your folks so they can come get you." The Lighthouse Keeper said, not unkindly. 

Roddy had hoped they could keep this whole incident between themselves, but as he had no idea where he was or how to get home, there was nothing for it but to give the man his father's mobile phone number. 

He had survived being lost at sea only to now be killed, or at least permanently grounded, by his very own parents. "I'm going to be in so much trouble." He whispered to himself, as the phone began to ring. 

#Flashfiction

#Coming of Age

#Kids

#Lighthouse

#boats

The Inheritance

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It was only crickets in the room after the lawyer read the will. We all blinked at one another, too stunned to speak at first. I could feel beads of sweat forming on my temple in the stuffy conference room. 

After the initial shock, everyone swiveled around in their seats to look at me, as if I might have known this was coming. "Hey! I don't know anymore than the rest of you all!" I threw my hands up and shook my head emphatically. I was just as surprised as everyone else that I was the sole beneficiary of my Uncle Leo's estate. 

My cousin Allegra just rolled her eyes in disgust and started typing into her phone with a scowl - searching up "how to contest a will," no doubt. My other cousin, Wilhelm, kicked me hard under the table while giving me a very meaningful look. Just to make sure I got the point, he rolled his meaty shoulders under his too-small jacket, and flexed his arms as best he could in his too-tight sleeves. 

Aunt Eloise wasn't looking at me at all now.  She had turned away and was quietly contemplating a bad painting of some fruit behind the lawyer's head as if none of this was happening. Typical Aunt Eloise behavior, in other words. 

As for me, I was just beginning to feel the slightest flicker of excitement. 

After my parents disappeared on a weekend hike in the wilderness, my uncle and aunt had raised me. But I never fit in with their family and my cousins always resented me. I wasn't exactly a well-behaved model student during my teen years, either, leaving my relationship with my aunt and uncle strained to say the least. Was I finally about to have the means to start over in life? To figure out who I might have been if my parents were still here?

But the lawyer had one more bomb to drop. "There is one other critical detail I need to mention," he intoned, without looking up from the papers he was shuffling in front of him. Uh-oh. Why did his lack of eye-contact make my stomach flip flop?

"The property is located in a remote area, in the wilderness really. There is a small cabin there, so you'll have shelter. But under the terms of your uncle's will, you'll need to stay there until you "find the hidden thimble," or you'll forfeit the inheritance to your cousins. 

"What was that?" Aunt Eloise snapped her head around to look at the lawyer, her usually vague expression overwritten with alarm. "Allegra, Wilhelm, you are not to get involved with this, do you hear me?" My cousins looked at one another, equally shocked at their mother's reaction. 

I looked back and forth between my aunt and the lawyer, nonplussed. "What was that about a thimble?" I asked. The lawyer just shook his head. "Unfortunately, I don't know. Your uncle didn't provide any more detail I'm afraid."

"It's a silver thimble, it isn't valuable." Aunt Eloise cut the lawyer off. "It's hidden somewhere on the 1,000 acres. Your uncle didn't hide it there, his great grandfather did. Your parents couldn't find it either, presumably. We never heard from them again after the property was left to them when your grandfather died." 

My parents were looking for the thimble when they died? My stomach lurched. Aunt Eloise continued, "The finder is supposed to inherit not only the property, but great power. What kind of power, I don't know as Leo would never discuss it. What I do know is I want no part of it now that he's gone."

Aunt Eloise abruptly stood up. "Come, children." She beckoned to my cousins. "There's nothing for us here." As Allegra and Wilhelm filed out of the room, looking confused, Aunt Eloise stepped over to me and looked me straight in the eyes. "Marcos, I know we were never close, but listen to me this one time." Her bottom lip trembled as she paused to take a deep breath before continuing. "Don't claim your inheritance, it isn't worth it. There's so much you don't know." And with that, she too left the room, leaving me and the lawyer to stare at one another across the table. 

My head was spinning and I could taste bile in the back of my throat. I had so many unanswered questions, but there was only one way to handle this. I fished a quarter out of my pocket. "Heads, I claim the inheritance. Tails, I'm out of here and this whole thing ends with me." The lawyer shrugged one shoulder; he'd seen it all now. With a flick of my wrist I set the coin spinning on the table in front of me. My life was, once again, in the hands of fate and somehow, I suspected it already knew what it planned to do with me.

#Inheritance

#Magical Realism

#Flash Fiction

The Librarian

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As a child Karina and her siblings attended the summer program at the local library. Her brother, Tate, always grumbled about having to go, but Karina loved it. 

Three days a week they would sit around the conference table in the community room and do crafts or play games. After they ate their packed lunches, they were free to read books and soak up the air conditioning in the children's section, which was Karina's favorite part. Ensconced in her favorite bean bag chair near the hamster cage, Karina lost herself in the magical world of Crestomaci, the dapper wizard in the works of her favorite author, Diana Wynne Jones.

In high school Karina's first job was at that same library, shelving books after school. Her friends didn't get it, they thought tiptoeing around, silently shelving books sounded boring. But to Karina the peace and quiet of it was what she loved best about her job. Home was always too loud, with Tate and his friends yelling or slamming doors or wrestling, and the TV was always blasting. At work, she could think deep thoughts or let her imagination wander to the alternate magical universes of her favorite childhood stories. If she could have lived at the library, she would have. 

It made perfect sense, therefore, that Karina chose to study library science in college. Her dream after college was to work at the library in her home town where she had so many happy memories, bringing the whole thing full circle. But alas, it was not to be. While she was away at school the library lost its funding, and the building was put up for sale. Karina was heartbroken. That library had been a part of her, and losing it felt like losing a limb.

A few weeks after Karina acquired her newly minted diploma, she received a letter from an organization called The Grimoireum Arcanum, with a very familiar return address on the envelope. The letter, typed on expensive thick linen paper, explained that the private collection had moved into the former public library building and was in need of an Assistant Archivist. If interested, she was directed to present herself at ten minutes to midnight at the waxing crescent moon for an interview.

Karina read the letter through twice, before the signature caught her eye. The letter was signed “C. Chant, Director.” Karina stared at the elegant script as an image of a tall, dapper wizard in a velvet smoking jacket rose unbidden from her memories of those long-ago summers at the library.

“Cresto—” She bit back the name before it fully escaped her lips.

No, there was no point in summoning him. After all, she’d be seeing him soon enough.

#MagicalRealism

#FlashFiction

#Library

#DianaWynneJones

#Crestomanci

A Sweet Obsession

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When David was a little boy, he loved ice cream so much that his parents joked he would someday grow up to own a Diary Queen. In actual fact, he grew up to be a chemist, but he never lost his obsession with ice cream.

David's colleagues in the lab at Ever Bloom Seeds were well aware of his ice cream fixation, but they didn't find it nearly as charming as his parents had. No, in fact they found it rather annoying. The too-small freezer in the staff lounge was so stuffed full of chocolate mint chip and toffee crunch ice cream sandwiches they couldn't fit their frozen microwave lunches in it. Even the cupboards were full of what David referred to as "Emergency Rations," stacks of silver pouches of freeze-dried ice cream that left little room for other staff members to store their coffee mugs or their tea bags.

In the evenings when the rest of the chemists and lab assistants clocked out at 5:00 pm, David could often still be found tinkering at his station. His boss teased him on his way out, "What do you do here after hours? Make ice cream?," but let him stay and work on his side project because David was a good chemist. Not to mention, paying him in ice cream saved the company tons of money.

Although David chuckled at the jokes about him staying late to develop new flavors of ice cream, in actual fact his extra curricular project was ice cream-related, but he kept the details to himself. He knew what he was working on would be revolutionary, something the world hadn't seen before. 

When ice cream cones began sprouting in people's flower beds and window boxes along with their nasturtiums and begonias, David worried that maybe he'd taken his ice cream dreams a tad too far. Luckily, the leadership at Ever Bloom recognized genius when they saw it. To this day, David is still happily tinkering away in his lab, coming up with new new seed/ice cream combos to add to what is now known as the Ever Bloom Magic Ice Cream Bean line. And, he still takes his pay in ice cream, except now he gets a double dip.

#FlashFiction

#MagicalRealism

#IceCream

A Cup Full of Magic

Miss Tilly found the teacups shoved in a cardboard box on the back of a shelf at the thrift store. They weren't even on the right shelf; instead of being with the other dishes, the box of tea cups was shoved behind a clunky chrome waffle maker, almost hidden from view. It was pure chance that she even spotted it, when she bent down tie the laces on her sneaker that had come undone. She hadn't come into the thrift shop looking for dishes, much less a set of three odd teacups that didn't even match, but for some reason the pretty floral designs caught her imagination and despite her better judgement she left with them (and without the electric skillet she had gone into the shop looking for in the first place).

Miss Tilly huffed and puffed up the steps to her apartment, barely keeping hold of the squashy cardboard box of teacups with one arm while she clung to the railing with the other. These stairs were getting harder and harder to climb, the older she got. At 85 she did her best to stay fit. She got her daily walks in and tried to remember to eat enough vegetables, but time marched on regardless. What she really needed was a residence with no stairs, but on her tiny teachers pension the second floor was the best she could do. Her friend Elmira from next door was in a similar situation, and Adelle on three had it even worse with two sets of stairs to navigate, and her with her arthritic knees no less!  

After a brief rest in her favorite chair and a tall glass of iced tea, Miss Tilly unpacked the tea cups and carefully washed and dried them in her little kitchenette. As she did so she mulled over what to do with them. The three cabinets over her stove didn't hold much and were already packed full, so she couldn't put them there. The bookshelf was jammed with nearly seventy years worth of books, so they couldn't go there, either. As she hung the dish towel on the oven handle to dry an idea came to her. 

Later that evening she put the three teacups out on her tiny balcony, now filled with potting soil and the seeds a friend from church gave her from her garden last fall. She'd been very insistent that Miss Tilly plant the seeds in the Spring, but she'd put the envelope in the back of the kitchen drawer and forgotten all about it till now. Before she went indoors to get ready for bed, she watered the seeds and admired how pretty the three unique teacups already looked lined up along the balcony railing. Once the flowers bloomed, they would be even prettier. Just as she put the watering can down a ladybug flew down and alighted on the delicate porcelain handle of one of the tea cups. Miss Tilly felt a little flutter of satisfaction at the sight of the polka dotted beetle. Lady bugs weren't just pretty, they were harbingers of good luck, and Lord knew she could certainly use some of that!

That night, Miss Tilly had the most beguiling dream. In it, a ladybug in a top hat flew in through her bedroom window. Miss Tilly got up and followed it out of the bedroom and through the dark apartment to the sliding door onto the balcony. She pushed aside the drapes, and saw the most marvelous thing. Just before she woke up, the lady bug pushed something hard and cold into her hand, before taking a bow with a sweep of it's silk top hat for dramatic effect. As she awoke with a start, she realized she was still holding whatever it was. She turned on the bedside lamp and sat up to peer at the thing in her hand: A tiny key ring with three itsy-bitsy metal keys on it. Each key had a letter engraved on it. One had an "A", another an "E" and the final one was engraved with a "T," all in the most marvelously old-fashioned looping script.

Quickly, Miss Tilly shoved aside the bed clothes and rushed out of the bedroom without bothering to pull on her dressing gown or slippers. She hurried to the balcony door and pushed aside the drapes. The seeds she'd planted in the teacups had begun to sprout overnight, but instead of tender green shoots pushing up through the rich black soil, instead Miss Tilly saw the emerging ridges of three tiny roofs. 

Over the next week, Miss Tilly had four more nocturnal visits from the Ladybug in the top hat. Each time, the Ladybug left her with a small gift and another clue. A tiny map, three miniature bottles of what looked like lemonade, three little suitcases full of tiny clothes, and three itsy-bitsy change purses filled to bursting with impossibly small coins. At dawn on the final day, Miss Tilly woke up knowing what she needed to do. She went directly to the phone, despite the early hour, and began dialing. "Elmira? It's Tilly. I know it's early, but I need you to come down. No, everything's fine...or it's about to be. Just come! I'll explain when you get here. I've got to go, I have to phone Adelle next."

The newspapers barely made any mention of the disappearance of three little old ladies from the same apartment house and the landlord wasted no time in getting a dumpster in to clean out the three now-vacant units. Only the cleaner noticed the fancy tea cups left forgotten on the balcony. Two had been broken, but one still had a tiny fairy house embedded in what looked like potting mix, along side three small rectangular indents where it looked like other houses had once been. She looked over her shoulder, guiltily, even though she was alone in the apartment. She wasn't supposed to keep anything left behind when she cleaned the vacant units, but for some reason the pretty floral design caught her imagination. Despite her better judgement, she picked up the cup, disturbing a little lady bug that was perched on the roof of the tiny house. She couldn't help but smile as it fluttered back down to sit on the handle of the cup. Lady bugs were good luck, and Lord only knew, she could use some of that. 

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#FlashFiction

#MagicalRealism

#ThriftShops

Power to the People

Mrs. Jacobs settled into the front row of folding chairs in the all-purpose room in the Community Center that hosted the monthly meetings of the Town Council. The rickety metal chair groaned under her weight as she settled into it. 

The all-purpose room was painted an out-of-date mint green and the brown and gray checkerboard linoleum floor had clearly seen better days. Mrs. Jacobs wasn't sure if she should be appalled by the state of the place, or pleased that the Council had saved so much money by apparently having not updated anything since at least the nineteen sixties.

At the front of the room an aide was setting up the folding table and microphone where the Council members would sit. To Mrs. Jacob's right was a woman in an electric wheelchair, wedged into a spot where two of the metal chairs had been removed to make room. 

"Hello," Mrs. Jacobs nodded a greeting to the occupant of the wheelchair. The woman, also middle aged, smiled and said hello in return. "I'm here to let the Council know that I still haven't gotten satisfaction from my landlord." She announced, as if Mrs. Jacobs should already know the backstory. "Oh?" Mrs. Jacobs said, not knowing how else to respond. 

"Curb cuts." The woman nodded. "They're supposed to add a curb cut by my handicapped parking space so I can get to my apartment, but they still haven't done it." Her tone implied this was ongoing ordeal.

"Well, that's just awful." Mrs. Jacob's commiserated warmly. "My late husband, Joseph, used a wheelchair at the end. We had to have a ramp built. I can't even imagine trying to get him over the curb when he was in his chair.

The woman in the wheelchair introduced herself as Laura, and asked "What are you here for?"

"Oh, I came tonight to speak about the proposed group home being planned on Elm Street."

Laura's eyebrows lowered. "Are you here to complain about it? I certainly hope not because everyone needs somewhere to live, you know. Even the handicapped."

"Quite the contrary," Mrs. Jacobs replied. "I'm in full favor of it, which is what I came to say. Some of my neighbors have been very uncharitable, indeed, concerning the proposal. I live on Sycamore; it crosses over Elm."

Laura's scowl retreated. "I'm so glad to hear you support the plan. It's deplorable the way able bodied people judge those of us who require some sort of accommodation to participate in society on an equal footing."

"My husband worked his whole career in the trades. Through the local he got involved with "Lift for a Vet," have you heard of it? No? It's a program where volunteers install stair lifts in the homes of veterans." Mrs. Jacobs fished a roll of mints out of her purse and unwrapped one and popped it into her mouth before offering one to Laura. "Joseph was very moved by the plights of the veterans he got to meet. It opened his eyes to how un-accessible so much of our society is to the differently abled." She put the roll of mints back into her purse. "He passed away last winter, so I'm here today on his behalf. I know if were alive, he would have wanted to speak up."

Laura reached over and patted Mrs. Jacob's hand. "Your Joseph sounds like a real gem. My ex, Louis, on the other hand, what a jerk!"

"Your chair is quite something. Is it electric? The one we had for Joseph was manual. Yours looks much more advanced."

"It is, yes. I just got it not that long ago, actually. It has some great features." Laura flipped a switch, turning on a set of headlamps Mrs. Jacobs hadn't noticed. "It's got both high beams and low beams," Laura demonstrated, flipping the high beams off and on while Mrs. Jacob's watched in admiration. 

"Ahem!" Someone coughed loudly from the front of the room. "Do you mind?" 

Laura and Mrs. Jacobs looked up simultaneously to see the row of now-seated Council members using their hands or the printout of the meeting agenda to shield their eyes from Laura's very-bright high beams. 

"Oh! So sorry!" Laura apologized, suppressing a grin as she flipped the lights off again. She leaned towards Mrs. Jacobs and whispered loudly "I'm not that sorry. This is my third time coming here to get the run around while nothing gets done."

Mrs. Jacobs clapped a hand over her mouth to keep from giggling out loud as the dazed Council members rubbed their eyes and blinked. 

"Will you have time to grab a coffee after the meeting?" Laura asked as the council meeting was called to order. 

Mrs. Jacobs smiled at her new friend and sat up straighter in her creaky seat. "Coffee sounds great. We can toast to the new group home." 

Image credit: https://www.foldandgowheelchairs.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/FNG_Headlight4-456x624.jpg

#FlashFiction

#DisabilityRights

#SocialJustice

#DifferentlyAbled

A Watery Surprise

Bryan hadn't wanted to move. He'd liked living on the family farm in Delaware, where he'd spent so much time roaming the fields or skipping stones in the pond. He'd liked the creaky old farmhouse, and always having his cousins there to play with him and his twin brother, Ike. But his dad had been accepted to do his Masters at Texas A&M, so they'd had to move here while he did his degree. 

"It's only temporary," his mother reminded him when he sulked, "We'll be going back to Delaware in a year or two. And we can visit at the holidays." But none of that helped him feel better. The holidays were forever away, and two years seemed like an eternity to be stuck in this cookie-cutter development of identical houses in hot-as-blazes Texas. The only thing Bryan liked about the new house was it had a pool, something they hadn't had back home. 

Mom wanted him and Ike to take swim lessons before she would let them use the pool, which wouldn't start until next month. But Bryan just couldn't stay away from the pool. Although he kept his promise to stay out of the water, he spent lots of time lying on the concrete apron next to it, one hand or a leg dangling into the water as he watched a show on his iPad. 

He was out there one afternoon, just sitting on the edge with his feet in the water, daydreaming, when something grabbed his ankle and pulled, hard. Before he could even scream, he was dragged into the pool with a loud splash, where the water quickly closed over his head. 

Much to Bryan's surprise, the next thing he knew he was staggering to his feet in the family pond back home, coughing and spluttering. He wiped water out of his eyes and looked around in disbelief. There was the old red barn with the peeling paint, there was the farmhouse beyond it, and the big tree where his cousins built their tree house. He was really here, he was home!

As he waded through the slippery mud on the bottom of the pond intending to climb out on the grassy bank, he lost his footing and fell backwards. He held his breath and threw out an arm to brace himself, expecting to feel his fingers sink into the soft mud only to find himself breaching the surface of the water in their pool back in Texas instead. 

The screen door to the deck slid open. "Bryan! I told you, no going in the pool until you learn how to swim properly. It isn't safe!" His mother yelled, a note of panic in her voice. 

"Mom! Mom, come here! You won't believe it!" Bryan spluttered, as he scrambled out of the pool. He ran up the steps to the deck, his clothes dripping, grabbed his mother's hand and towed her towards the pool. "Hold your breath," he yelled just before he jumped. 

Image credit: https://www.nyip.edu/images/cms/photo-articles/tell_story_pool_jumping.jpg

#FlashFiction

#MagicalRealism

#Pool

Bye-Bye-Birdie

"Bosley! Get out of there!" Bosley flinched as the lid of the trash can slammed down just inches from his snout, blocking the lovely wafting smells of last night's leftovers. "Bad dog! No garbage for you."

Bosley dropped from his hind legs down to all fours and chuffed his disgust at this turn of events. He cast his baleful droopy-eyed gaze upwards at the tall human who had thwarted his plans. The human, whose name was Neil, glared back down at him, hands on his hips and a frown on his hairless face. "Go lie down." He pointed a long finger towards the laundry room, where Bosley's so-called dog bed resided. Grumbling to himself, Bosley waddled in the opposite direction towards the living room. He plopped down onto the braided rug under the coffee table and sighed heavily. 

"I swear, that dog's always into something." Neil grumbled to the other human, the one with the fur on his chin named Fred.

Bosley had come to them as an inheritance, of sorts, when Fred's grandmother passed away and none of the other family members wanted to take him. Neil wanted to drop the old Basset Hound off at the pound, but the more soft-hearted Fred hadn't let him do it. His grandmother loved that dog, though only she knew why. Bosley was generally known throughout the family to be bad tempered and gassy, neither of which did much to endear him to anyone other than Fred's grandmother, Francine. 

Bosley knew none of this. All he knew was that one day his beloved human best friend, with droopy eyes not unlike his own, hadn't woken up to take him out for his morning potty like usual. He'd then found himself bundled off to live in this tiny city apartment with only a potty pad to do his business on, no back yard with grass and interesting things to sniff. 

"I think he's bored." Fred stated. "But I don't know what to do about it. He doesn't seem to like toys, and last time I tried to walk him he lay down on the sidewalk and refused to go anywhere." Fred leaned down to look at Bosley under the coffee table. "Maybe he's grieving for my gran?"

“Maybe?” Neil's head appeared next to Fred's. "Or maybe he's just an asshole. Wait, is it just me, or have his ears gotten longer?"

Fred gave Neil a sideways look and laughed. "Of course not." Then he looked at Bosley again and a small frown line appeared between his eyes. "But I see what you mean, they do look extra-long at this angle, don't they?" Bosley stared back at them, then blasted out a fart, causing both heads to abruptly disappear from view.

Later Neil discovered a turd centered on the welcome mat by the front door. Ears dragging, Bosley lumbered from the hallway into the kitchen to examine his (unsatisfyingly empty) food bowl and left the humans to bicker amongst themselves about whether the rug would have to be thrown out or not.

Francine hadn't bickered, not that there'd been any other human in the house for her to argue with. She also hadn't gotten bent out of shape if a poop appeared where poop didn't belong on occasion. She was old, too, she understood that sometimes these things happen.

That night Bosley managed to wrangle a pork chop bone out of the trash without either human noticing, which he ate with relish while the rest of the household was sleeping. In the morning, Neil found Bosley had vomited most of it back up on his shoes. 

Bosley tuned out Neil’s squawking and plopped down where he was with a burp. He still hadn't had his breakfast, but all the humans cared about were Neil’s shoes. No one seemed to have noticed he was practically wasting away from hunger. "Woof." Bosley let out a pitiful little bark to remind the humans how hungry he was. Only Ted seemed to get the message; Neil was still frantically dabbing at his Nikes with a damp paper towel.

"Come on Boz, let's get you some dog food."

Bosley followed Ted into the kitchen, his ears now dragging behind him, and watched sadly as kibbles rattled into his bowl from the big bag in the pantry. The little nuggets felt wrong on his tongue and were hard on his teeth, but he ate them anyway knowing that was all he would be offered. He sorely missed the cans of soft, deliciously smelly wet food that Francine fed him twice a day. 

By Saturday Bosley's ears were long enough that he could wrap them right around himself, something which he found quite useful when napping. There was no longer any doubt on the part of the humans, either, that something odd was happening.

"Hey guys, check this out. I had to jump on a live to see if anybody's seen anything like this before." Neil thrust his phone into Bosley's face while he narrated to the empty air. Bosley glared at the phone and the tiny lines of text and emoji's that scrolled across it. Bosley didn’t like phones. Both Ted and Neil were rarely ever without theirs, but Francine hadn't owned one, a fact Bosley had heard her proudly proclaim on more than one occasion. 

Later that same day, Neil and his phone were back again. Neil propped himself up awkwardly on one elbow next to Bosley, who was lying in a patch of sun by the window. Smiling widely as if he and Bosley were best buddies, Neil held the phone out at arm's length and started talking in a high, artificially cheerful voice. "I didn't expect that earlier video to blow up like that, wow, but I'm happy to answer all your questions with my guy Bosley here."

Bosley snorted and flopped over on his side, his back to Neil and his device. He pretended to be asleep in the hopes his tormentor would get the hint and go away. He eventually dozed off for real against a backdrop of Neil and Ted excitedly chattering about how Bosley and his ears had "gone viral," whatever that was.

That night, ears wrapped around him like a cocoon, Bosley dreamt that a younger, spryer version of Francine woke him, a finger to her lips to let him know not to bark. She fed him his favorite treats, then led him to the living room window and opened it before helping Bosley scramble up onto the sill. 

"Are you ready, Bosley? Shall we fly?" Bosley licked her face as Francine slung her arms around his neck. Then he leapt, carrying them both out into the night sky, his ears flapping like giant wings. Together, they flew higher and higher as he did zoomies across the Mily Way.

The next morning Ted found Bosley curled peacefully on the sofa, where he wasn't supposed to sleep. His ears were back to normal size, and his droopy eyes were open but unseeing. Ted sighed and stroked Bosley's snout softly before whispering. "I'll miss you, Boz. Run free."

Image credit: https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/z/funny-beagle-dog-flying-air-flapping-ears-dog-fly-sky-132987545.jpg

#MagicalRealism

#FlashFiction

#MagicalRealism

#BassetHound

#Grief

A Day at the Chicken Races

No one knew why the chicken races had started, only that they'd been a staple of the Moshkovinia harvest festival for as long as anyone could remember. Unlike geese, or even swans, chickens made terrible steeds. They were excitable and easily distracted, making them hard to control, but that was what made the races so much fun for spectators to watch. 

The event had been River's favorite since he was a small boy. Each year he had begged his father to let him enter with one of their flock, but his father never allowed it. "Those hens would eat you right up, if you fell off," he'd say with a chuckle. "You'll have to wait till you're bigger."

Now, at 16, and thanks to a growth spurt since his last birthday, River towered six inches over his father. "I reckon this is your year," his father said when River once again announced his desire to enter the race. "You might as well ride Gemima, she's the smartest hen in the flock."

The day of the festival River loaded Gemima and all her tack into the wagon they usually used to bring produce to the weekly market and made his way into town. Strings of solar lights had been hung from the massive tree trunks that towered over the fairgrounds, while thick ropes of hefty flowers braided together festooned the various booths. Inside the tents were colorful displays of quilts, canned goods, pies and miniature fruits and vegetables galore. 

"River! Hey, are you finally racing this year?" A girl with long, dark coils of hair spilling down her back emerged from one of the animal tents, a miniature rooster tucked under her arm.

"Hi, Aikila. Who's that you have there?" River asked. 

"This is Max, I'm showing him today in the miniature fowl competition." The randy little bird puffed up at the sight of Gemima, a glint in his eye. "She's too much woman for you, silly." Akila laughed at the Rooster. 

"Gemima and I are heading over to the paddock now. We're in the second race." River met Akila's eyes with a smile, the sparkle in his eye not dissimilar to that of the little rooster. "Are you going to come watch us win?"

Akila pursed her lips and arched a dark eyebrow. "I just might. But who says you're going to win? It's your first time competing. Don't you think that's a bit...cocky?" She grinned at her own pun.

With a squawk, the little rooster broke free from Aikla's grasp and fluttered to the ground, where it made a beeline for Gemima's trailer. "Hey! Come back here, you!"

Akila and River both lunged for the rooster, bobbing and weaving after him as he fluttered just out of their grasp again and again. Gemima clucked anxiously, seemingly unaware that she was large enough to flatten the aggressive smaller bird with one good stomp. 

By the time Max had been captured and safely contained in his cage, both Akila and River were weak with laughter. 

"It's hard to believe they all used to be his size." River marveled, watching the irate little rooster puffing up his chest with indignation at his romantic overtures being thwarted. 

"Yea, so weird." Akila agreed. "I've heard people used to feed wild birds, even." She shuddered involuntarily. "Can you imagine?" She and River exchanged a somber look, both recalling the gym teacher whose class witnessed a hawk plucking him off the playing field only a few months back. Although many, many generations in the past, nuclear war had wrought irreversible changes to the natural environment. Birds, trees, and other species had evolved over time to gargantuan proportions, helped along by the increased radiation in the atmosphere. Although most public areas like the fairgrounds sported netting to protect against bird attacks, the random incident did still occur. 

A burst of static rent the air, followed by a crackly announcement calling all chicken racers to prepare their steeds and bring them to the paddock in the next ten minutes. 

"That's me, then. Will I see you over there?" River asked. 

"Sure, I'll be there." Akila blushed, despite herself. 

River suppressed a grin as he picked up the handle of the wagon and resumed his trek with Gemima towards the barn where racers and their steeds were already gathering. Regardless of how the race turned out, he was already feeling like a winner.

Image credit to: https://i.ytimg.com/vi/qMAUDXkE7ZM/hqdefault.jpg

#FlashFiction

#MagicalRealism

#GiantChicken

#Dystopia

#Post-Apocalypse

Flaming Fast Feet

Something about the used pair of Chucks in the thrift store window caught Audra’s eye, stopping her in her tracks. They were scuffed and worn, but the red and yellow flame pattern was still bright.

As she gazed at the shoes, Audra let the heavy backpack full if laundry slide to the sidewalk beside her and rolled her sore shoulders. The laundromat was a two mile hike from her apartment on the other side of town, just far enough away to be too far to comfortably lug a heavy load. But without a car, lug she must.

Money was tight, she knew she really shouldn’t, but Audra reached into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out the roll of quarters she’d brought for the laundry. She peeled back the paper and dug out fifty cents, the exact price of the flame covered Converse, then pushed open the shop door and stepped inside.

Moments later Audra emerged, the flame covered sneakers in hand. She plopped down on the shop steps and kicked off her crocks. The sneakers fit her feet perfectly, as if molded to her exact footprint.

A grin spreading across her face, Audra stood up and bounced from foot to foot. She had the sudden urge to take off running to see if her new kicks would make her run faster, like she had done as a kid. She remembered her younger self, flying down the sidewalk after leaving the shoe store with her mother, yelling “Look how much faster I can go!”

She imagined the flames on her new shoes blasting her forward, like a pair of rockets at her heels. "Look, Ma! I'm flying!" She said to herself, then laughed out loud. As she hefted the backpack crammed with laundry and continued on her way, her step was just a little bit lighter.