Sunday, October 17, 2010

FLASH FICTION


You can really learn a lot from the Internet. It was a lot simpler than I anticipated – the skin, making the face expressive, was the hardest part. I couldn’t resist adding half a cup size, although I did precisely recreate my crooked ear. After a week of tests I was satisfied the thing would run smoothly. Would handle the customer service calls according to protocol. Would never misfile records on purpose. Would handle loans with equanimity and speed, reducing human stories to series of numbers contained within beige folders, filed with a thousand folders just the same. I was sure it would notice the oppressive wall of grey and white winter unaffected. Would cook supper, eat one full helping of my husband’s favourite dishes, never obsess over getting fat. Already, I noticed, the thing always remembered to shower, trim its nails, apply antibiotic to minor wounds. It didn’t seem lonely; it never cried. It did the laundry as soon as the hamper filled.  The thing was perfect. I put on my oldest black tshirt and my heaviest shoes. I cut off my long hair and hid it at the bottom of the trashcan. I took six boxes of books and two notebooks and all the pens I could find. I took my keys off the hook while he was at school. I’m driving south now. Even though it’s March and freezing I have the windows down, wondering if I miss the feeling of my long hair blowing across my face. I’m probing at the edges of the strange feeling in my chest, worrying it like a new filling. I’m driving lightweight, not sure if I feel free or empty, waiting. I want another hole in my ear. I wonder if he minds that I’m gone. I eat too little, drink gallons of black coffee and diet soda. I’ve never been west, never seen the desert. I wonder if it’s happy. I’ve never seen the west coast. 

327 words

1 comment:

  1. I am copying the content of this comment from a facebook message from my brother:

    Reuben Kendall October 18 at 4:37pm Report
    I tried to comment on your blog for an hour last night but it failed 8(, However, I am very happy to have remembered what I wanted to say:

    Flash Fiction ii... (long exposure flash)

    It was not quite a sound - it was more like having heard a sound for so long that she could only hear everything else. It was also distracting. She turned off the radio and rolled down all the windows in the car. One of the notebooks on the seat beside her panicked at the highway wind's rough roar, throwing its pages over and over and over; twitched its spiral spine in futile window-bound hops. She rolled the windows back up.

    A tall man was sitting behind her in the car. She had not meant to let him in when she rolled down the windows. He seemed to have his hands around her liver, but she could not be sure because it was difficult to see into the back seat. She ignored the pain and pushed the accelerator down to the floor.

    Meanwhile, he managed to take her kidneys, pancreas, left lung, heart, thyroid, (the thyroid took a full half hour to claim,) and left clavicle as well. Ignoring him did not alter the fact that wearing someone else's clavicle was an interesting experience. It seemed to have a positive effect on her hearing. He leaned forward, his lips in her short hair, and whispered a question to the back of her neck. It did not seem to know the answer.

    It did not seem to know the answer.

    Shit -

    She hit the brakes, hard, only in time to keep from punching the car through the back of their garage. Her face bounced off of the airbag, off the headrest, off the airbag; the airbag, sighing, sagged. She sagged, sighed.

    He unbuckled her very gently and carried her inside, her heart beating erratically under his breastbone. Her liver was throbbing, her kidneys pumping solid-state adrenaline straight up his spinal column into his brain. It was an interesting experience.

    **********

    3 words: AI LUV YOO. 8[P

    by RK

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