Not quite #fridayflash fiction: Flower

Holding onto the flower seemed to be the most illogical thing in the world - both practically and emotionally. Marianne had carried it with her every day of her life. The petals were white, parchment dry and brittle. It was not a particularly beautiful specimen. It came from her marriage bouquet.

According to Marianne, it lost its color on the day Frank first raised his hand to her. She would not tell him what it was originally.

Now, his ass stiff from too many hours on the hard edge of the sidewalk, damaging the flower was the least and most immediate of his worries.

The whitewashed walls of the house across the street betrayed nothing. Somewhere within, Frank Bain had a gun trained on the person of his estranged wife Marianne. Was she dead or alive? There had been several gunshots, one at three o'clock, two at four-thirty and another at a quarter to five, but at five oh five, the cops spoke to her. She sounded strained, emotional, but still very much alive. It was almost six now. There had been no more gunshots, but Frank could have used other means. There were so many. A hangman's noose, a sharp kitchen knife, his bare hands, a cocktail of domestic insecticides. All of those might be soundless.

He tried not to think about them, but the images flooded his thoughts, almost as if he was there in the room with her, listening to Frank Bain tormenting her with the possibilities, asking her to choose. Was he picking up her stream of consciousness somehow?

That had happened before, to the surprise of them both, somehow confirming that soul mate link they had been aware of from the first.

Don't die. His mind was pleading. Don't die.

Live. Take me with you. Live for me.

The words popped into his head. The voice was hers, although the acoustics echoing within his skull sounded odd, as if coming through a long, narrow tube or from underwater.

The very air around him seemed to come alive and it was as if he could feel every ant meandering across the sand, every blade of grass glistening as it unfolded, pushing up towards the sun. The flower in his hands was a deep, dark plum, the color of old blood and promises broken. But the whitewashed house across the street seemed to have given up its ghost.

That was the moment he knew, long before the SWAT team stormed the place and brought out both blanketed bodies.

Worms & apples

Here is yet another analogy about worms. We always talk about worms in apples being a bad thing, BUT just look at it from another perspective. The worm believes it is in heaven and this is the biggest glutfest on earth. The apple is being loved and appreciated. Apples are born to be eaten, whether by a worm or a human being, or a horse, for that matter. The only problem is you and who said it was your apple anyway?

Humans......

Not quite #fridayflash fiction: Crows

"Look, crows," said the boy. His name was Aidan. He wore jeans and a T-shirt that advertised the amusement park they visited three days ago on his birthday. He had turned nine, which meant that he was exactly three-hundred and sixty-two days away from counting his age in double digits.

One thing puzzled him. His feet were bare. He felt sure he would have worn shoes in a place like this, with the wind continuously whipping up rust-colored leaves and the tarmac scattered with pieces of broken glass.

"Why are they so shiny?" his sister asked. She was five and her name was Courtney. Asking stupid questions was her number one occupation.

"Because their mommies always made them wash behind their ears," Aidan replied. He thought it odd, but quite peaceful that their parents were nowhere in sight. A little way off, some car wreck was burning. Aidan wanted to look at it. Later. Before their mother came back. She always made them turn the other way if there was an accident.

"I think they're scary," said Courtney.

"They're fine," said Aidan. "They're very smart and they live a long time and sometimes people tame them. The Indians believe they are very important."

"Why?" Courtney asked.

"Next time I see an Indian, I'll ask him. The only reason most people don't like them is because they eat carrion."

"What's carrion?"

Aidan sighed. "How must I know? Some junk I think... Or rotten meat." He peered at them. There were five crows. They pecked at something on the road.

"Why are they so close?"

She did have a point there. Most wild birds flew away when you walked up to them, but not these ones. They just kept working their beaks as if the two children weren't even there.

"I dunno," said Aidan.

"Palo says crows eat people's eyes," Courtney said. "Can you see what these ones are eating?"

"Somebody's eyes," said Aidan. He leaned forward. It was true. The orb, tattered with blood, was the size of a marble. The size of a little girl's thumb scrunched up and with the bone sticking out. Almost as big as a nine-year-old boy's big toe sticking out of his Ben-10 sock.

He walked. Closer and closer. Shiny black crow feathers passed through the soles of his feet, but he never felt them.