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Man Of Two Worlds, by Bobby Warner

30/12/2014

 
Often, when I lie down to sleep at night, I fall into a strange revere. I seem not wholly nor all the way in slumber. I am in a half-way world, and I sink slowly, slowly, down into darkness after darkness, until the world about me is no longer that of air, but water. I am myself, yet no longer myself... and I live a life far beneath the surface of the ocean... fathoms upon fathoms deep. I swim – propel myself with uncanny speed – deeper and deeper, exploring the abyss, finding mountains and valleys undrempt by mortal man.

And finally, after much wandering, I set my course, with all speed, for my underwater home. Great, dark caverns, portions of which are lighted by phosphorescent organisms clinging to the walls and ceilings, are my domain which I share with all the others of my kind.

And the greatest prize of all awaits me, with open arms and tender smile. We swim together and couple in ecstatic reunion, my mate and I, careful to enjoy each moment before I, the explorer, most be off on another mission of discovery.

I sometimes call myself the man of two worlds. But this, the man of the waking world, would rather fall into an eternal slumber and dwell forever in that so-called "dream-world beneath the sea."




An Old Love Returns, by Bobby Warner

30/12/2014

 
"Who are you?" I asked when she walked into the room.

"I'm an old love. Don't you remember me?"

She was about my age--70ish--but had held her beauty remarkably well. I did know her but could not quite recall. How frustrating!

"On the night train back to Texas, from California," she said. "We were together when the--the accident happened."

I could hardly speak; a trickle of memories momentarily froze all other thought.

"I remember . . . almost," I said. "And I remember afterwards. In bed. A long time in bed. And . . . someone caring for me. Someone there with me all the time."

"Yes," she said. "That was I."

And many, many more memories came flooding through my mind.

Of course I knew her. I would have no life, if not for her. She was there always, nursing me back to health.

She came to me, and I held out my arms, with the silent prayer that I would not forget again.

The Sunday Papers, by Bobby Warner

30/12/2014

 
My wife and I don't like our local skinny paper, so on weekends we order a fat one from the Big City. Sometimes we're astounded at the things the paper looks like, strewn about the house.

Once a section of paper fell in an upright position that looked like the pup tent I use when I camp out fishing; and last week I wadded up a few sheets in a fit of irritability, and they looked like misshapen snowballs, ready to roll downhill; then there was the time my wife put the paper so close the edge of the table that it fell off, making a torrent of sheets that looked like a miniature waterfall before it all landed on the floor. There was the time my wife called me to come look: "See how we dropped the sheets; they fell in a pattern, and it looks like the way my mother used to lay out her quilts and blankets to air them on the back porch." And I could go on and on like that.

Yes, sir: The shapes we see in the way our Sunday paper sometimes gets shuffled never fails to amaze us. Sometimes the things we see in the pattern of fallen sheets is more interesting than what we read on the printed pages!

A Big Cat, by N Iván Contreras

27/12/2014

 
The freezing night wind wakes up the uneasy wild beast. Recent images come to his mind: the precarious dam of the eve, yet more vividly the envisioned new prey. Such a glimpse will sustain his next hunting drive. With strength and cunning the beast will beat the new prey to quench hungers. Another kind of consumption will require different tactics. He must wait, pay attention, learn to doubt. Perhaps the new prey will come on her own before dawn, seeking his warmth, his muscle and skin. They will both lie placidly, then fornicate, and slowly resume the interrupted sleep. No morning will be sweeter. It began chilly but ended warm, peaceful and perhaps even fruitful. All in good time, my dear comrade. 

Craver's Christmas, by Bobby Warner

24/12/2014

 
Craver trudged home through the cold night. Blake was in the hospital; it had been a profoundly bizarre accident, but he was expected to live. He was forced to work out the remainder of Blake's shift.

And then, reaching the parking lot, he realized he had a dead battery. On top of that, he had brought his other wallet--the one without his credit cards, and with only a couple of dollars in cash. How stupid of him! He had no alternative but hoof it home; but it was only four or five blocks. Hardly worth trying to find a taxi on a night like this, so he started walking.

He turned down his street, realizing it was Christmas night. Well, what the heck? He'd never gone in for things like that. He hadn't even believed in getting gifts on Christmas morning even when he was a young kid. His dad thought it was all a lot of bunk--and that's the way he felt about the holiday, too!

Suddenly a man appeared out of nowhere, bumping into him. The man was large, round-bellied, with a snowy beard and wearing a red suit trimmed in white. It was as though he had dropped out of nowhere, right into Craver's arms, so to speak.

The man carried a large bag slung over his shoulder, one evidently stuffed with--something. A lot of somethings. He looked like the pictures Craver had seen so many times, especially that ancient one advertising a soft drink. Good Lord, could it be? Had he been wrong, after all, after all these years. Could this actually be--?

Then the man grinned and said, "Sorry 'bout that, friend. I'm kinda near-sighted, and I had a couple at a bar after I finished my shift at the Mall. Playing Santa for money is a real bummer!"

Craver felt an instant let-down. "It's all right," he said sharply. The other man, the fake Santa, turned on his heel and ambled on down the street toward home, his footsteps none too steady.

Craver continued on his way, turning into his walkway. Almost home, and what a relief. It had been one heck of a day--and night!

As he slipped the key into the lock Craver heard a sound; a far-away sound. It was a voice, a faint, jolly voice. It said, "Ho, ho, ho! And a Merry Christmas to you, too!"

Was it the fake Santa he had met? Or was the man a fake after all? Was it just some drunk from up the street, or was it really--?

Well, he could believe anything he wanted to believe, couldn't he? And if he wanted to believe in--in something or someone he had never believed in before . . . well, that was all right, too, wasn't it?

And so Craver pushed open the front door, walked into his house, turned on the living room lights, raised his arms and said, to no one in particular:

"A Very Merry Christmas--and God bless us, one and all!"




Child With Toy, by Bobby Warner

15/12/2014

 
Heck of a thing, having to work on Christmas Eve. We had a contract to fulfill, though; and I was the one with the expertise to finalize details.


On the way to my car, I saw this little kid sitting on the curb with a big grin on his face and holding an open package in his arms.


"Hi," I said. "Merry Christmas. Whatcha got there?"


"A Captain America action figure," he said. "It's what I wanted most of all for Christmas."

"That's great," I said, "but why aren't you home? And don't you know it's dangerous to be sitting that close to the street?"

"Mom and Pop were fighting again, so I ran away till they get over it. I was just sitting here when I heard tinkling bells and looked up. There was a great big thing up over my head, like a dark shadow. This package fell down, then a red light came on at one end of the thing and it shot up into the sky. A little laughing voice came down and said, 'Merry Christmas! Hope you like your present from Rudolf!"

Then the boy jumped to his feet and, holding his present to his chest, ran down the street till he melted into the night. 

Down By The Riverside, by Bobby Warner

15/12/2014

 
Hodges and Marnes walked along beside the muddy brown East Texas riverbank. They were lifelong buddies, and Marnes owed Hodges big time. He'd got him out of that mess with the Smith woman. And now Hodges was calling in his marker.

"You say your pa-in-law'll be down from Illinois next week, eh?"

"Yeah, he likes the fresh water fishing down here, and I told him I'd take him out on the river and we'd catch a pile. Old fellow's going on 90, and I swear he'll outlive me. If I let him."

"So you want me to catch 'em, sack 'em, and put 'em in the boat, huh? What day?"

"Tuesday morning, afore six o'clock. Put 'em in the front of the boat. I'll seat him looking backwards, so they can come out while he can't see 'em."


"That oughta do the trick. Make sure they don't get you, too."


"Don't worry. I got a flap rigged in the bottom of the boat that I can pull up and keep 'em away from me. I'll take it out soon's they do their job on him."

"So you think he's worth maybe ten million bucks, huh?"

"Give or take a few. Don't worry. You'll get a nice bonus for this. I'll take care of you, old buddy."


"And I'll help you take care of him. Come Tuesday mornin' there'll be six or seven of the meanest cottonmouth moccasins you ever saw in the boat ready to take care of your pa-in-law."


Hodges clapped Marnes on the shoulder. "Let's go find us a place to get a beer. All of a sudden I'm god-awful thirsty!

A Dying Breed, by Bobby Warner

15/12/2014

 
There aren't many of us left up here in the mountains. We used to thrive, and for the longest time we ruled the land, so to speak. Guess you could say we're a dying breed, all right. And it won't be long before we're all gone.

Everything was all right until the new people came in and settled down amongst us; we tried to be friendly . . . but we had old habits and old hungers that were hard to let go. But we kept it down to a minimum.

Elias Wilson was the one who did us in. He was a brand-spanking new dentist up from one of the big cities in the lowlands. He had a lot of book-learning, and he knew quite a bit about us. So he got folks stirred up, and they got to harassing us something fierce. Because he was a dentist, it was his damned idea to bring us in, plunk us in his chair and pull ever blessed tooth in our mouths.

Every time he finished, he'd slap whichever one of us who was in the chair on the shoulder, grin and say with a nasty laugh:

"No charge for vampires. Now get on outta here and have yourself a nice day!

Do You Hear That? by David Wing

14/12/2014

 
“Do you hear that?”

Jim hit pause on the remote and strained his ears. 

“I do now, shall we?”

Laura and Jim rose from their sofa and headed to the front door and passed the advent calendar with too many chocolates already missing – Jim. 

The sound outside was getting louder.

Conscious of the cold breeze outside, the pair donned their winter coats and opened the door. The snow sat heavenly on the ground, the hedgerow and over the cars all up and down the road. The sky - filled with a thick, heavy grey, hung above and then began to shed whispers of white.

The carollers, seven strong, sang.

They’d finished Good King Wenceslas as they rounded the driveway and were now fully immersed in a modern rendition of Silent Night.

The pair stood there, shivering a little, but holding each other tightly.

As the carollers passed the mid-way point, a tear began to form on Laura’s face and then swiftly freeze. Her cheek glinted. Jim looked over at her and smiled.

“Are you OK, my love?” 

Laura turned slowly, looked up at Jim and said,

“It’s, it’s just…”

Her words stuttered and stalled.

“What, my love? What is it?”

Laura leaned in towards Jim’s ear and whispered,

“…they’re just so bad!”

Sure There's Nothing After, by Marilyn R. Freedman

13/12/2014

 
I skipped out of the doctor’s office filled with relief and joy. I knew my friends and family—even the grown kids—wouldn’t understand. 

For months after, everything I saw was bathed in that glowing light you only see in the days before and after an equinox. A red leaf on the stream behind my house reminded me of the poppies I had seen in spring. Both well-loved. But I wouldn’t miss them. 

In time, I lay down. Death came like a kiss on the mouth, and I. . . 

Rustling. “You can open your eyes, you know.” 

I pretended not to hear. Must be an odd neural hiccup. 

“You’re not planning to just lie there, er, forever, are you?” More rustling, like the dog turning round and round. 

I rolled my eyes. “I was hoping for nirvana.”

2014 Christmas Circular Letter, by Gordon Lawrie

12/12/2014

 
The Old Village Gatehouse
City Road,
Markham-By-The-Sea
11th December, 2014
Dear

Well that's another year in – isn't it amazing how time passes so quickly? And so much seems to have happened in the last twelve months, too.

This year has seen Tony extremely busy at work, four big contracts, all successful – a middle-east businessman, a Mexican politician (there's so much work there at the moment), a Russian oligarch (the trickiest) and the wife of a Singapore doctor who wanted to set up with someone twenty years younger. Tony prides himself on his work, but was thrilled to receive the Guardian International Hit-Man Of The Year award in October.

Jennifer's business continues to go from strength to strength. She now has a staff of eleven, most of whom are from eastern Europe, and she her services are developing a fine reputation across the city. One new innovation is the serving of scrambled eggs, topped either with crispy bacon or smoked salmon, after what she rather old-fashionedly terms "the main course". Well, it makes a nice change from a pizza delivery. Relations with the authorities have been rocky at times this year – she received a Police Caution in February and narrowly avoided a more serious charge in August only because very conveniently all the prosecution evidence vanished from the police store mysteriously. However, Jennifer's new "Discount Loyalty Card" system has proved popular within the local constabulary and goodwill has been restored.

In the meantime, Tony and Jennifer have been very busy with their new conservatory, and now they enjoy their breakfast there every morning. Jennifer has also been very busy redesigning the front garden, which now features a rockery with a wide range of alpine plants, while both Tony and Jennifer have been consolidating last year's work on the back garden by spending many happy evenings drinking red wine into the sunset!

Timmy's rock band has just released its fourth single, a number called Smash Your Face Into The Wall. They've had some internal difficulties this year – the bass player wanted to kick Timmy out, claiming that his only contribution to the band was to sing, which he did out of tune – but it was nothing that couldn't be sorted with a flick-knife. As an experiment, Timmy himself is now playing bass until the bass player recovers.

Leigh-Ann celebrated her sixteenth birthday in April along with her two sons; Jennifer and she have come to an excellent arrangement where Jennifer looks after Zoot and Boot while Leigh-Ann earns some money working in Jennifer's family business.

Daniel turned twenty-one this year, which was a cause for great celebration. Daniel is really developing an ability with money – his twenty-pound note is quite indistinguishable from the real thing but all of his work is of a high standard. This year it's allowed the family to pay all of its employees out of our own produce as well as allowing Tony and Jennifer the odd fun night out at the casino. Speaking of which, there was a nasty incident at the casino in June where we caught the croupier cheating. The police seemed to think Tony might have had something to do with his appearance face-down in the local river two days later, so for a few days John Clark, our solicitor, had to threaten to sue them for defamation.

Jennifer has a new car, a Vauxhall Astra in red, her favourite colour of course. She particularly likes the two front seats, each of which have heating elements, always very welcome in the winter. She uses it a lot when she goes to walk the dogs either by the sea-shore or in the woods. Sadly, we had a misfortune in March when our two Staffordshire bull terriers, Pontius and Herod, chased after and mauled a six-year-old child to death. The court insisted that we have them put down, which seemed to us very unfair – after all, they'll have been seriously provoked by the little boy. After all, everyone knows what little boys are like at that age, don't they? Anyway, a friend of ours managed to get hold of a couple of replacements, Japanese Tosa dogs which are actually banned but we just tell the neighbours that they're some sort of cross-breed. We've learned not to mind what the neighbours think, and to tell the truth they're not very sociable – we get the feeling sometimes that they'd rather avoid us. Their loss.

This year we had four lovely holidays: Argentina in February, Thailand in May, Russia in October and Afghanistan in November. The Russian and Afghan trips gave us plenty of opportunities to pick up some lovely potplants and jewellery which we were able to fly back, which many of you can look forward receiving when Santa comes down the chimney! And of course there's our country cottage near Balmoral which gives us so much pleasure.

Not all of our family news has been good, however. Tony's brother Alex sadly passed away in April when he stepped into the path of very heavy steamroller near his farm – it was very messy, and when Tony went to identify the body it took him more than five minutes to walk all the way round. Then, just two months later Jennifer's aunt was shot and killed while carrying out an armed raid on a bank in a nearby town. Not a bad way to go out at eighty-seven, though! We've had all the usual coughs and sneezes of course, but we continue to enjoy good health generally.

Finally, if you happen to be reading this, we should let you know that all of our Christmas cards this year were actually posted, along with this letter, by John Clark, that excellent solicitor we mentioned earlier. After receiving last year's great wad of inane, pointless Christmas circular letters, Tony and Jennifer decided that if they received equal or greater numbers in 2014, they would put their suicide pact into operation. As a result we're sorry to inform you that on the 4th December, we retired to the garage where Tony lovingly blew Jennifer's brains out with the family shotgun, then turned the gun on himself. This will therefore be the last Christmas card and letter you'll receive from us, and you can look forward to saving a stamp next year.

Wishing you all a very merry Christmas, and all the best for 2015!

Love





Jennifer and Tony

Rumbles, by Eric Smith

10/12/2014

 
In junior high school, rumbles would occur after classes at some specified location—on the athletic field or at an intersection near school. Some rumbles were between two people; others might involve a mass of people from two quasi gangs. I seldom recall hearing what score any of the rumbles was supposed to settle and often the fights failed to materialize.

One rumble involved a hot head named Buddy Gordon. He was a year younger than I was but big for his age. You had to give Gordon his due, he wasn’t a bully. He fought tough, older guys. Eventually he played football, but in junior high you were more likely to see him fighting. Gordon typically beat his opponents by using his size to advantage. On this occasion, Gordon challenged a guy everybody called Pryor. Gordon and Pryor were going to rumble on the back street that dead-ended into our athletic field.

No one used Pryor’s first name—he was one those guys who didn’t need one. He was in my gym class, which made him a minimum of a year older than Gordon. But who knows how old the guy really was? He was all muscle; you couldn’t hurt a guy like that with an ax. He was also strong and fast. Acne covered his pasty skin; he had dark brown hair cut medium long and combed back on the sides. Pryor didn’t seem to have any friends, and you couldn’t imagine where he lived. He never talked much. Pryor was the last guy you’d tangle with. So, of course, Gordon decided to pick a fight with him. I never knew what their rumble was about, if anything.

Gordon was a brawler-wrestler kind of fighter: he liked to throw people down and make them submit. Pryor was a little smaller than Gordon, but I figured he must know how to fight. They exchanged some words and a crowd gathered as Gordon moved in to work his best stuff. But Pryor punched Gordon twice, hard in the face, with a left and right, before Gordon could lay a hand on him. Gordon fell to knees in front of Pryor with blood drooling from his nose. The rumble was pretty much over before it started. But Pryor wasn't finished. He took off one of his black loafers and put his foot in Gordon’s face where he kneeled.

“Kiss it. You pick a fight with me, Gordon, you kiss my foot!”

Gordon shook his head, so Pryor dropped the shoe and hit him two more times hard and fast in the face. There was more blood, spurting this time, and Gordon was crying. Someone appealed to Pryor to let Gordon off the hook, saying he’d had enough.

I never saw Pryor again after that school year. He must have moved away. But I did see Gordon fighting a high school kid downtown. The older guy was subduing Gordon with a choke hold and talking him down.

“Bygones are bygones,” he said. 

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    Friday Flash Fiction is primarily a site for stories of 100 words or fewer, and our authors are expected to take on that challenge if they possibly can. Most stories of under 150 words can be trimmed and we do not accept submissions of 101-150 words.


    However, in response to demand, the FFF team constructed this forum for significantly longer stories of 151-500 words. Please send submissions for these using the Submissions Page.

    Stories to the 500 word thread will be posted as soon as we can mange.

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    ​Please note that we tend to post longer flash fiction exactly as we find it – wrong spacing, everything.

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