Scores of old photos,
of us in each other’s arms
fixed smiles, missing love.
Tag: flash fiction
Silent, Suffering
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They pulled into the driveway just as the sun began to settle in the West. Janet got down from the Porsche to admire the now pink horizon and the lake beyond the rickety picket fence. As far as her eye could see there was nothing more than clear water and the occasional ripple. She turned to her fiancé. While Janet had been memorising the view, Jean had parked their vehicle and was now walking towards her.
Janet’s eyes sparkled. This would be their last trip as two single women. They had waited long enough, enduring more than enough. And if their parents couldn’t handle it, then so be it. Jean stopped next to her and smiling, slid her hand into Janet’s. They stood looking at the sun, as it sunk into the depths of November’s icy lake.
“Let’s go in.” Jean cajoled Janet into her ancestral wood house. They had decided to pay a pre-wedding visit to the place they’d make their home later. As she walked inside, a wave of warmth spread over Janet. The house wasn’t too big but it emitted an aura of comfort.
On her right was a window overlooking the now darkening sky and the silhouette of the lake. On the left was the kitchen and in front of her, leading away from the hall, was the master bedroom that opened up to life-size windows and views worth of a lifetime.
“Chill out, I’ll whip up some dinner.” Jean pecked Janet on the cheek and went into the kitchen to make, Janet knew, her speciality pasta with fresh cream and marinara sauce. While Jean rummaged in the kitchen, Janet went over to the window, looking out at the lake. It was almost dark now, the pink had morphed into a navy and the moon tried to walk out from behind the clouds.
Trrriiiing…trrriiiing. Trrriiiing…trrriiiing…
Janet jumped before realising that it was just the telephone. She hadn’t noticed it earlier, but now she saw that the sound came from a small table that lay beside a giant radio. “I’ll get it, J” she called out to Jean and went over to answer. “Hello?” she spoke into the receiver.
“In,
search of skin,
color no matter,
brighter or darker,
tell no one,
I will take someone,
Ssssshhhhh!
– ghost, me!”
And with that, the line died. Janet gulped and clenched the receiver harder. The voice — she couldn’t tell whether it was a man or a woman for it was a mere whisper— had sent bouts of shivers down her spine.
Sat down on the sofa hugging herself. All of a sudden, the room felt as much colder than it had been when they entered it. Jean’s rummaging in the kitchen had also stopped. “Jean?” She called out without leaving the sofa. She didn’t understand why her brow was sweating or why she shivered so much. And when Jean neither replied nor came out of the kitchen, Janet became scared. That’s when she identified the source of the cold: the front door stood ajar, letting in the chilly night air.
Frowning, Janet remembered shutting the door behind them. How did it open, then? In small cautious steps, she approached the doorway.
Janet screamed. And then breathed a sigh of relief. Jean stood in the doorway. “You scared me!” Janet reproached her. “Why did you go out in the cold?” She added a little concerned. Jean looked white and her smile looked strained.
Jean only shook her head in reply, walking right past Janet. Shrugging to herself, Janet shut the door with a snap. Jean jumped at the snap. “Are you all right?” Janet approached her extending a hand to her cheek. Jean stepped away from her nodding with a vigour that surprised Janet. She stood staring at Jean, her hand still stretched out.
“Jean?” Janet spoke with a firm voice that could convince no one. “Why were you outside?”
“In… search…” Jean started with a whisper and stopped.
“Of what?” Janet asked her voice reaching the near-shriek point.
“In… search…” Jean repeated in the same whispering tone. She sounded coarse. “of… milk.”
And then she smiled. Her warm smile was back, and the colour returned to her face. “Hey, J” she threw her head back and laughed at Janet. “Relax. I went to get some milk. That’s all.”
And then as if someone had flipped a switch, the room felt warm again, and Janet saw that Jean was back to her usual self. They had had a rough ride. Janet smiled too. Her mind must’ve been playing tricks on her. There’s no way Jean would cringe away from her. “I’m tired. Let’s go to bed?”
Jean nodded and hand-in-hand, they walked into the room. Jean smiled. The search had ended.
I’ve signed up for the Incredible Blogger Marathon Challenge. It’s a ten-task-challenge that can span up to fifteen days. This post is my response to the sixth day: The Mass Media Challenge. The challenge is to combine the image, the poem, and the word “telephone” in a single post.
A Walk Down the Memory Lane
Alethea chanced a glance at the large clock on the wall. It was ten AM. She had packed the husband off to work and the kids off to school. She had woken up at 5 am to make sure the kids got solid breakfast. They were going on a field trip that day and had to be at school by 7 am, which was much earlier than the usual 9 am.
As she shuffled around in the kitchen packing some extra sandwiches for the ride and her kids’ friends who couldn’t resist her homemade peanut butter and jelly, Alethea’s husband walked in with red swollen eyes. He had had a rough week at work, and it was disrupting his sleeping patterns. She whipped up another pair of sandwiches for him and tried to coax him into taking the day off. And when that didn’t work out, she resorted to making some soup to soothe him.
After making sure everyone she cared about had had a good morning, Alethea decided to clean up the basement. It had been on the to-do list for far too long now. She and her husband had talked about turning the basement into a smaller recreational room, and he had volunteered to do the cleaning himself. However, given the state of his work pressure, Alethea decided to do it herself. A decision she came to regret soon enough. As soon as she opened the door to the basement, she came up with a sneezing fit.
Once the air around her cleared a bit, she looked around at the mess and slapped herself hard on the head. It had been fifteen years since she and her husband had graduated high school, and yet, she still preserved her old school notebooks and scrap papers. It had seemed important at the time, but now when she looked at them, she wanted nothing more than to kick herself. She spent over an hour sorting out her things from her husband’s. They had both been complete idiots, she told herself over and over again. And when the clock struck ten, she knew she needed a break. She picked up a couple of old notebooks from the pile and went up to the kitchen.
Letting a pot of coffee brew, she sat down at the table and opened one of the notebooks which hadn’t had her touch in over 15 years. The pages had frayed in the corners, and she felt them stiffened by the coffee stains of a lifetime ago. One by one, she turned the pages, unable to recollect why she elected French because she had gone on to teach German. She kept turning the pages, smiling as she looked at the little drawings she had done in the margins. She couldn’t contain herself as she recognised a rude caricature of a teacher she hated in school.
By the time she took a large swig of her black and sugarless coffee, she had reached the end of the notebook. She looked at the scribble on the last page and realised her kids’ notebooks had similar scribblings. No matter how many years passed, some things never change, she mused. And then she noticed something. Sketched in the corner, hidden behind a bunch of meaningless pencil strokes, was something she had revered back then. It was her and James’s names written one below the other and the common letters in both their names scratched off. Next to their names was the word “FLAMES” with all letters but “M” scratched out.
James had died in a car crash the next day.
The Start of an Era
“No matter what happened, this would be a historic day,” Kevin thought to himself as he adjusted his tie for the fourth time that morning. Everything had to be as perfect as planned. His had his suit custom-made so that not a stitch would be out of line. It was an important day.
A few blocks down the street, Mary was examining her long dress in the mirror. She wanted to make sure nothing had gone amiss. If anyone noticed even a small flaw in her dress, it would become her nightmare. Her parents would be disappointed and her brother even more so. She couldn’t afford anything going wrong. It was an important day.
All the hard work of the last few months had led to this day. For far too long now, they had both given up their personal lives, working through long days and longer nights. And as they both looked at the unmistakable dark circles under their eyes, they thought, with a tinge of regret, of the barrels of coffee they had drowned. It had led them to this. It was an important day.
They left their buildings at the same time. He in his Hyundai Sonata with his best friend at the wheel, and she in her Chevrolet Cruze cruising down the street towards the same towering white building.
It was an important day. Over a year of campaigning and cheering and jeering had resulted in the whole world talking about the election. And yet, no one knew that the lead staff of both candidates were just about to get married.
“No matter what happened, this would be a historic day,” the pastor began.
The Chaos Within 