UPDATED WITH WINNER: LitReactor's Flash Fiction Smackdown: September Edition

A Big Deal.

Jeff wiped a tear from his eye and grabbed a stick from the warm sand.  It was the perfect shape, long on one end with a handle that resembled a gun.  Jeff headed in to the large mouth of the nearby cave and took a seat in the sand.  He began to dig.  “I bet they won’t find me in here.” he said. 
“Davey is gonna wanna play with this stick and I won’t let him, even if Mom tries to make me.  I found it and I’m gonna keep it.  He thinks just because he got money from Grandma for his second birthday he is so big and can have anything I have.  I’m five years old now and he has to do what I say!  I TOLD him not give that shell I found to Dennis! He did it anyway and now Dennis threw it in the stupid ocean!”
As Jeff relived the experience the hole he was unknowingly digging grew darker, as he uncovered moist sand.
“He didn’t learn about shells in his stupid fifth grade class.  Liar!  He put it in the water just to be a bully. That’s not even a hermit crab shell, it was flat!  I HATE stupid Dennis.  They are going to be sorry when they can’t find me.  I am going to throw all of Dennis’ toys in the ocean when we get home.  Oh no, here comes mom, she found me!”
Is that…Superman ice cream she has?  Awesome!

Pillow Talk

You've been in the bathroom for a while now. Are you okay?

You're missing beach volleyball. You're missing me teach her how to surf.

While your eyes speed-read the labels in the medicine cabinet, looking for a skull and crossbones or all-caps letters shouting "DO NOT TAKE WITH:", while you're studying the no-no list on the bottle, my hands are on her waist, showing her how to move with the waves.

When you remember my iron liver and wonder if crushed OxyContin in a glass of Captain Morgan would be enough to do the job right, you'll second-guess yourself. You'll pout, slam the medicine cabinet, and join us again before I help her with her wet suit.

But first, you'll notice the sliver of light bouncing off a sharp blade in the dish drainer. You'll take the handle of the carrot cutter--yes, when you know how to cook, there's a knife for everything--and you'll admire its light weight, perfect size, and above all its cut. A red ruby will shine on your fingertip when you slide it gently along the edge of the blade.

This carrot cutter, you'll conceal it in your pillow case on your cot in my living room.

Then you'll come outside again, join us on the beach. You'll see her smile at me.

You will smile at me. You'll say, "Hello."

I'll smile back and ask, "How's your stomach?"

Why graffiti is important

Groups of worshippers trail along the beach and cross the threshold into the great spirit cave. Just as they should.

Spirits can live anywhere, of course—shrines, carved rocks, sacred springs, temples, churches, endless woods or deep still lakes. But this grand cathedral is something special. The voices soar and echo, the salty waters sing as they rise and fall, sun, moon and stars shine through. And the walls record tributes down the ages, scratched drawings of beasts, of the glorious sun, of rivers and fish and hunting, words and patterns of life.

And if they don’t? If they don't, this rock wall is cracked and unstable. Nothing easier than to dislodge a few boulders, or even a whole rockslide, to encourage a bit more awe and respect. Or even total catastrophic collapse as the final punishment if that doesn’t work. Spirits can always move on.

Removed.

This piece will be published in the February Edition of  Parable Press the sneak peek is up now.

Thanks,

Jonathan

A View of the Water

          “They’re coming, baby,” Jeremy said.
          The first boatload emerged from the cave. Loud, vulgar, arm-chair explorers grasping into the sunlight.
          Noticing his wife’s fetal, sleeping form ghosted in the kitchen window, he now wished he’d kept silent.
          He looked down the cliff again at the shoals that spat up from the maw the waves had burrowed into the sandstone plinth, now at low tide and offering a fleeting artery through which the Spring Break leavings could churn through unabated.
          They’d been told the beach was inaccessible—continued to be told so even as the cottage went up overlooking the lagoon. That had been four years ago.
          “I know,” Stephanie murmured from the bed at length.
          Jeremy nodded. Each year around Easter she would withdraw, as if for some inexorable cold.
          He looked at the sand and water, inviolate and pristine only ten minutes before, now roiled and wrecked by madly flailing limbs and the gurgling wakes of jet-skis they’d hauled in.
          Their first nine months here had been the lifesaver they’d so sought. They’d sit on the beach and gaze out at the teething coral as gulls cooed and rode the breezes above, and they felt a little less tethered to the void that still pulled at their souls.
          “Lily would’ve loved this,” Stephanie would say to the sun swelling the sea’s end.
          “The water never scared her,” Jeremy would always reply.
          In time, he joined his wife in bed and listened to the frenzied cries lapping from below.

Adrift

She shook her head, delicately, so as not to upset the coif that had so carefully been sculpted that morning. The sand beneath her one bare foot was cool; she looked down and saw she was missing a shoe.

There had been a boat, an old vintage thing with peeling paint. They’d assured her it was artistically distressed. She’d stood in the boat, in the water, holding her bouquet...adrift in a sea of love. Yes, that was the theme. Adrift in the blue waters, framed by the natural rock formation while the photographer stood in its shade, moving an inch and then snapping. The clouds were rolling in...

There was a tangle of seaweed at her feet, punctuated by spikes of white-painted driftwood. My Jimmy Choo bridal flip-flops. Her hand instinctively went to her ring, its five carat weight solid and reassuring under her fingertips.

She hiked up her skirt, that train that had been so lovely in the boutique proving just as impractical as her mother had said it would be, and picked her way back down the shore toward the resort.

A smattering of people on the beach but none of them would look at her; typical.

“Excuse me, have you seen my other shoe?” Her voice cracked.

The sun rose above the cliffs ahead, its light dispersing what few atoms of her remained, sending her back to the grey space between worlds. She’d be back again the next morning, 11:52 as usual.

98….99….100!

Timmy loved to play hide-and-seek.  The other kids (so many 12-year-olds here – cool!!) he had met at the hotel were looking for him around the bushes further down the beach, but he was far away, inside Cathedral Cove, in the shadow of a big boulder, and had buried himself up to the neck in the cool, refreshing sand, his salty, blonde hair darkened by the wet sand.  Outside the cove, turquoise waves and locals in the early afternoon sun were outstaring each other.

Nobody could see Timmy.  Fun!

Something just stung Timmy in his left arm.  It wasn’t very painful, Timmy stayed quiet; he didn’t want to be found.  Urgh.  Another sting, in his right arm.  He stayed quiet.  The pain passed, as did any sensation in his arms. Timmy couldn’t feel them.

The waves were loud, nobody would hear him.  Nobody needed to hear him.

Or did they?

Another sting, to the side of Timmy’s neck.  Now he saw it, Tityus serrulatus - a Brazilian yellow scorpion.  Timmy knew about arachnids.

This one and the two other yellow buggers, which presumably had nipped his arms, scuttled off, turned, and seemed to leer at scared Timmy.  He wasn’t stuck in a well, but Lassie would’ve been great right now.

Timmy’s neck was pulsing and tears started to stream down his cheeks.  He tried to scream, but his throat was closing up.  He was wheezing.  The three venomous Stooges came back for more.

Dodge a Bullet

Meribelle met Chad in Cabo San Lucas one afternoon collecting seashells. Now three nights later, he’d taken her to a night club. The lights swirled to the beat of the music. He pulled her in for a kiss.
“Let’s go to the beach,” he shouted. She nodded. The quiet  and cool air would be a relief. She waved at her friend Kelsey, who stopped talking to Andrea and gave her a worried look.
They strolled down the beach until they came to a pier. She ran her fingers through his hair, but he seemed distracted.
“What’s been the best part of the summer for you?” she asked.
“Meeting you,” he said. She heard a motor and looked up. A boat? It carried two unshaven, dirty looking men as passengers.
“They’re going to take you somewhere,” Chad said.
“I don’t want to go.”
He gave her a cold smile. “They paid your fee.”
A car screeched its brakes in the parking lot. When Meribelle looked, she saw Kelsey and Andrea and two unfamiliar men. They piled out and rushed towards the pier.
“Damn,” said Chad. He jumped off the pier into the boat. The man who was driving revved the engine and the craft started moving away. Meribelle was left alone.
“What are you doing here?”
“Meri, Dominic told us Chad’s a bad guy. He sells drugs and…maybe even women.”
Meribelle felt faint. 
“You weren’t going to get in that boat?” Andrea asked. She gave Meribelle a hug.
 

Rebirth

We emerged from the cave on shaky legs, shielding our eyes from the sun we had feared we would never see again. Fingers gingerly stroked wrists rubbed raw by restraints.  In the darkness of captivity, in those moments we had thought might be our last, we had huddled together and spoken in hushed whispers of past regrets and present fears, of loved ones we would leave behind.  Now free, our voices gained strength, making promises of reunions we knew we would never plan.

Three weeks earlier we had been strangers setting out as eager explorers. “Looking for adventure?” the ad had beckoned.  Twenty-two of us had answered, each with our own reason for taking part in a journey that promised to “change our view of the world”. 

We had certainly changed.  I thought of my life back home, of the guys back at the plant and how they would react upon my return: “Fucking pirates, Travers?  You invest your life savings on some crazy ass trip and then go and get yourself kidnapped by pirates?”

Perhaps sensing my thoughts, Marguerite sidled up to me, gently resting her hand on my arm.  “Nothing will ever be the same after this, you know,” she sighed.

As I caught sight of the ship that would carry us back to the lives we had led before, I prayed she was right.

When Icarus Listens

“Mommy, those are stratus clouds!”

He’s still enthusiastic for something he learned three long years ago.

“How did the clouds get up there again?”

Given the scientific abilities of his mind, why create a fairy tale explanation?

“But the water can’t be in the sky. The water is on my toes.”

He imitates a ninja kick he’s seen on television towards the oncoming wave.

“Does the water fly up to the sky using its wings?”

This same argument has been used for centuries to justify the existence of religion.

“Don’t look directly at the sun, Mommy. It will hurt your eyes.”

He can recollect rules better than he can follow them.

“So Mommy, does a cloud feel like water?”

The simple questions are the hardest to answer.

“Does a cumulus cloud feel different than a stratus cloud?”

Using the word impossible will crush a few dreams.

“Is the water trying to be like a stratus cloud on the ground?”

Such complex logic from such a simple premise.

“Can a shark swim in the sky?”

There’s the spark to make his imaginary world concrete.

“Remember, Mommy, yesterday in the morning when we woke up, and you told me the clouds were touching the ground and it was called fog? See, Mommy!  Water is like a cloud on the ground. That means a shark can swim in the clouds!”

He is laying the groundwork for his future.

“Swim up, you sharks! Swim up to those stratus clouds!”

White Walls and Blue Skies

I sat on the crunchy white paper and slowly lowered myself until I was fully horizontal on the bench, my eyes looking straight up at the ceiling. The room was cold and the sterile sheet beneath me crackled with every movement. They tell me to ease up and feel comfortable, but how can you in a place like this? Hospitals are made to be uncomfortable, so talk to me about the irony in that. The nurse comes over to me and tries to explain the upcoming procedure. Her words move in and out like waves. I’m too focused on willing myself to be warm that her words become jumbled impressions of Charlie Brown's teacher. All I can feel is the frigid air course over, under, and through my body, chilling any heat that I may give off. I can feel the hairs on my arms stand up as goose bumps ripple over my flesh. I close my eyes and a tiny salty tear forms and rolls down the side of my face into my ear. The nurse squeezes my hand and says, “It’ll be all right. Just… think of a happy place. This will be over before you know it.” I kept my eyes shut and nodded. I thought of smooth, sandy beaches and bright blue water. I considered vacationing in the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, New Zealand. I told myself: when I get out, I’ll go anywhere but here.

Waiting Alone.

He collapsed at the mouth of the cave alone and wouldn’t get up again. When we found him his face had gone the colour of white sand and his eyes were glass. A storm was forming above us and Clara had grabbed at my hand and told me that we should leave. I shook my head, transfixed by his prone state. I knelt by him and cupped his face and ran my hands through his hair. In a few hours, he would be underwater, ensnared by seaweed and dragged out to sea. What had once been a personality was now just a slowly dissolving mass of cells. I told Clara that I couldn’t leave him here, that I couldn’t lose anyone else to the sea. She whispered that she knows about my past and that I don’t need to remind her of anything but that staying here and trying to rescue a corpse would be stupid. I tell her she can leave as I stare into his eyes. I’ve put myself forward for hopeful resurrection alongside him and I can’t abandon him now. As the skies thundered I heard her walking back through the sea, leaving me alone with him and waiting for the inevitable. I took both his hands in mine as the water swirled about us and as rain began to lash my back he opened his eyes and his fingers clenched tight. A smile broke across my face and the winds beckoned, absolute.

The End.

Three hundred million people are in a panic. They know the bombs are going to be dropped, but nobody knows when. These bombs don't take prisoners, or so we're told. They're big enough to wipe our entire country off the map. The news footage is showing me the mobs of people screaming and crying; they're calling for preemptive revenge. I don't care though, not really. There's nothing to be done about it.

It's time to turn the television off. I'm going to the beach. I always told myself that I would revisit my childhood, and now is a better time than any. I want to enjoy that hot sand and cool sea once more; I just hope I make it there in time.

Congratulations, J.Y. Nicely done.

congrats J.Y.