Archive for the ‘Flash fiction’ Category

Waking Beauty

Friday, January 7th, 2011

Rory’s eyes fluttered open and her first thought was, “I can’t breathe!”

She tried to sit up but succeeded only in hitting her forehead hard against what turned out, upon further examination, to be another forehead. She also realized that her breathing problem had been caused by someone’s mouth covering hers. Someone staggered backward, clutching his head and having the good grace to look embarrassed.

“Sorry,” he mumbled.

“I should think,” she replied. One hand fumbled under her pillow and came out with a dagger, which she promptly unsheathed. “Guards!” she shouted. “Help!”

“They’re probably just waking up,” he said. “Give them a minute.”

“Silence, knave.” It occurred to her that the guards really should have arrived immediately, and that even though she was brandishing a weapon, the intruder had his own sword at his side and had made no move to draw it. Had he already killed them? “Who do you think you are, anyway?”

He cleared his throat and gave an elegant bow. “Prince William Alexander Michael Eduardo Lysander de Montebello de Gros, at your service.”

“Eduardo?”

“Erm, yes. An uncle by marriage.”

“Well, Eddie, since when do princes sneak into the bedchambers of princesses?” The man was covered in fresh wounds, she saw, scratches that could have come from fighting. “And did I mention, help!”

“If you’ll just let me explain–”

The doors flew open at last, and three guards rushed in, brandishing their halberds. The prince, if that’s what he really was, held up his hands and started to protest.

“Take him to the dungeons,” Rory said, and they complied without hesitation.

“But your highness,” he said, “I don’t–”

One of the guards cuffed him on the mouth, shutting him up while another dragged him out. The third bowed to the princess. “My apologies, highness. He shall be interrogated at once.”

Now her nursemaid rushed in, her face wrinkled with dismay. “My word, what a commotion! Where did you get that, that…” She gestured at the dagger, then waved dismissively. “Never mind. Your poor nerves! I’ll have a bath drawn at once.”

Rory yawned. Judging by the light streaming through the window, it was just about dawn. Or was it sunset? No, it must be dawn. “If it’s all the same to you, Nursey, I could do with a few more minutes of rest.”

Art in Public Places

Friday, October 22nd, 2010

Raul swung one leg, then the other over the roof’s ledge and began to rappel down slowly. His partner Pepe stayed on the roof, smoking and watching the ropes to be sure nothing happened. Sometimes he wondered why he was a window washer, even if he was working on these big apartment buildings instead of little restaurants or shops. Probably because he wasn’t afraid of heights. He hated this building in particular because of the big statue thing on the side.

It was a four-story-tall fiberglass woman, legs spread as if in mid-leap, toes delicately pointed, orange and yellow tentacle-like hair blowing in an eternal wind. Her clothes were a patchwork of reds and pinks and oranges mixed in patterns of stripes and spots that no sane fashion designer would replicate. It was a pain to clean and he had to be extra careful not to damage it. Hmmph. Artists.

He stuck his sponge in his bucket and spread soapy water on the girl’s hair. It was nothing like washing his daughter’s hair, which was thick and curly and tangled easily, but either way it was delicate work. He slid his squeegee along the surface and carefully flicked the excess water off, falling into a pattern and letting his thoughts wander.

* * * * *

Becky hated the sculpture attached to the side of her apartment building.  She assumed some marketing genius had thought it would be a great adornment for the property, bringing in score after score of rabid art fans to sign leases for any amount, but actually the rent was pretty cheap. That was the only reason she stayed, really.

But not anymore. Today she was going to ask if she could move in with her boyfriend, Manny. He had a great place on Brickell near the shops and the grocery store and the Metrorail, and if they split the rent, it would be a sweet deal. They might even upgrade to a bigger unit and still come out ahead of what they were each paying separately. Then she’d never have to look at that Technicolor abomination again.

She finished getting dressed and made sure her makeup was perfect, her skirt a little too short and her top a little too low. She knew how guys could get about commitment, and she didn’t want Manny to turn her down. It wasn’t like they were getting married or anything; it was just sharing an apartment. And if she asked him in public over lunch, he wouldn’t make a scene.

* * * * *

Raul heard a muffled shout, then a scuffling sound on the roof. “Pepe, what’s going on?” he asked.

A face peered over the edge, but it wasn’t Pepe; it was some young guy with a scraggly beard and a manic grin. “Aw, no,” the man groaned. “If I do this now, you’ll just clean it off!”

“Do what?” Raul asked.

“Whatever, I’m not going to waste this.”

“Waste what? Are you crazy?”

The man grinned and Raul was pretty sure he knew the answer already. “Naw, man,” was the reply. “But I freaking hate this artwork.”

Without another word, the man leaned over, opened his mouth, and vomited all over the enormous woman’s face.

* * * * *

Becky exited the building and began to walk around to the side, toward the nearest Metrorail station a few blocks away. Her cell phone rang.

* * * * *

The puke arced toward Raul and he yelped and tried to dodge. He lost his grip on his ropes and the contents of his bucket sloshed and spilled. To steady himself, he grabbed at one of the sculpture’s ridiculously bulbous fingers.

With squeals and groans, whatever was holding the giant woman to the wall bent and broke. Raul pushed himself away and watched in horror as the figure which had seemed to be flying now fell instead. It was at least a ten-story drop, he knew.

“What do you mean?” Becky spat into her phone. “You can’t cancel on me now! Do you have any idea–”

And then she was crushed by several hundred pounds of metal and fiberglass. And a few pints of vomit.

Veronica was taking a picture of a house she was appraising when she heard an incredible crash behind her. She turned around and saw the mangled mess of red and orange and pink, the twisted metal, the spray of blood and flesh mixing with the shards of crystal that caught the noon sun and scattered its light in a thousand directions, and she did the only thing she could.

She took a picture.

Curiosity: a fairy tale in two parts (2)

Friday, October 15th, 2010

This is the second part of Curiosity: a fairy tale in two parts. To read part one, click here.

* * * * *

Sera scrubbed a yellow stain in a corner of the tavern’s great room and sighed.

“This is bloody ridiculous,” she muttered.

“What was that?” her mother asked. She was scattering straw on the places Sera had cleaned.

“Nothing,” Sera replied.

Sera usually kept her disdain to herself, so it could fester and roil to a crescendo of contempt that would carry her through the wretched holiday. Every year, the kingdom celebrated the anniversary of Prince Alan and Princess Ella’s wedding. It wasn’t that she was opposed to parties, or costumes, or dancing; she simply had the bad fortune to be the child of a tavern owner, so on the biggest feast day in the kingdom, she worked while everyone else had a grand old time. It wasn’t fair.

“That spot isn’t getting any cleaner, dear,” her mother said. “Why don’t you try the lime?”

“Don’t need it, mum, thanks,” Sera called back over her shoulder, redoubling her efforts. A sly smile crossed her face. “Mum, what time is it?”

“Half past nine,” her mother answered quickly.

That was easy enough, Sera thought. Maybe something less simple…

“Hey, mum?”

“Hay is for horses, dear heart.”

“Mum,” Sera continued. “Why do I have to get the floor so clean if we’re just going to cover it with straw?”

Her mother’s mouth moved almost before the question was finished. “It keeps the bugs away so we don’t get infested like that godsawful Crusader’s Stein tavern down the road.”

“Oh.” That made sense. Why couldn’t her mother have said that the last time she asked?

“Here, now, young lady,” her mother said, frowning. “I’ll thank you to finish your work and keep silly questions to yourself.”

Sera smiled and said nothing.

Allie, Sera’s older sister, danced in from the kitchen. “Away, away, you coal-black smith, would you do me this wrong…”

“For to think to have my maidenhead that I have kept so long?” her mother continued.

“I’d rather I was dead and cold, and my body laid in the grave, than a husky, dusky, coal-black smith my maidenhead should have,” they finished together, chuckling.

Sera cleared her throat. It was time for the real test. “Mum, what’s a maidenhead?”

“A girl’s virginity,” her mother responded.

Before she could be interrupted, Sera asked, “So that song’s about some blacksmith trying to take a girl’s virginity?”

“Yes.”

“Why do you like to sing it, then?”

Her mother’s hands flew up to cover her mouth but it was no use. “Because it reminds me of when your father and I were first courting.”

Sera stuck out her tongue. “Gross!”

And just like that, Sera found herself locked in her room.

“You can come out when you’ve got a civil tongue in your head,” her mother said. “Or when we need you to help with the serving.”

She only spent a few hours leafing through her book of fairy tales before she was called to help clear tables and wash dishes. Eventually it was so busy that she was stuck serving while her younger siblings did all the cleaning. She managed to stay quiet and let the patrons bark orders until at last she forgot and slipped up.

“What would you like, sir?” she asked a quiet older fellow with a big bushy mustache. He spent several minutes enumerating things he would like, starting with new boots and underclothes, and Sera learned far more about him than she ever cared to know.

“What would you like to drink, sir?” she finally interjected in desperation.

“Water!” he exclaimed, gasping for breath. The patrons around him had moved away as much as possible, perhaps thinking he was already in his cups.

Sera darted off, her stomach doing a nervous jig. This was supposed to be a little spell? All she wanted was for people to give her straight answers, but if she asked the wrong questions… Sure, she could find out whether her little brother had nicked her dolls, or where her older sister was sneaking off to some nights, but this was so much bigger. Ye gods, she could ask a killer whether he had done it and he’d confess like a shot.

That was it. Sera had to get out and find that dwarf. The spell had only cost a few of her tears, though what he would do with them was anyone’s guess; maybe she could barter more to have the spell broken…

She slipped out the back door and tiptoed toward the crowded streets before realizing that no one would hear her. She took off at a run, dodging between women bustling about trying to look interesting, and men shopping for trinkets to give their sweethearts, and children playing with tiny popping fireworks that made a loud noise but didn’t burn. Food vendors danced to and fro, hardly needing to cry their wares with all the hungry people on every side.

But where the dwarf’s shop had been, squeezed between other buildings, there was nothing. Not empty space, but no space, the shops fitting snugly together. She even ran her hands over the walls to be sure.

“You can’t be serious,” she muttered.

Someone grabbed her shoulder and spun her around. She found herself staring at a boy about her age, with a halo of absurdly curly blond hair and dark brown eyes. He looked about as confused as she felt.

“Are you a princess, then?” he asked.

“No,” she sputtered. “Who do you think you are?”

His eyes widened as his lips moved of their own accord. “Crown Prince Wilford Otha Delmer Sebastian of Eastford and Greater Gramontis.”

Sera gasped. In seconds, she was pressed against the wall with a hand over her mouth.

“I was very much keeping that a secret,” the prince whispered into her ear. “So how, may I ask, did you do that?” He moved his hand enough to let her answer.

“I’m under a spell,” she said.

His eyes flicked to the wall. “The dwarf?”

She nodded, her nose turning red from impending tears.

“And the spell was?”

“To make people answer my questions,” she muttered.

His cheek twitched. “Better than the one I got, I think. Why are you here?”

Part of her noted ruefully that she was answering all of his questions, no spell needed. “I wanted him to take it off. I can’t live like this.”

“And your name?”

“Sera. Sera Innskeep.”

“Well, Sera Innskeep,” he said. “First, we’re going to nick some food. Then, horses.” She could almost see his thoughts flying around in his head.

“And then?” she asked, dazed.

“We find that dwarf.”

And that is the story of how Sera met the Crown Prince. How the two set off to break her peculiar spell and what befell them on their journeys is another story, and shall be told at another time.

Curiosity: a fairy tale in two parts

Friday, October 8th, 2010

Nestled between the butcher and the baker, across the street from the candlemaker, a shop stood as if hunched in on itself and trying to look inconspicuous. Sera had never seen it before, despite living in the same town and passing the same buildings for as long as she could remember. Glancing around, she noticed that unlike all the other shops, this one did not have a single customer wandering in or out. A small sign hanging from a metal arm simply read, “Charming Little Store.” This, she decided, warranted further investigation.

She marched straight up to the worn wooden door and pushed it open. A strand of bells jingled somewhere in the strangest room she had ever seen. Rows of shelves stretched from floor to ceiling, each stuffed with stacks of scrolls in varying colors and sizes–some brown and brittle, some creamy white, some a strange non-color that seemed to change when she watched it out of the corner of her eye, but stopped when she stared at it directly. Something in her quietly insisted that the space between the other shops was not big enough to accommodate all of this.

“Are you a customer?” inquired a raspy voice from about the height of her navel. Sera looked down and met the bright blue eyes of a man whose beard reached down to his waist. His hair was white and his skin was wrinkled and ruddy as a fallen apple, but he was only slightly taller than her youngest brother, who could still count his age on the fingers of one hand.

“Are you a dwarf?” she asked.

“No, I’m just very short.” He rolled his eyes. “Yes, I’m a dwarf, don’t be daft. Are you here to buy something or not?”

“What are you selling? Just paper?”

The dwarf bristled. “Just paper? This—” He flung his arms open to indicate the army of shelves. “This is no mere paper, my potential purchaser of property. These… are magic spells.”

Sera folded her arms over her chest. “Oh, so you’re one of those dwarves. And what would you want in exchange? My firstborn child? Some straw spun into gold?”

“Well…”

“Because I can’t spin, you know,” Sera interrupted. “And I don’t intend to have children any time soon. I can’t charm forest creatures, and I certainly won’t clean your house while you’re away. I already work at a tavern, so I clean enough as it is.”

“Now hold on there,” the dwarf said. “It’s not all like that. You’re thinking the really big spells, the ones that turn poor girls into princesses. I sell… smaller spells.”

Sera was nothing if not curious to a fault, and this was the first really interesting thing to happen in her life—not counting the incident with the jellied pears when she was seven, because honestly, she had just been standing nearby. She wrinkled her nose at the dwarf, who reminded her strongly of the “magic” carpet salesman that her father had chased out of the tavern last summer.

“How small, exactly?” she asked.

“So small, most people don’t even notice them,” he replied. “Have you ever wondered what it’s like to walk on the ceiling?”

“Like a spider?”

“Just like that,” the dwarf answered.

“I don’t like spiders.”

The dwarf’s hand twitched. “Perhaps you’d like the eyesight of an eagle?”

Sera shook her head. “I’d go mad, looking at all the dirt on the floor.”

“The strength of a bear?”

“I’d be made to move barrels of beer all the time.”

The dwarf shifted nervously from foot to foot, then set off down the nearest aisle. He pulled down scrolls and scraps and even thick sheaths of paper, scanning them briefly before tossing them aside, occasionally calling out to her in a voice that cracked at the edges.

“What about the speed of a hare? Or darksight? Would you want to speak to animals?”

“Is that anything like talking to humans, or do they have more interesting things to say?” she asked, poking a small paper folded into the shape of a flower.

“Depends on the animal, but not usually,” he responded. “Birds are the worst, gossip like old ladies.” He disappeared, and Sera thought he had finally given up when a crash issued from a far-off corner, followed by a cloud of dust. She suppressed a sneeze as the dwarf waddled forward, holding a ponderous tome nearly half his size. With a dramatic thump, he dropped the book on a podium and produced a magnifying glass.

Sera peered over his shoulder at a mass of tiny, unintelligible squiggles that could have been writing. She could almost swear that the splotchy bits were moving whenever she looked at them directly.

“We’ll find you something,” the dwarf grumbled, moving the glass back and forth as if trying to follow a hysterical bug in an invisible maze.

She turned away from the dwarf and found herself nose to nose with an enormous white cat. It could have been two cats huddled together for warmth, or hiding under a blanket with only one head sticking out. A cat only got this big by devouring small dogs and digesting them slowly like a snake.

Slowly, gingerly, Sera stepped back while maintaining eye contact with the creature. It stretched out a paw and began to clean its claws, licking between them as if sharpening them with its tongue.

“Nice kitty,” she mumbled. The cat paused and its pupils widened.

“Pay him no mind, young lady,” the dwarf said. “He’s just looking for attention. Sweet as a baby, he is.”

“Babies aren’t sweet,” Sera replied. “They scream and cry a lot. And spit up on things. And he’s far too big to be a baby.”

The dwarf paused in his relentless reading to glare at her. “Aye, he’s older than the… he’s very old. Already gone through seven of his nine lives.”

“How’s that?”

“Curiosity killed the cat, don’t you know,” the dwarf smirked. “And he’s a very curious cat.”

Sera tried not to stare at the fluffy mound of menace. “But that’s doesn’t make sense… what’s so dangerous about curiosity?”

“It depends on the kind of curiosity, I suppose.” The dwarf stroked his beard, staring at the book. “There are some things that folks just don’t need to know.”

“Like what?” Sera demanded, her back stiffening.

“I wouldn’t know,” he replied. “No need.”

Sera whirled to face him, fists clenched. “See, that’s the problem. People just decide you don’t need to know something, so they won’t tell you. Or they think you know, so they get angry if you ask. Or they don’t know, but they don’t want you to know that they don’t know, so they pretend to know but you still don’t know because they won’t tell you, because they don’t really know themselves. And that’s not fair, you know?” she finished, whirling to face the dwarf, who sported a bemused yet satisfied expression.

“Have I got the perfect spell for you,” he said with a grin.

* * * * *

Part two

I Spy With My Third Eye

Friday, October 1st, 2010

Giselle watched the people stream past her in the mall as she sat on a plush armchair, legs crossed. Which one of them was a monster? Was it the bald man sitting at the cafe table in front of the churro maker? The giggling women with doughy middles walking into the clothing store? The teenager with his hands stuffed into his pockets, earphones distancing him from the world? She had played this game since she had learned how to control her ability, even if it made her government handlers edgy.

Randy’s voice whispered through the tiny receiver in her ear. “Stop screwing around and get your mojo on.”

“Spoilsport,” she murmured. She closed her eyes, then opened the third one that no one could see and looked at the crowd again.

The regular people blurred, enfolded in hazy clouds of color that minor psychics saw as auras. Here and there a person was more clear, focused, and Giselle knew it meant they had what Hollywood called the “It Factor” and what she called “being extra real.” If she could look down at herself, she would see a bright silver glow; unfortunately, so could the creature she was trying to find.

Giselle picked it out of the crowd and smirked. It was pretending to be a mother with a toddler, and the adorable tyke was eliciting a more than reasonable amount of head-patting. She wondered what those poor people would think if they knew they were having small amounts of their life forces siphoned away by a bulbous green appendage.

“Two o’clock, adult female holding little kid’s hand, red shirt and black pants,” she whispered.

“You sure?” Randy asked.

“No, I’m just screwing with you.”

Her sarcasm did not go undetected. While she watched the creature, out of the corners of her eyes she could see the agents closing in around it.

Unfortunately, that was when it noticed her. Its warring instinctual responses were almost palpable: fight or flight? Giselle hoped it would run, because then it would just be a track and bag. If not…

The creature roared and charged her. To the other patrons, it would look like a mom screaming and dragging her also screaming child forward. To Giselle, it was an eight-foot-tall mass of muscle bearing down on her with a mouth full of needle teeth.

She nearly fell out of the chair trying to get up. That’s what she got for picking a soft one. Hoping that Randy’s boys could keep an eye on the critter without her help, she took off in the opposite direction.

The sounds of pursuit followed. People protested behind Giselle as the creature shoved them aside with more strength than any slim lady and toddler should possess. She didn’t bother glancing over her shoulder, just ran as fast as she could while dodging the fuzzy rainbows of cloud-people drifting about.

Even worse, now she could see tiny dark forms massing around her, attracted to her bright aura. They were like the pilot fish of the spirit world, and as far as they were concerned, she was a big blob of chum in the water. If she kept her third eye open much longer, she’d be shark bait.

Ahead, she saw a big department store, which would have some swell places to hide. Unfortunately, it would also have exits through which the creature could escape. She had to do something.

“Come on, Randy,” she muttered, and plunged into the store. She made a beeline for a lady with a fake smile and a bottle in her hand.

“Would you like to try–”

“Yes!” Giselle snatched the bottle and raced for the big perfume counter. Her nose was assaulted by a mix of floral odors and spicier aromas with hints of rose and licorice and a dozen other conflicting scents. Ignoring the protests of the staff, she vaulted the glass display case and ducked down, hoping the creature would be gone when she stood up.

Instead, the glass next to her shattered, and she crawled in the opposite direction, stifling a scream. The display in front of her exploded. Through the empty space she saw giant teeth, then a huge lidless eye.

“Made you look,” she said, and sprayed the perfume at it. The creature roared in pain, trying to wipe the burning liquid out of its eye. Giselle backed away, glass crunching under her feet, and wished she had worn sneakers instead of flip-flops.

The creature flinched as if stung and groaned. Giselle saw the tranquilizer dart sticking out of its… shoulder, for lack of a better term, and sighed in relief. The dark bits around her were getting bigger, but she could finally close her third eye. The sharks would have to find her another day.

Now all she could see was a puzzled woman holding a puzzled child’s hand, both of them slowly sinking to the ground. Some people around them looked concerned but none interfered, especially when a kindly looking older man in a white coat helped the woman to her feet and guided her away. The women at the perfume counter were dazed, but Randy’s agents were already feeding them a cover story that probably involved a psych ward.

Giselle was picking glass out of her feet when Randy arrived. “Wish you wouldn’t run like that,” he said.

“Wish you’d give me a taser or something so I wouldn’t have to improvise,” she retorted, tossing him the bottle of perfume.

He laughed. “How about I buy you a drink to take the edge off?”

“One drink? I’ll tell you what: you buy, and I’ll let you know when the edge is gone. I hope you brought the company card.”

* * * * *
Like Giselle? Check out her other stories:

You Get What You Pay For

The Doors of Perception