256 – She’ll Be Right (A Very Short Story)

I didn’t usually let myself be the kind of man who cries, or feels sorry for himself, or wails into the night after a girl. It was no wonder Harriet couldn’t look me in the eyes; I wouldn’t be able to look at me either. I wouldn’t recognise myself, red-eyed and hopeless.

With a cough and a grunt, I cleared the mucus from my throat and propelled it to the concrete in front of me. I started to feel like I was regaining some of my masculinity.I swiped the back of my hand across my eyes, wiping away the mix of rain, tears and sweat.

Harriet didn’t want to see me now, but she had this terrible, and admirable capacity for hearing me out. Regardless of how awful I’d ever been to her, or how much she wanted to hate me for the rest of her life, she always came back around.

239 – The Wall (A Very Short Story)

I knew it was going to be like this standing in the sea breeze, on the other side of the wall. With you in there, not knowing I am out here at all.

But still I came, hoping you remember my name and can feel me here out here in the cold, with you in there because somehow everything went wrong.

I knew this would feel awful, like standing at a grave, but worse. Because I can still feel you breathing here in my heart, with just this wall keeping us apart.

I’m here outside because I knew it would feel exactly like this. Like nothing I ever thought I would ever feel, but it is as close I can get now to feeling like what you and I had was real.

So I came to feel just like this; and even though you don’t know that I am standing right outside I hope you can feel me here wanting to share just one kiss with you.

There is nothing I can see myself ever wanting more than for the two of us to be standing on the same side of this wall.

232 – I Dropped To My Knees (A Very Short Story)

My whole body shook with the tremendous effort of trying to breathe. I flattened my palms to the concrete in front of me in an attempt to brace myself, heaving in one rain-saturated breath after the other.

“Oh my God.” Harriet’s voice punched out the words as if they were burning her mouth, like she had to spit them out before they could singe her taste-buds.

I didn’t look at her, or notice her tear-streaked face. I didn’t pay attention to the trembling in her voice, or the way she locked her fingers together, twisting them around trying to figure out what to say next.

“Oh my God,” she coughed again, followed by a sharp intake of air, like she didn’t really mean to say anything at all.

“Oh my God.”

I slapped my hands hard on the concrete, splashing the puddle that was forming around them.

“Stop saying ‘Oh my God’,” Harriet jumped at the sound of my voice. “Say something… Say anything that isn’t ‘Oh my God’!”

The small brunette stumbled as she stepped backwards onto the grass. She wiped her face furiously, brushing away the soaked hair that had matted to her forehead.

“I can’t, Luke,” her voice was thick with the tears she was holding at bay. “I just… Oh my God.”

She turned on her toes and vaulted over the no-longer-white picket fence of her house. Launching into a sprint Harriet disappeared into the stormy night.

“Harriet!” I called after her, leaping to my feet.

208 – Your Love Has Died (A Very Short Story)

“I’m sorry Laurel, but your love has died.”

The words rang in her ears
But she didn’t hear, she just cried,
And moved her head to the side
Trying to hide the tears in her hair.
She’d tried to hope for the best,
But without even trying she had prepared…

“He died from a broken heart, he couldn’t survive being apart.”

Laurel had known from the start
She wouldn’t have the last say,
No one would really have their way.
Their love was the unearthly kind.
The sort that defies space and time,
A second love that came just behind.

“Laurel, is there anyone we can call?”

And she sighed.
They are together at last,
A love that was never allowed to fall

“No, thank you doctor. There was never anyone else at all.”

196 – Ten (A Very Short Story)

‘You have 10 unread messages’.

You’re an unread message.

The young woman looked around her office at faces brightened by artificial light from the computers they were staring into. She listened to the robotic strumming on noisy, out-dated keyboards, and pondered the dull hum of an air conditioner making the room just slightly too warm.

‘You have 10 unread messages’.

What would happen if I deleted them all without reading any?

The air itself seemed to gasp at the idle thought, as if someone somewhere might implode on the deletion of their unopened, electronic mail. She could almost see the words floating around in the uncomfortable clamminess, lost with no direction; floating in cyber-space never to be heard of again.

‘You have 10 unread messages’.

A phone rang in a far, darkened corner of the office; it added a shrill note to the workplace symphony and gave the noise a sense of purpose. The air-conditioner hummed its bass line underneath the professional key of a male voice taking the call.

‘You have 10 unread messages’.

Her screen blared in an ominous build up of symphonic tension, and dared her to topple over the edge; or more succinctly, throw herself hurtling forward into an abyss of the unknown.

‘Delete all’.

Take that emails. Take that email-ers. Take that internet, and corporate one per cent.

‘You have 0 unread messages’.

Leaning back into her rolling office chair, added a quiet squeal to the mix. Suddenly the rattling away on keyboards that she had so quickly dismissed, seemed important and busy. More phones rang, a door bell sounded, multiple conversations happened, fax machines faxed, printers printed, a photocopier copied, two cellphones vibrated; the sounds went on and magic happened around her.

‘You have 0 unread messages’.

The sounds go on and magic happens…

‘Deleted messages. – Select all. – Move to inbox.’

‘You have 10 unread messages’.

189 – It Could All Work Out (A Very Short Story)

He half met the gaze of a young woman, much prettier, and far more intelligent than any woman he might usually have dared talking to. Normally he might avoid someone so youthful and lovely, and with such quick wit. But, she made him feel like he existed in a way that he was so removed from feeling; unintentionally she conjured up something he couldn’t describe with words, only in beats, and semi-tones, and chords.

It was a snap decision to ask her name, equal to deciding on revealing his own; they said nothing but everything in a short moment of introduction. A kind of electricity buzzed around them, setting their proximity to each other ablaze.

A steady beat on a sturdy cello mourned the loss of the older man’s diffidence, and played a sumptuous lullaby filled with everything he’d ever wanted to speak. Not with many words but one, he found the courage to tell the truth about his thoughts. He found he could look into the eyes he’d once considered too magnificent to gaze upon, and she wouldn’t look away. She spoke a smile with sparkling, grey eyes and told him silently that somehow, it could all work out in the end…

68 – An Ending (A Very Short Story)

The truth is I don’t remember seeing you for the first time. I don’t recall meeting you, or even the day we met. But I remember the first time I noticed your smile. Almost too wide for its owner’s petite face, but it reached all the way to grey eyes that seemed to…dance? And for the maybe the only time in my life, I didn’t have anything snide to say, for just one second you took my breath away.

That day your smile changed me, and I haven’t been the same since.

I didn’t know that at the time, nor did I expect what would become of my life, or that you would have anything to do with any messed up part of it.

Neither of us could have seen this coming. No one prepares for it to end like this…

I didn’t know I loved you until the day I loved you, and even then what was I supposed to do about it? There were so many doors and the only one that was even remotely ajar was the door marked, “Keep It All Closed Inside”.

Y’know? I guess you do know.

I’d take it all back if I could. All of the pain; all of the lies, and all of the time we…I wasted. I always told you I was never gonna be good enough for that smile.

I tried to warn you; to warn both of us.

But it did keep me out of harm’s way for a bit. Harm has a way of tracking me down though, and locking me up in dark places, where no one can find me. You found me, and I wish for your sake that you hadn’t. For the confusion, and terror I brought to your life, all you have to show for it is my heart. Which isn’t worth too much I know, and is broken far worse than I ever was…

But it’s one-of-a-kind, and has only had one owner.

This… You and I, what we had, I’ve never taken it for granted. I just think it wasn’t supposed to be this time. I’ve felt you love me, so much more than I deserve… Now, one more time your love gives me strength, enough to be strong for you.

Another lifetime perhaps.

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Hey babes, and babettes. So, I had some blog trouble earlier this week and people were super kind, and helpful with it. Those amazing people know who they are, and have my undying gratitude. Also, it seems that this time of week has become a bit of a ‘Very Short Story Thursday’. For the most part these are the results of a great writing class I’m taking. Thanks once more, from my heart to yourses, for checking in, and checking up! In the words of one Dobie Gray: “I want to get lost in your rock and roll, and drift away.” . xo – M

62 – A Savoury Treat (A Very Short Story)

“What’s an indoor picnic without cucumber sandwiches?” The shrill voice of my brother’s fiance rang through the vast halls. “What do you mean there’s no cucumber? How are we supposed to have sandwiches without cucumber?” As if she could hardly believe we were still confined to the use of our ration books from week to week.
“Let us not forget that we are in the midst of a famine, my dear,” my brother rested his arm affectionately around her shoulders and led her away.
Always the bearded, voice of reason my brother; diplomatic and kind. Though you wouldn’t know so to look at him. His eyebrows were too close together, which made him look quite cross, when in fact it was more often, very much the opposite. He had big hands that hung limp by his sides. His knees were knobbly, and for as long as I could remember, he had never been able to walk in a straight line.
But he did have the most brilliant smile; and it wasn’t he who needed to parade down an aisle, in a straight line anyway.

56 – A Beginning (a short story)

This is the very short story of an ending, that doesn’t totally make sense without the perspective of a starting point, but I think it’s an ending that itself tells you everything you need to know. He died.
And everything everyone had ever known stopped; it just halted. Suddenly, our lives were painted on a landscape without him in it, and the sky was a slightly darker hue of blue, with a few squiggled birds, that looked more like they were falling, and not flying.
The clouds began to hang lower and we continuously knocked our heads, trying to find some sense in a nonsensical tale. He was here, and then he wasn’t; it was pointless trying to find sense there.
So, the end, it began just like that. With a tip of his hat, he was gone; and there was something so wrong about it. Like I should have somehow been consulted first, because the surprise of finding out was so much worse than he could have imagined; if he’d imagined it at all.
(Credit a little bit goes to Gail Pittaway,  and the lovely way she teaches.)