Trans/plant/portation

It’s not as short as Hemingway’s shortest story (For sale: baby shoes, never worn.) but seeing as I don’t compare myself to him, it doesn’t matter. It is, however, my shortest story, barely scratching 450 words.

She feels the pressure at her knees, because this roof is on more of a slant than the hill behind her house, and she’s only used to running down dirt and grass. Something about this hard tile surface hurts.

Looking toward the sunset she’s excited by how far her vision extends. She’s only ever seen the curve of the earth when she visits the coast with her parents, and somehow, it never seemed as powerful a view as this does now. She wishes, for a snatch of time, that she could just extend this sunset into tomorrow. Read More…

My heart was on fire, or at least, it felt like it was on fire. I kept one hand over the middle of my chest to double check. A nurse noticed and came over to me.

“Inez, are you in pain again?”

I nodded. I still wasn’t any good at talking. Not on a consistent basis.

The nurse leaned in and squinted at the monitor behind me. “I can only give you one more increase,” she said, twisting something on my IV line. “The pain should start to subside soon.” She patted me gently on my shoulder and I resisted jerking away. I smiled at her in as small a fashion as possible, so I wouldn’t tear the corners of my mouth. Read More…

He watched the activity around him: fruit salesman, old woman selling goat cheese, some loud man pulling people aside to show them silk scarves. Teddy was a little afraid of the scarves man.

Walking around seemed better than standing here waiting for Sophie to come back. The last he had noticed her, she’d been counting out change to give the woman from the dairy, two rows over.

“…Twenty-three, twenty-four, and twenty-five cents,” she’d said, standing up straight and running her hands down her skirt. She didn’t like touching money, she’d told Teddy. It was very dirty, probably the dirtiest thing a person would touch all day, except for live chickens. Read More…