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Stephanie leaned forward to blow into the orange glowing embers. Smoke stung her eyes and drifted into her lungs. She sat back on her heels and coughed.

“And then there was light,” Marquita said. She took some sticks from this pile next to her and put them into the fire.

“Leave it alone for now,” Stephanie said. “It has to get going before we had more wood.” The tangle of dry grass they’d used as a starter glowed with heat.

“It’s a good thing we have light,” Marquita said. “You never know what might sneak up on us in the dark.”

“Now they’re sure to find us.” Stephanie started the fire because Marquita wanted it. She didn’t think it was a good idea. They spent all evening hiking to the other side of the lake to escape, and this fire could give them away. [Read more…] about The Runaway (Flash Fiction Challenge)

Some children are afraid of storms but not Lydia. She welcomes the wind and the rain. The weight of thunder in the air comforts her.

Lightning flashes, illuminating her room for a split second. Lydia kicks the sheets from her legs, now damp with sweat, and turns over onto her side so she could see out of the window. The Spanish moss swings on a tree branch outside. Gray and matted, Lydia once believed it was the hair of a monster. When she was younger, she could see them every time she closed her eyes. Fat and furry they lumbered through the neighborhood on feet the size of cars snagging their fur on the trees.

She used to be afraid in her room alone at night. Her mother plugged in nightlight in by her closet door to chase away the darkness. Lydia would pull the blanket up over her head to protect her from the monsters. She once believed that the thin fabric was enough to protect her. [Read more…] about What Storms Bring (Flash Fiction Challenge)

The children are all in bed. Tucked tightly beneath their blankets their tiny bodies twitch with sleep. Susan checks on them before tiptoeing downstairs. She tries her best to be quiet, skipping the creaky step at the bottom of the staircase.

The house is perfection in the wee morning hours. The TV that usually erupts with colors and sounds is a quiet black box. The toys lie dormant in the corner waiting to come alive with play and get scattered across the living room carpet. This is Susan’s only time alone, and she cherishes it. She wraps her baby blue robe around herself and ties the belt closed. Sunlight is only just beginning to bleed into the darkness. A mockingbird twitters in the tree outside the living room window. [Read more…] about The Old House (Flash Fiction Challenge)

I felt like I was coming undone, like an old sweater unraveling into a pile of yarn. My nose falling on top of my lips, my eyes rolling under a chair.

Sonny spoke in warm, fluid sentences like a gentle ripples on a lake. Each thought ran into the other giving no room for a response. I stared at his mouth, watching the words form like smoke signals in the air.

“So, what do you think?” he asked. [Read more…] about The Breakup (Flash Fiction Challenge)

Anita sat on the edge of the bathtub, her head in her hands. She’d had to make many choices in her life, and she never thought that this one would be the hardest.

She first realized tht she was different when she was five years old. It was her first day of kindergarten and the children were all put in pairs. Anita remembered her partner, a dark brown girl with multicolored beads hanging from the end of her neat cornrows. “What are those?” the girl asked pointing to the bumps on Anita’s forehead. Her mother had always told Anita that these bumps were lovely and that Anita’s were particularly beautiful because of their rounded shape. The five little mounds over her eyebrows were one of the distinctive features of their people. “Why are your ears so pointy?” the girl shrieked and started to laugh. Only the females of Anita’s species had pointy ears. She was taught that they were a sign of feminity. Anita thought that these few features that distinguished her from humans were to be treasured until she started school. [Read more…] about Anita (Flash Fiction Challenge)