Extreme Flash

Change of Fun

Norbert appears boyish in his flat cap, wrinkles hiding beneath the brim’s shadow. He watches a swarm of tots gathering ‘round a soccer ball. He played football, without protective gear — tackle, not touch — in a yard wearing outside shoes. Norbert grins; shin guards and pint-sized cleats supervised at manicured fields.

*Writing Flash Fiction is an exercise in brevity. My original example here is just 50 words. The short story genre is often standardized at 750 words, with some guidelines allowing to a 1,000 word count. The exercise is fun; I dare you to try it. Feel free to leave links or examples in the comments.  

The Companions We Keep

Grandma Suzanne always said, “I take my happy with me wherever I go.”

I always thought happy was grandpa’s name.

When grandpa retired, I was just learning to read. The banner said Congratulations Mark! Best Wishes.

“Who is Mark?” I asked my mom.

“That’s Grandpa,” she said.

“I thought his name was Happy, because grandma always says she is taking her happy with her.”

My mom’s sister overheard this and she laughed as my mom did the best she could to keep her face straight.

“Oh, Elliot, honey. That’s just an old saying Grandma likes,” she said.

“That’s right,” know-it-all Aunt Bee said. “The entire saying is ‘happiness is not a destination. It is a companion we can choose to accompany us on our journey.’”

I exhaled through a clenched jaw. My welling, deep black eyes squinted to slits. I turned and stomped away. I heard oh my and snickers following me. I hid beneath a row of coats in the hallway leading to the restrooms. I situated myself in the corner, well concealed among the bunched coats.

That is what I took with me — memories of teasing, laughter, and gut-twisting embarrassment. I carried my thoughts of my own stupidity.

I watched ankles and legs. From my vantage point I could only make out cropped people as they walked in the hallway.  

 

Mom came out and called a hushed, “Elliot.” A half-heartedly attempt to reach me, I thought. Dad stepped behind her and convinced her that the concern she held was unfounded.

“He will be fine. He’s just a little embarrassed,” I overheard Dad say. “He’s just a boy who needs time alone to get himself together.”

I should muscle through and be a tough guy like my father, I thought. My dad never did anything embarrassing. He played hockey with the guys from the health network where he practiced orthopedic medicine.  

“Are you sure he’s okay?” mom asked.

“I’m sure,” Dad said.

“You are probably right,” she conceded.

I watched ankles, shins and shoes parade back and forth. I’m not sure how long I sat there. As time passed, voices got louder, steps got quicker. The party was building momentum. Laughter was populating. Inhibitions were vanishing. Happy was a promiscuous companion of all the party guests.

Well nearly all. I only had shame to carry with me. Grandma Suzanne came to me then. At an age when her peers walked with orthopedic shoes, she wore a beige, wedge sandal. Her slender legs hadn’t lost their tone, thanks to her regular practice of yoga and Zumba.

She often said, “inactivity was akin to playing dead, and she had far too much living yet to do.”

Grandma Suzanne described herself as young, which she justified because she could still sit on the floor.

“Children sit on the floor,” she always said.

It was unsaid that old people sit in Barcalounger or arm chairs with ottomans to put their heavy feet up. She gave her chair up at gatherings to people half her age.  

Grandma knew where to find me, and magically she knew just the right time to seek me out. She crawled right under those coats across from me. She didn’t say anything. She just sat there in her pantsuit and waited for me to acknowledge her. I couldn’t wait long. I looked up at Grandma and didn’t feel a need to explain what I was doing or why I was sitting there. She didn’t need me to express how angry I felt when Aunt Bee laughed or how lonely I felt after leaving the party.

I sensed her calm. I felt peace just being near here.

She stretched her arms and said, “Won’t you please join me? Happy is inside watching the band. She’s waiting for you.”

I returned her smile. I nodded. I placed my hands in hers with age spots that wouldn’t lie. I loved that woman.

We danced and laughed. I noticed Mom, well into her swaying stupor, color her face with relief when she saw me with Grandma.   

I was with Happy then. Grouchy was too heavy a companion, I decided.

 

Flowers for Rodger

The petunias were stored in the back hallway. Last year, at this time, they hung beautifully in an odd row of three at the front of the wrap-around porch. Nancy hadn’t bothered to buy the other five baskets for the west side of the porch.

Mother Nature paid no attention to the calendar. She confused and swirled the Wisconsin seasons together. The sun seldom made its appearance between the endless, overcast days. Nancy sat in her dim sunroom — her feet propped on an ivory ottoman with a shag blanket tugged to her armpits.

Nancy read. She distracted herself with pop psychology in attempt to drive her blues away. Blues is such a disrespectful euphemism for the depression, which came each winter uninvited. This noun identifying a disease was misunderstood as a characterization of a feeling, a controllable emotion.

In truth it was an intermittent interruption of a productive life. It interfered with the most basic tasks — showering and eating. And, certainly, it killed manicures & haircuts, shopping & socializing, and work & school for the young.

Blah was the rain for which Nancy had no umbrella, no shield or armor. Comfortable misery enveloped her as did the sweaters, thick and soft. She longed to bounce into well-being, snap out of it as the cliché goes.

A passage she read said to do something, anything, just move, find any activity to take your mind off your feelings. Nancy thought about those empty hooks around the white house. She thought about the baskets of petunias that she could not hang. She thought about the rope in the garage. An idea came to mind.

Nancy went outside without a coat, but she kept that blanket for a shawl. She grabbed the rope from the garage and walked to the back of the house. She could see the koi pond in the northeast corner of the city lot. She was enclosed in the privacy of the cedar perimeter. Nancy dragged a heavy, iron chair away from its table and pair. Looking up, Nancy saw the hooks secure enough to hold a two-pound basket. What about a two hundred pound blob of a woman wearing sweatpants and slippers? She looked like the grandmother she wasn’t; her children — one gay and the other selfish — had grown to move away and find happiness without kids. She had no family nearby, no child’s colorings on her fridge. Her green, lush gardens were the only life she tended.

Nancy heard footsteps on the porch, delicate footsteps.

“Hello? Nancy? Hello? Are you here?” a sweet voice called from the front of the house.

Nancy recognized her neighbor Grace who considered herself a social butterfly, but Nancy considered her more of a busy body bee buzzing around without invitation.

“Yes, I’m in the back,” Nancy called and kicked the rope to the side of the house.

“Oh, thank goodness you’re home! I wanted to bring you these marigolds for Rodger. I remember they were his favorite and I couldn’t help but notice your window boxes have been empty the past two summers,” Grace gushed.

Nancy hadn’t had the heart to fill those boxes. She a tended the grounds, her hostas, hydrangeas, lilacs, bleeding hearts, corn flowers, daisies, and ferns; her garden beds were the envy of the neighborhood. The annuals were Rodgers job.

“Why thank you. How thoughtful of you,” Nancy said.

The curt nature of her response was meant to thwart any attempt Grace would make to worm her way into a glass of tea or conversation of phony pleasantries.

“Well, I just wanted to drop off the flowers. I was at the garden shop and thought of you, well Rodger, when I noticed the bright orange blooms and sturdy stems,” Grace said. “I think you could plant now and they will survive this lingering winter. It is mid-May after all.”

“Yes this winter is a bugger,” Nancy agreed. “I’ll bring these in the garage and watch the weather report to make sure we don’t have a repeat of last night’s frost.”

“Okay. Well, I’ll be going. Spring should stick around now. They lady at the garden center said seventies by the weekend,” Grace said.

Nancy smiled, really smiled, and allowed hope to plant inside her.

She wasn’t planning to fill those window boxes. No, they would remain empty. What she did plan to do was bring the marigolds where they belonged: to Rodger. She’d plant them in the half moon plot in front of his headstone. Nancy pictured herself visiting those annuals throughout the summer to deadhead the dying making way for new blooms.

Yesterday

I sleep in pajamas, a white pair of cotton Capri’s with pastel polka dots and a pink tank top. The nightmares are sure to come. Toddlers will scamper down the hallway past the nightlight’s glow from the bathroom. Either one of the blond boys will charge into my master suite, an oversized room with a his-and-her dresser set in cherry wood. The child will scream “da da” and crawl over me to the free side of the king-size bed bedecked with chocolate and turquoise comforter and sheets.  

I used to sleep in cotton panties, which he softly slid down my thighs and past my ankles before they were tossed free by willing feet. Our tongues would find each other. Then, his would explore my neck and breasts while I’d caress his strong back and glide petite hands farther to his soft bottom. My hands would then guide his face back next to mine. Gently, he would rock me to a place of completeness until we’d collapse into each other. Other nights, I’d rest my nearly naked self onto him fetal-like in an embrace until sleep would come.

Husband, father, friend, no more, just a memory, empty space, void in my heart, and air in my arms. Our twins reach for a daddy vanished from us. I turn to them, swallow my pain, and quiet their fears whispering promises of security I cannot keep. I curse Doug for building a life he couldn’t sustain leaving a family without its head.

Breadwinner

I park the sedan in the driveway, too anxious to maneuver into the tight garage spot amidst bikes, roller skates, and hula hoops. The air is trapped in the car having been heated from sitting in the un-shaded parking lot from 9 to nearly 5. I drove home without rolling down the windows to release the dense, still air. I turn off the car. The radio continues to play something I can't recognize.

In the back seat is a box overflowing with years of stuff that personalized my office space. There are the framed photos from our trip to Disney World, 10 years ago. The girls proudly twirled in their princess outfits after their breakfast and pampering with Cinderella. At the time, I rolled my eyes and reluctantly allowed the indulgence. Now stamped in time is a picture of my then 3- and 4-year-old daughters in complementary dresses with ruffled pink and purple skirts. Oh, how my mom shook her head at this, having raised me better.

"Prince charming is a booby prize for women," the bitter housewife repeated throughout my childhood.

She wanted to raise an independent woman. Romance was something foolish girls pursued. She insisted I get an education and use it for something other than coming up with intelligent cocktail-party conversation.

The radio times out. The glow of the digital clock numbers fades leaving no way to track the time. As I sit with self-inflicted paralysis, my husband and daughters likely are preparing a baked or grilled variation of some boneless, skinless chicken recipe. Because of my mother, I resolved to have a career and turned up my nose at stay-at-home-moms. I lived in a family with reversed roles, my husband the primary caregiver.

I stare straight ahead, years of posture lectures have me trained to avoid a slouch no matter how defeated I feel. Through the rearview mirror I see the couple next door walking their pair of Shepherds, Jack and Jill — pets to replace the void of children that never came.

It was 4 when I was called back to meet with our district manager Bob Teebone. He has manicured square fingernails and wears a thick standard gold wedding band.

"Bob, nice to see you," I said trying to hide my suspicion of the unannounced visit.

"Please, call me Mr. Teebone," Bob said.

I blushed and mumbled, "Yes, of course."

I stood with my legal pad folded across my chest hiding an elongated tear-shaped coffee stain on my white blouse. He reported the sales records for the month of June, which I had compiled for him.

"We need to make drastic changes in the way we do business in this market," Mr. Teebone said. "While we cannot afford to subsidize this location any longer, we think it’s premature to close."

A sigh of relief released from my chest. Since the Family Dollar opened in the strip mall across the street our sales had steadily declined. I thought with time the customers would return to Shopko's store aisles. I thought we could beat them with customer service, but with staff reductions customers are waiting in longer, slower-moving lines. I thought a redesign would set us apart as a more upscale shopping center. Turns out the redesign just pissed off our regular customers who had to relearn the location of their favorite products.

"I can turn this around," I said.

"We decided we need someone to competently move us forward. We have hired your replacement," Bob said. "I need you to sign these termination papers. You will find a generous severance package, the options for continuing your health coverage, and the procedures for payment from your paid-time-off balances. Questions can be directed to Tina in HR."

Inertia, my mind reeled back to high school chemistry, the tendency for an object in motion to stay in motion. This action, unbeknown to me, started long before our conversation took place. I was unable to argue, debate, or plea.

"We need you to sign and date here," Bob said sliding a document to my side of the table.

I accepted defeat and scratched my first and maiden names.

**

My identity is gone; I carry the copy paper box past our rose bushes, which are remarkably healthy, much to the jealousy of one particular neighbor who haughtily said they would never survive a Wisconsin winter when she saw me planting them last spring. These plants have survived; they are defiant and bloom without reserve, against the alleged odds.