Daily Flash Fiction Stories
A black bird tumbles from the clear, blue sky.
Beneath it looms a small, untouched grove where thyme and hemlock make themselves at home.
The small creature crashes through leaves and branches. The fall peppers its black, glossy wings with kisses from evergreens and oak trees until the creature is embraced by the mossy ground.
The hardest kiss is received from a mighty oak and the left wing breaks so the rest of the animal might not.
By Raji A. Samuel
The plan is to survive on the noodles for the coming weeks, until the salary is paid. The plan, however, is flawed from the start. The salary never comes on time, and when it comes, well, it goes back to the payment of debt. And if it was her alone she might not even ask.
“Pay me back when you can,” she says always, “however you can.”
From the first time I met her, I knew I was in debt. First I owed it to myself from that moment, to solve the mystery that is her, to know her like I have never known anyone, and my senses will not let me rest until I do. And secondly I owed her, to know her as she wants me to, as she begs me to, since I had gotten close to her, against the warnings of my own continence.
By Shannon Azzato Stephens
This is how it was supposed to go: Alphabet City would, contrary to all expectations, be good for the baby. They would wake when he woke, and they would tell him every story they knew so he would never feel alone. When he got older, he would make friends with panhandlers and leave a skateboard tipped against the wall in the hallway before washing his hands and coming to dinner.
It seems foolish to JC now, the idea that they could control how they would raise their child. JC cannot remember the last time he and his wife touched in their sleep, or when he went to bed in the dark and did not wake until daylight. The baby does not sleep between them but in a crib JC’s mother bought when she came to visit. The baby only sleeps after drinking from his mother’s breast, and when JC is with him, he is desperate for moments of relief. When he steps away, it is with a sense of great failure.
The crisp air of the last days of autumn filled the room as the steady back and forth of her rocker sounded eerily like a metronome. Most leaves on the gnarled oak in the back yard had long since fallen to the ground. The few that still clung to the tree’s long branches shuddered in the cold of the night breeze. Two brown and crinkled reminders of a summer past swayed on the outstretched limb nearest to her open bedroom window. She began to hum the memory of a waltz she thought she had forgotten.
How we used to love to dance.
By Caitlin Kay
He had laughed at her the first time she brought up the idea of eloping.
“Seriously? You…eloping? The girl who has had her wedding planned since she was eight years old?”
She sat elbow to elbow with him on the dark brown leather couch he insisted on moving in. It took up the whole ten foot wall and had a lounger that reached almost to the window in her tiny apartment. The room had never felt so small. She hated it. She hated the way she clung to it. She hated its cold firmness. She hated its modern flashy look. She missed its predecessor, the plaid microfiber loveseat that made the room feel less claustrophobic. She missed its warm welcome home every night. She missed the way it held her, lovingly, never forced. She missed the Saturday mornings, curled up, drinking coffee until noon. She stroked the thick leather arm chair with her fingertips, pitying its inability to hold coffee stained memories.
“I don’t know. I’m just so overwhelmed. All this wedding planning has made me dizzy. I don’t even know where to begin.”
By Shreyasi Majumdar
“Don’t worry about your toes sweetie, you’ll find them just like you found your finger.”
She looks down at her right sleeve, where her arm ends in an abrupt stump at the wrist. “I never found my finger,” she says, “and now I’ve lost all five and my palm.”
“Uh-huh, that’s great honey. Check out the All Blacks doing the haka!”
She blinks, stares at the TV, right through the NZ rugby team. “The Last Cab to Darwin—it’s playing at Reading. We can catch the 7:45 show.”
“Sure thing munchkin, just not today though—I’m bowling with the guys at 7:00. I bet Jim $20 I’d beat him by 50 points at least.”
