Category Archives: Flash Friday Fiction

Strawberry Fields Forever – 159 words

“Better than Benjamin Button!” the ad said. Anything had sounded better than this: lying in bed day after day, forgotten by family, waiting to die. All my friends were dead, anyway.

“Mutter these magic words while eating strawberries,” the instructions read, “and you’ll be back in the prime of life!” They never mentioned you actually travelled back in time.

I’d hated strawberries ever since my youth. I’d eaten them anyway. Guess I ate too many, because instead of being back with Ada and Herb, dancing the night away in that speakeasy, I’m here. In the strawberry fields.

I never wanted to be here again.

The only good thing is, I know what’s coming. I know better times are coming. And I’m going to march in 1920. I’m going to build in 1940. I’m going to root those young women on in 1970. I’m going to celebrate every second of my age.

And I’m never eating a damn strawberry again.

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This week’s challenge? A 150 word story (+/- 10 words) springing forth from the photo prompt and containing some thing about friendship. What do you think? Do you like my take?

Want to read the other marvelously inventive entries? Head on over to Flash Friday Fiction and check them out – or enter your own!

Monk-eying Around – 158 words

“You’re fired!”

“Why? Because I was woolgathering and missed ringing the vesper bells by seven minutes?”

“Yes. We have zero tolerance for daydreaming.”

“But, Father, I was LITERALLY gathering wool. Brother Giovanni said we need more if he’s to have enough for weaving our winter robes.”

“That’s no excuse.”

“You’ve got bats in your belfry.”

“Pardon me?”

“I’m serious – there are bats up there. I’ve figured out a way to get rid of them.”

The abbot sighed. Brother Francesco had wreaked havoc yesterday when he’d accidentally knocked a fellow monk into the cesspit. Not to mention the time he’d nearly burned down the abbey by forgetting to extinguish the candles after midnight mass. Maybe the best place for him was up in a tower. Alone. Where he couldn’t get into anymore trouble.

“Fine. But end the ‘original compositions,’ will you? They give one such a headache.”

Francesco grinned. “Exactly. How do you think the bats feel?”

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I had to go humorous this week, since the first phrase that popped into my head after noting we had to include something about a fire was “You’re fired!” Perhaps that was not the meaning Rebekah Postupak, fearless leader of Flash Friday Fiction and selector of the weekly image and word prompts, was going for, but it amused me, because I’ve taken to exclaiming “You’re fired!” to anyone and everyone around me who makes silly or outrageous decisions. What can I say? It cracks my kids up when I announce that the driver that just cut me off in the left lane “is fired,” or when I fire daddy for attempting to catch raspberries in his mouth but dropping them on the floor instead.

The second phrase that leapt to mind was “bats in the belfry,” so I just took off from there. What do you think? Does my story ring true, or is it off-key?

Hop on over to Flash Friday Fiction to pen your own take on this photo, or to read the other fabulous submissions.

Ashes to Ashes – 154 words

What have they done to you, my darling daughter?

They’ve poisoned your waters in the name of progress. Paved over your prairies as proof of their power. The skies burn now not with the brilliant blue of untainted life-giving air, but with the smoke and chemicals of countless fires, churning, consuming, destroying all that they have been given.

Oh, my child, what they have done.

They raised me here. An homage to Mother Nature, they said. An homage to myself? Who are they kidding? Never has there been a more appropriate tribute. I am trapped, restrained, buried by the same ones who seek to revere me, staring forever into the distorted flow of my own tormented offspring.

The pain is evident across my brow, the weight of infinite sadness. My lips purse in shame. My eyes bow in sorrow. How I long to break us free from their ruination.

I am sorry, my child.

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In addition to the standard 150 word limit (+/-10), this week we had to incorporate something about freedom along with this photo prompt. What do you think of my take? Want to read the other wonderful entries, or contribute your own? Head on over to Flash Friday Fiction and check it out!

The Green-Eyed Monster (155 words)

He hadn’t meant for it to happen. Polite society frowned upon such goings-on, after all.

Impolite society had taken matters into their own hands, obliterating the house while he’d been away, leaving nothing but the graffitied mailboxes as a reminder of what he’d once had. What they’d once had.

Who were humans to say interplanetary love was wrong?

He frowned, kicking at the dirt. Brown. Not red. He’d come home – not that there was much to come home to.

His heart soared upon noticing the envelope waiting in the box. Had she forgiven him? Opening it, fury burned his face. “$25 million for taxi service to and from Mars? On top of the lawyer fees I’m already facing?”

He was starting to wish he’d let her vaporize him like she’d threatened to after she’d discovered the affair.

“They say ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned,’” he muttered. “Ha. Try a Martian.”

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This week’s challenge was to include something about an unpaid bill in our 150 word story (+/- 10 words). What do you think of my take? Want to craft your own, or read the other stellar entries? Rocket on over to Flash Friday Fiction and check it all out!

The Sweet Smell of Victory – 145 words

They never knew what hit them.

Standing there with their exuberant grins and flashing eyes. They thought they were on top of the world. Honeymoon in Berlin, the adulation of the world.

I showed them. She couldn’t steal my husband from me. Not for long, anyway.

What did she have that I didn’t? Brilliant teeth? Perfect gams? I may have packed on a few pounds over the years, but it was I who bore him four sons. Not her.

The floozie acted like she loved the old fat fart.

I knew better. I didn’t love him, either. I just loved his money.

Let her clutch those flowers as closely as she can, I’d said, cackling from the crowd. Let her inhale the sweet smell of victory.

I was invisible to them. I didn’t mind, this one time.

The cyanide powder did its work soon enough.

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Bwah ha ha! I never imaged I’d be researching inhalable poisons this morning when I woke up, but such is the charm of the Flash Friday Fiction challenge, especially when one must incorporate something about “comeuppance” in relation to this photo. In 150 words (+/- 10), of course.

What do you think of my take? Do you have a different take? Head on over to Flash Friday Fiction to share your own version, or just read the other excellent entries submitted by fellow flashers.