The Shackled Man

I’m taking a two-week course in flash fiction writing with the definition of flash fiction being “You can read it in under three minutes.” The Shackled Man is my offering. I’ve got it down to 2m46s.

Let me know what you think, and thanks.

Creator and above level members can listen to my test read.

The Shackled Man

 
Saturday mornings. That was our time.

Dad tiptoed into my room and knelt beside my bed. I could smell him before my eyes opened. A good smell, a night’s sweat just washed away.

I kept my eyes shut until I felt the bristles of his mustache when he kissed my cheek. I’d open my eyes and see the twinkle in his.

“Want to go for a ride?”

There were four places we’d go. South, Logan Airport. West, French King Bridge. North, Queechee Gorge. East, L.L. Bean.

We always stopped at a Dunkin Donuts. If we started a little late it’d be a Dunkin Donuts half way there, about an hour out, half hour at the least. Or sometimes it’d be at the edge of town, right before we hit the highway.

Dad knew where all the Dunkins were. Nobody had breakfast sandwiches or drivethroughs back then. You had to go inside. He’d get a medium coffee, two sugars, two creams, and I’d get a chocolate milk and a bavarian creme, the first bite and it oozed out and into your mouth.

And then off we’d go, listening to the radio or singing songs. Didn’t matter the weather, every Saturday morning we’d go, always sure to be out of the house by seven, no later.

West and north we’d get to the bridges. There were parking areas and we’d get out and walk around. Dad would stay close to the rails, look over. “How far down do you think that is, son?”

I was too small, I couldn’t see.

“Be a long drop from here.”

East we’d get to L.L. Bean. It was totally different back then. Only locals and hunters knew of it. How my dad knew I’ll never know.

You could talk to guides, men who knew the lakes and rivers and mountains. Dad listened to their stories, about going so far out in the woods it seemed there was no coming back, then he’d check his watch.

“Come on, son. Time to be getting back.”

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Interviews with Writers Did Me!

I like being interviewed.

Let’s me know somebody out there is listening.

It’s like writing Goodreads reviews. I’m shocked when people like or comment on my reviews. I responded to one person, thanking them for the Like and sharing that I didn’t think anybody paid attention. After all, who am I to review a book?

They understood and felt the same way re their reviews.

I wonder who reads/watches/listens to my interviews. Are they bored? Are they curious? Do they know me from a previous life?

I’ll read/watch/listen to a review if I’m interested in the author, often if I’ve read and enjoy their work, often if I know them personally and wish to support them.

What’s your reason for reading/watching/listening?

You can read my Interviews with Writers interview here.

 
Enjoy!

A Possible Agnes Sighting?

The Old Girl’s Still Got It

I wrote in Safe for Another Year that we had not seen Agnes for a while.

We may have been premature.

True, we had not seen that glorious hen in a bit. Perhaps she rested. Perhaps she attended to to her matronly duties.

One can never be sure with matron hens.

But then we saw her. We think we saw her. In all her matronly glory. We’re pretty sure it’s her from her markings and more so because she’s standing where we often put seed for her, where she first performed her Chippie War Dance, and is staring at me, basically saying “Come on, Two-Legs! Gimme some!”

We’re glad.

We like to be with our friends for as long as we can.

And the Old Ones…they are the truest of friends.

 

Empty Sky Chapter 11 – Shem

(Getting feedback from proofreaders now, all good. You can read the previous version here)

Read Empty Sky Chapter 10 – Poppie

Creator and above level members can download a PDF of this chapter to read offline

Two men, one shaved bald, tall, thin, and quick like a whip, and the other a fireplug on legs with a jet black ponytail halfway down his broad back, both in tailored, navy-blue pinstripe suits and wearing hand-made, alligator-skin shoes so polished they reflected the lights marking the aisle, made their way from the locomotive through the tender to the back of the train. The whip would walk a few long, waspish steps, wait, then spin the gold and diamond pinky ring on his right hand until the fireplug caught up. When the fireplug reached him the whip would walk a few more long, waspish steps, wait and spin his ring again.

The fireplug strolled, his hands clasped in front of his chest as if in prayer, his eyes skimming over his knuckles as they evaluated, the bands of the two turquoise rings he wore — one on each ring finger — clicking sometimes as he walked. He passed no one without reaching out to their carotid and checking for a pulse; conductors, stewards, clerks, passengers. It didn’t matter.

The fireplug’s slow methodicity and attention to detail frustrated the whip who released his frustration by aiming a small but powerful ruby laser into the lens of the security cameras while he waited for his partner to catch up.

“Christ, look at this place. What did The Boss use again?”

“Ambien. That’s what he had us dump in the food service trucks. It makes you sleep and wake up without feeling groggy. ‘Far as everyone on the train is concerned, they’ll all think they probably had too much to drink.”

“Do you have to test every mother’s son?” The whip broke protocol and used names in an attempt to make the fireplug move faster. “We’re supposed to get MacPherson to Pangiosi before morning, you know.”

The fireplug stopped and stared at the whip who turned away before the fireplug answered. “We have plenty of time. Besides, we find one dead person, we got trouble.”

“Didn’t you tell me once something about your grandfather teaching you to help people die?”

The fireplug nodded as he worked. “Not exactly. He taught me to sing them from this world to the next, to carry the souls of the dead so they’d find peace.”

“Happy hunting ground stuff?”

“Something like that.”

“You believe in that stuff?”

“I don’t believe in much of anything anymore.”

“Yeah. Ditto that.”

The fireplug continued his slow inspection. The whip tapped his foot at the rear door to the car.

The fireplug stopped and looked up. “I wonder if these people dream.”

The whip broke protocol a second time. “John, who gives a shit. Pangiosi gave us an order. We carry it out.”

John stopped. His arms folded over an expansive chest.

The whip looked out a window and spun his gold and diamond pinky ring. “Sorry.”

John’s prayerful hands went back to work.

Shem twitched himself awake. His head rose up and he sniffed the air. A scent, something from deep dog memory, canine memory, canid memory, canis memory. He leapt off the bunk and growled. A door opened in the bedroom suite, a door only dogs, only canines, only the line that first walked before man then behind then beside could see, sworn under the first full moon to watch for such doors because humans, the canids knew, would grow to forget.

The door closed. Whatever had been there had been warned away by flashing eyes, by baring teeth.

He jumped back on the bunk. As he circled to lay down he remembered the Little Master had gone. He looked across the suite to the other cot. The Great Master snored lazily like an old Alpha in the tall grass on a hot summer day.

Shem scratched his ear with a hind paw then sniffed his genitals. He rested his head over his paws, flopped to his side and stretched on the mattress. The entire bed was his!

Glorious His!

A few minutes later he, like the Great Master, snored like an Alpha in the tall grass.

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Safe for Another Year

A little over a year ago I wrote Thankful Turkeys Celebrate – Turkey Day of Infamy 2018.

You’ll be thrilled to know they made it through another remembrance of avian holocaust.

We waited to publish this year’s turkey celebration until all holidays had past.

Safer for them, safer for us.

Sometimes I’ll go out and commune with them. Don’t want to be mistaken for a turkey, me.

You’ll note that Agnes is not in attendance.

We’re concerned, as we miss our friends even though we know they wait for us.

That is The Old Ones promise handed down since before Two-Legs walked on two legs; “We’ll wait for you.”

They have no sense of worlds beyond their own (or at least they’re not telling. I mean, would you? And ruin the neighborhood?) and, as Borges said, “To be immortal is commonplace; except for man, all creatures are immortal, for they are ignorant of death.”

So we ask those that move on to wait for us.

Or they tell us they will.

There is no hurry.

All things return.