Category Archive Browsing Category: Friday Fictioneers

“What is it supposed to be?” he asked. I could see the disappointment on his face. I felt the old fury rising. My selfish son. I struggled  to keep my voice calm. “It’s a bicycle, John.” “It looks weird. The wheels don’t turn. And what’s with the seat?” “It’s a work of art. Your aunt…

She gets out the car, phone in her hand. Her brother is waiting for her on the jetty, his tie askew. She points at it. “Aren’t you going to take that off now? The lawyer didn’t come.” He smiles, tugs the tie around like noose, sticks his tongue out. “Grim,” she smiles, turning back to…

The doctor sits across from us at the steel table, mouth pursed. My wife’s hand goes clammy in mine. “Well,” says the doctor, “aside from the things he says he sees, your son does not show any signs of mental illness. None.” “That’s a relief,” I say, smiling. “Isn’t it, honey?” “You said aside from the things…

Word comes down from our senior officers to prepare for evacuation. We busy ourselves making rucksacks and gathering our belongings. I linger in the room and pry up the floorboard to my hidey hole. One of the cartons of cigarettes is missing. In its place is a small German army musette bag. I open the flap.…

Ramana held the image of the insect in his mind, his full attention on the grasshopper, remembering not only the careful hours of detailed observation but also the many other times he had seen the colorful creatures during his childhood in the mountains. Titighodo, they were called, used as medicine by the village elders. His brother Venka had…

My father’s hardness ran so deep that anything tender in him was trapped like a bug in amber. Certain angles you might see it, but kindness and compassion were dead relics buried inside him. This no doubt served him in his role as constable, but didn’t make him shucks as a father to three motherless girls.…

I got off work early and arrived around midnight. The leaden sky was pregnant with snow, the cold air stinging my lungs. Uncle John had pulled strings with the nursing staff to extend visiting hours, since Grandma had always been a night owl.  I entered through the ER and made my way through the dim hallways, glancing through…

Valentine’s Day was a Sunday that first year, I remember.  The cat marked the occasion by presenting us with three headless voles left on the doormat.  We didn’t think anything of it, since some cats are like that. It’s in all the books. But the next holiday, St. Patrick’s, he presented us with a brace…

April showers, they say. It had not stopped raining since December. It might slack off  some, drop to a drizzle, but then it would start back up stronger than ever. The ground was all thick mud where it wasn’t standing water, the trees bending with the weight of their swollen branches.  I figured Pa was all right…