Flash fiction

I’m not a big fan of Christmas, so I wrote this piece of flash fiction to get myself in the mood. Enjoy!

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We grinned at each other as we heard cursing come down the chimney. Becky was ready with the good silver tray with its glass of milk and expensive shortbread biscuits. I prepared to lend a hand unloading the Xboxes, PlayStations, and accompanying games we’d requested. The figure was soot-black and still cursing as he climbed backwards out of the grate. Then he turned around and Becky screamed.

“It’s not what it looks like,” said Death. “I’m just filling in to help out.”

“Gran’s in bed, take her!” said Kevin.

Death pursed his… mouth? “Well, that’s not nice.”

Kevin wasn’t getting a go on my Xbox, I thought. Then I quickly and loudly thought: I mean, of course he can play on mine. (No point taking any risks at this stage.)

“Would you like a biscuit?” Becky had picked one of the broken shortbreads off the carpet and offered it to Death.

“Thanks, I’m on a diet.” He patted where his belly would have been if he wasn’t a skeleton. “Tough crowd,” he said after a minute, and sighed. “Let’s get this over with, shall we? An Xbox and three games each, alright?” He rummaged in his bag.

“I wanted a PlayStation,” said Kevin, as he wiped his nose on his sleeve.

“Yes, but you just tried to trade your granny for one, so no.”

He stacked the brightly wrapped boxes under the tree, while we crowded around to double-check the name-tags. Once I saw mine, I went to get a wet dishcloth to mop up the spilled milk. Again: no point taking chances.

I rubbed at the carpet’s pile, waiting for Death to say “just kidding!” but it looked like he meant it, and was going to leave without giving Kev anything. Father Christmas is usually prepared for a bit of give and take, when he comes around to our house. And that’s when the strangest feeling came over me. It was a sort of aching hollow in my chest, which I had never experienced before.

I…

I felt sorry for Kevin! It was a Christmas miracle, just like on TV!

“Wait!” I called as Death was folding himself up to get back up the chimney. It wasn’t fair to leave Kevin like this. Death turned, so did the others, and I knew this was the right thing to do. I even felt it in the tears running down Kevin’s face.

“About Kevin… “ I took a breath. Was it just my imagination or did Death’s skull face soften? It wasn’t Kevin’s fault that he always messed things up, but he’d be miserable all during Christmas again.

“He got nothing this year. But neither did you.”

Death’s eyes flashed, but we’d already got our presents, so there was no question about it being a bribe.

“Won’t you take him with you? As a gift?”

In the end, Death had to go out the front door because of course Kevin’s stupid dead leg wouldn’t fit properly into the sack.

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If you read this on Thursday, the 23rd of December there’s still a chance to boost my preferred Christmas song into the number one spot of the UK charts.

Because I’m a “certain sort of person” and because you owe it to posterity. Get it here! (<– Content warning for lots of swearing.)

And if you’re still looking for a Christmas present, may I recommend Witness X by S. E. Moorhead? (<– Content warning for an unputdownable page-turner!)

It’s cold and dark here, so for this week’s piece of flash fiction, I let my imagination take me away to a tropical island. Join me?

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My guess is: it was some sort of WWII installation. A tiny island – only 15 metres at its widest point – and smooth red rock rather than the sandy beach, those cartoons about a man stranded on a desert island would lead you to expect.

And a huge pylon antenna right in the middle.

My guess is: I was going to die here.

A lot more rain than you’d expect, too. I sat under the antenna, wishing it provided some shelter, listening to the raindrops sizzle as they fell through the metal struts. Microwaved castaway: like that joke about only needing five minutes to get a full eight-hour sleep in the microwave bed. I’d be dead of thirst, exposure, or pure boredom in hours rather than days. Fine.

The rain sounded like music after a while, cheap 80s synth beats.

Then it sounded like voices: “This is an emergency broadcast, this is not a test. If you can hear this…”

That’s when the storm let up and it cut out. Murphy’s Law.

Was that how I came to be here? I couldn’t remember, the antenna must have fried my brain already. I left the psychological shelter of the antenna’s iron legs to search for my boat for answers.

#

No boat. No supplies. Was WWII still going on? Was I a prisoner of war?

Dummy, I’d learned about WWII in school. How could it still be going on?

Unless that’s what they wanted me to think. But who were they?

I didn’t really fancy touching the antenna in case I got electrocuted, but I had no more options, so I climbed to search for a clue as to what was going on.

And I found it. There was a little steel plate screwed to the back of the antenna – or brainwashing machine, or whatever it was. “Made in China” was stamped into the metal in block capitals.

They couldn’t do this to me. I was an American citizen.

Wasn’t I?

Looking at my hands didn’t help. I could have been American. Or anything else, really. Maybe I was a God? Of this whole island. And unless someone else came along – if there was anybody else, which seemed unlikely at the moment – I was God of everything else, too. I clambered away from my metal totem pole down the slippery rocks to the shore. There were crabs there.

I let the ones who worshipped me escape and ate the non-believers.

Some butter would have been nice to fry the meat under my microwave tower.

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