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Flash Fiction
STORIES UNDER 1,000 WORDS
JACOB AND THE TECHNICOLOUR TV
By Eirene Hogan
Jacob loved watching TV.
He was not supposed to, of course, he was supposed to climb trees.
You need to get him out and engage his mind. Don't let him vegetate in front of the tube.
So I did. I got out card games and board games, Lego and cars. He lined the cards up in numerical order. He was frightened of the snakes in the snakes and ladders. He couldn't put the Lego together and screamed when I tried to help him. He picked the cars up and spun the wheels, watching them closely as they twirled. He ignored me when I tried to play races with them.
I gave up and left the room to read a book. He went back to his TV.
When I came back he had placed a magnet on top of the TV - it changed the colours on the screen. I screamed, "don't do that" and whipped the magnet off. The colours didn't go back to normal. I yelled at him, he sat with his hands over his ears, rocking.
I rang a TV repairman. When I returned, Jacob had placed the magnet on the TV again.
"DON'T DO IT!" I yelled.
He screamed back, "BUT I WANT TO."
I switched the TV off. "You can't watch the TV anymore, go outside and play." He just stared at me. I opened the outside door. He didn't move. I tried to drag him outside. "No, no, no." he cried. So I left him there and went into the lounge room to try and calm my nerves.
The TV was switched on again. I huddled in the chair and cried.
Mr TV repairman came. He asked how it
happened, why Jacob did what he did. I
translated that to mean; why did you let him do it?
I shrugged. "He's autistic."
No one knows what to say after that.
Finally he said, "I'll have to take the TV away to be fixed."
Jacob cried on his special chair for two hours. I eventually got the portable TV out of the main bedroom. Immediately Jacob put the magnet on it. I went back to my chair and cried. Why hadn't I hidden the thing?
The next day was Saturday. Jacob did play outside, in the sunshine. David took the portable TV to the TV repairman. I went outside to find Jacob and try and tell him. He was holding a piece of coloured cellophane up to the trees. He took no notice of me.
Helen came to visit; she has an autistic son too. I told her the story and she nodded. "All you need to do is wave the magnet in front of the TV and it will go back to normal."
I could only laugh hysterically. "Thanks."
By evening the TV was back, the magnet on top.
"Perhaps he will be an artist?" David said. We tipped our wineglasses and toasted our brilliant son.
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MISSING PERSONS
He sat down at the table near the wall, with friends.
From behind the cafe counter Maree nodded to me, but I knew anyway. It had to be him.
I slipped my sunglasses on and sat my book up against the salt n pepper shakers. The sunglasses shaded my eyes so no one could see
I was watching him. I kept my head directed to my book but turned my eyes toward him. It hurt my eye muscles, but I didn’t want
anyone thinking I was some sort of pervert. Maree had said, “he was about eighteenish”, when she told me she had heard of him and
seen him in her cafe. I knew how old he was. He was seventeen years, eight months, four days and-- I looked at my watch-- nine
hours and twenty-four minutes old.
He turned his face briefly, to check out the menu written up on the blackboard behind the counter and I could see his face clearly.
My mind flashed back to that same face, eighteen years ago, when it smiled to me and whispered in my ear and suggested we "do it".
I agreed, because my body wanted to feel it, because my ego wanted to be like everyone else, and because I wanted him. And I thought
if we did this, it would be a committment, we would be one, he would be mine. But he left.
After a few months I didn’t care that he left, except that he had left behind his baby. And my mother didn’t want that, and made me give
it up, and let the nurses whisk it away.
But here he was, again, in front of me, smiling, happy with his friends, casting his eyes casually over in my direction and seeing only a
stranger.
My son.
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FLOWERS
Boys are not supposed to like flowers, or want to sing, or dance, or say they don't like football. I have usually kept those passions secret, hidden from the other boys at school, hidden from every one. Just one little slip and my sexuality is questioned.
I sit alone on Saturday night and watch the movies, sweet romantic chick flicks. I catch the news on Sunday to check the football news, and at school on Monday I pretend I know all about it – but I usually get caught out.
The other boys are beginning to shun me. They are worried for their own virginity.
I went to the library to look for a book, not a fast action story or crime mystery – but something that tells me about people and their emotions. I eyed the girls books, but wasn't game to walk over to them. Instead I picked up Tolkien. Perhaps that was safe enough. Someone else reached their hand to grab it at the same time. We both stumbled an apology, then laughed. We agreed to share the book, one of us reading for one week then giving the copy to the other.
Mum knocked on my bedroom door and told me my friend with the Tolkien book was here. I opened the door just a little. A flower was held out to me – a beautiful pink rose –its deep perfume filled the air. I took it and cried. "It's beautiful.
"It reminded me of you, I'm so glad you like it."
"I love flowers," I whispered.
"So do I." I opened the door, and let my friend in, the beautiful girl I had met at the library.
(c) Eirene Hogan, 2006
280 words
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I went to meet him there. The sun was shining, birds singing. Perfect. But where was he? I waited...waited. Should I jump into the hay? Yes. So I did. Err...yuck. I jumped out again. Scratchy and itchy and hard.
I waited some more, but the clouds were coming and he wasn't coming. How could I come if he wasn't there?
I left.
The next day he rang me. He had a massive allergic reaction to the hay. I had to laugh.
We'll try my bedroom next time. I could tell he smiled from the way he said, "I'll be sure to come."
(c) Eirene Hogan, 2006
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REUNION
Five years ago he woke up early, before me, and left. I never saw him again. He never rang, wrote or anything. He was still alive, as far as I could find out. His mother had left her home and gone back to her old country. I heard nothing about his father, or him.
Now – five years later – I hear from him.
(c) Eirene Hogan, 2006
63 – words
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ONE-NIGHT-STANDS
One-night-stands. You see the men and you want them, then and there.
Tall, bronzed, thin T-shirt, sculpted body. Your purpose for the
rest of the night, is to get them into your bed, or you into theirs.
You don't care about their minds, their erudite expostulation of
Aristotle's ethics; you just want their body. "The more time we spend
talking, the less time we have for foolin' around".
Well, that's the theory anyway.
There was the first time – when you did it because he asked you, and
you hadn't ever had a one-night-stand before, so it was a novelty. It
is the cool thing to do. You were enjoying the conversation, and then
he kissed you, taking you by surprise. You had not expected it at
all. But here's your chance, why pass it up?
But you were so embarrassed after the night was over that you avoided
him, slipping into shops you had not intention of visiting so he
couldn't walk past you.
Then there was the one who flirted with you all night, but you were
with someone else, so you resisted. But the someone else spent too
long talking to another about something boring – so you left and
walked all the way back to campus and searched for the flirter – whom
you found. So you spent the night with him. But he bit your nipples
too hard and barely waited for you to come, so when he fell asleep you
slipped out of the room so you didn't have to face him the next day.
And there was the young one, the ex-schoolboy who wanted you to be his
lover, but you had only just met him that night, so he sounded
desperate for anyone who would listen. But he'd spent most of that
night boring you by talking about himself anyway.
And the one who was so grateful that you went with him that you
wondered how desperate you were.
And what about the one with the dick that veered to the right.
And the other who had white fluff all over his dick, as if it had been
washed with a tissue?
And the one who gave you crabs!
And there was the dorky guy who invited you to a pool party – where
you thought you might get lucky cos some other guy you liked was
there. But the dorky one with pimples and freckles kept grabbing you
in the pool and he dared to wear no clothes and he thought you'd like
it, but he just grossed you out.
And the one who whispered all these nice things about looking after
you, but you were just being kind to him cos he had worked so hard to
get you into bed but all you wanted to do was go home, alone.
And the one where you left your new watch. But you wouldn't go back
to get it cos you never wanted to see him again. And you hoped he
might return it yourself, but he didn't.
And the ones who got away. The gorgeous blond in the photos you
processed in the camera shop where you worked. He never looked at you
when you picked them up.
The dark-haired Italian-looking one you followed to the club. But he
never seemed to see you, but another with a weak schoolboy moustache
talked you into coming home with him and you only did cos you were so
frustrated at missing out on the other.
The guy who played the banjo in the band, who you'd watched and eyed
all night but you didn't feel good enough for, – then he rubbed
himself up against your back on the dance floor and he was fat and flabby.
And the one who came onto you one lonely night and made you feel
attractive again, even though he was skinny. He sat you on his lap
all night during the party, and when you escorted him home he gave you
a goodbye kiss, so you pushed yourself against him to let him know
what you wanted, but no matter how hard you tried you couldn't get a
hard-on out of him.
And then there was the one who wasn't the one-night-stand.
The one you sat around the wine cask with all night, but then he
slipped out without you managing to invite him home. And you had to
arrange to "accidentally" bump into to him on campus. And he looked
more and more gorgeous each time you saw him, and you couldn't stop
smiling every time you saw him. And he had to go away for the summer
to work on his family's farm. And you wrote him letters and when he
finally returned he was bronzed from the sun and you couldn't wait to
get him into bed but it still took a number of days and when you
finally got him there… it was great, and you couldn't remember the sex
so much as the feeling after, the way the sex seemed to open up a
channel between the two of you that everyone must see – a rainbow
linking you. And how fantastic you felt and how beautiful life was
and how all you wanted to was to walk by his side and be with him and
drag him into your bed every night and it just kept getting better and
he felt the same.
The one you fell in love with.
(c) Eirene Hogan, 2005
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THE ANNUNCIATION
By Eirene Hogan
Mary blows onto the candle to extinguish the flame. Darkness floods the room, then the light from the full moon slowly filters in to fill the space. Mary stares into the blue moonlight, then slowly lets the warm night air lull her into sleep.
Her dreams drift in and out, weaving between the moonlight. She sees a figure slowly form; the body of a man, beautiful, full of light, straight from heaven, sent by God. An angel. He moves toward her bed, she smiles in her sleep.
She is a virgin. But she knows she is asleep, so she can allow the man-angel to approach her.
He leans over the bed, touching his hand to her forehead, warm but cool and not really there. He leans close; the light that emanates from him almost blinds her even through her closed eyelids. He whispers in a silent voice – ‘I am here to give you a gift from God. You have been chosen.’
Silently he lifts the covers, and slips in under. Without even realising, she moves her legs apart. He lies in the space between her legs; his arms embrace her, hold her gently but fast. She feels herself becoming one with him, as he merges into her – entering her quickly, smoothly, and completely. She has never been taken by a man before. She whimpers for her lost maidenhead. He whispers into her soul; ‘No – you are not soiled, a virgin you will remain’. He thrusts himself into her. As she touches the sacred it fills her, she opens herself, feeling the joy; she shudders as he embraces her, his male body completely covering her, his angel spirit surrounding her. He squeezes her tight, as the rapture begins.
Blinding light and consuming darkness flash through her closed eyes as the ecstasy crescendos and the divine floods into her.
She feels the two halves; male/female, human/divine merge into one as the seed joins with the egg.
He lays her down tenderly, resting her back onto the bed as she drifts into a deeper dreamless sleep. He touches her lightly on the forehead with his lips, leaving a soft indelible mark.
He goes from the room, drifting out with the moonlight – but leaves behind his seed, the touch of sacred which was the message the angel had brought from god. Mary, the virgin maiden, is with child.
© Eirene Hogan, 2005
Words: 394