Short story by Louise Pieper – Page 3

Feeling lucky?

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Or if not lucky, at least in the mood for some fiction…

The Australian Writer’s Centre sets the Furious Fiction challenge on the first Friday of the month and writers have 55 hours to write no more than 500 words. This month the goal was: 1) start the story with a two word sentence, 2) set it in a supermarket and 3) have something breaking. You can read the winning and shortlisted entries on the AWC website.

Here’s my 500 words:

LUCKY’S
‘No Credert.’

That sign makes me twitch every time I walk into Lucky’s Holesale Supermarket. Don’t worry, the ‘holesale’ bugs me too, but at least the rusty ghost of a ‘W’ is visible on the corrugated iron. The other, hand-written, sign is taped to the back of the cash register.
First time I saw it, I swear I flinched.

“Listen,” I said to the woman leaning on the counter. “That’s not how you spell credit.”
The badge on her blouse said her name was Shirl.
Shirl said, “I know.”
“Then…” I gestured at the sign.
She looked at me through ice-pale, unblinking eyes.
“Some people like to have something to complain about.”

I thought about turning around and walking out, but I didn’t want to burn my bridges too early. The next nearest shop was the petrol station six blocks away and they charged like wounded bulls. I was renting between a sprawling industrial estate and a fetid, snake-filled swamp. I’d need my bridges when that damn swamp flooded.

So I nodded, grabbed a trolley and headed into the first aisle.
It was like no supermarket I’d ever seen. Industrial shelving lined one wall of a big, ugly warehouse and most of the floor space was taken up with water-damaged pallets. Perched on top were boxes of loose-leaf liquorice tea.

Three litre jars of dill pickles.

Blood pressure monitors.

Packs of toddler training nappies.

Tinned brawn.

Souvenir spoons.

Cheap, sure. But none of it made sense.
At the end of the aisle the stink of rotting seafood slapped me. Four chest freezers stood reeking against the hot corrugated iron. A sloughed snakeskin fluttered, caught on the wheels of the nearest freezer. I gagged and swore.

“Silly, isn’t it, putting them against the western wall?”
An old lady emerged from the next aisle, clutching a wire basket which held three tins of baked beans and a blood pressure monitor.
“I never buy their fish,” she confided, “but that’s not why we come here is it?”
“Why do we come here?” I was genuinely curious.
“Because one day we’ll find what our heart desires.”
She sighed, smiled and drifted into the next aisle.

Mad, I figured.

I was halfway down aisle two, digging through tinned beans for the extra cheese variety, when I heard her cry out. I pushed between pallets piled high with toilet paper and novelty lawn ornaments, sending a ceramic panda crashing to the floor.
“Are you alright?” I gasped.
She held something against her chest which lit her face like she cradled a star.
“I am now. It’s what I’ve always wanted.”
She sailed off towards the checkout, leaving me to push pieces of broken panda under the pallet with the side of my shoe.

“Got what you want?” Shirl said when I wheeled my trolley up.
“Uh, sure.” I gave my gleanings a dubious look.
She cracked a slow smile and said, “Maybe next time.”
Maybe.
I guess that’s why I keep coming back to Lucky’s.

The Lost Hour

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With the clocks changing for summer time, the Australian Writers’ Centre challenge for October’s Furious Fiction was to write 500 words or less in 55 hours which needed to:

be titled ‘The Lost Hour’
contain the phrase ‘It was lighter’
include a sentence naming three colours

You can read the winning and shortlisted entries here.

I was reading Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Market recently, which got me writing something else, but it also made this uncanny transaction occur to me…

***

“Buy a song for sixpence and pocketsful of time,” the market woman crooned.

Luc wouldn’t call her a witch, even in his thoughts. Witches weren’t safe to deal with – everyone knew it – but he needed coins. Now. Today. Before the dance.

“What’ve you a fancy for, young sir?”

Silver needles flashed in her lapel as she stroked the cloth on the bench between them. She wasn’t old and black-clad and bent, like he’d expected, and no grey streaks marred her russet hair. Still, her tanned skin was loose on her, as if it was a size too large. As if she could cast it off, like a coat. As if–
He swallowed hard. He wouldn’t think about it.
“I need–”

“A stolen moment?” She handed him a purple pocket stitched with copper threads, plump as a ripe red pomegranate. It was lighter than it looked. “No? Wisdom, then? I can sing you a song of such good sense every choice you make for a sennight will be the right one.”

“Affie said you pay for time.”

Her brows went up but she nodded. Luc let out a breath.

“As do others.” She looked across the green. “Yon brewer needs strong lads to load his carts.”

Luc didn’t turn. He pushed back his sandy hair and said, “You just want time, though? Not work?”

“There’s always a market for time.” She rested one ringed hand on a pile of cut cloth. “People pay for a moment’s peace, or a few minutes to themselves. There’s not enough hours in the day.”

“How much? How much will they pay?”

“I’ll give you thruppence for ten minutes.”

Thruppence would buy him a cup of cider and a red ribbon to give Bessie Croyland when he asked her to dance. Thruppence was enough.

“For just ten minutes?”

“For ten minutes of hope.” She lifted a circle of primrose pale cloth.

“What would you give for an hour?”

“An hour?” Her gaze raked him. “I can take an hour, but you ken it will take an hour?”

Her gaze darted across the green and this time he looked as well. The Croyland sisters were watching Affie and Rom work and sweat, rolling barrels in the hot sun. Luc shivered.

“How much?” he demanded.

“Two shillings,” she said, “for an hour.” She laid down the primrose yellow cloth and picked up a large piece of green silk, shot through with blue flame, like the flash of feathers under a magpie’s wing. “For an hour of opportunity.”

He nodded and heard the first three notes of the witch’s song, but the hour was lost before he heard anything more. He came back to himself, clutching two shillings, with Bessie Croyland’s laughter ringing in his ears. She walked by, holding Rom’s hand, her dark hair falling loose.

The witch set the final gold stitch to close the bulging green pocket.
“It doesn’t matter what others will pay,” she said, “some hours are priceless.”

River City, River Sea

brisbane river Another month, another dose of short fiction.

You can read the winners and shortlisted entries on the AWC Furious Fiction page or just settle in here with my 500 words. The requirements were that the story: take place in an airport, include the word ‘spring’ and include the phrase ‘it was empty’.

I went for a little bit of post-apocalypso fun…

Departures are bickering hard when I paddle over to Inashnal. It’s how they spend their time. Arguing and watching and waiting for something to happen, somewhere to go. Sitting, always sitting, in their endless rows of seats.

“We’re in the bloody bay,” Gammy Owen roars, because he thinks being loud is the same as being right.

Vespa just rolls her eyes but Hakim can’t help himself.

“River,” he mutters. He should know better. Gammy won’t let no-one else have the last word.

River? Bay? It doesn’t matter to me, nor to the water. The moody bay heaves, sighs salt and tosses her seagrass hair. The river runs, gravy thick and mud-silted, indifferent to our struggle to evade his embrace.

I bite my tongue and wait to be noticed, while Gammy shouts tides and channels and things he knows nothing about. The walkway casing is cracked, but solid enough to hold the stink of rot and mud. I shift my feet and the wet carpet sucks at my thongs like it’s hungry.

I know better than to go through the Gate without permission, though.

“It’s thirty-eight klicks–” Gammy yells.

The nearest McIntyre woman interrupts him.

“Yeah, whatever,” she says, unclipping the barrier. “Here’s Tula from Control. What’s news?”

Even Gammy shuts up then and they turn to me, eyes shining in the light from the broken windows. A few get up from their seats and shuffle closer. I stay by the Gate.

“Domestic,” I say. “The Forties Hub collapsed last night. There’s at least a hundred and twenty-five dead.”

They groan together and the building joins in. Maybe it feels the other terminal’s weakness as its own, since neither was meant to stand in ten metres of water.

Gammy Owens is the first to find his voice. He always is.

“Too many in there,” he gripes. “Too much weight with the spring rains. If it weren’t–”

“Truck got swept down the river,” I say. “Hit the satellite arm by Gate Fifty full on. Smashed the support.”

“Because we’re part of the river,” Hakim says softly.

“Salvage on the truck?” Vespa asks.

“It was empty,” I lie. No use getting them worked up. “Spread the word?”

I wait for Vespa’s nod, so I can tell Nan they’ll let the rest of Inashnal know.

There’s a grim silence, then Hakim says, “Trade?”

We haggle over the usual exchange of the fish I’ve caught and the eggs Nan wants. He passes them to me, once I’m in my kayak, then puts his hands on his hips and glares at the horizon. The water covers everything, except for a few skeleton trees and Control, which rises from it like a wizard’s tower. It’s been this way since the seas rose and the sky fell.

“Bloody river,” he mutters.

I push off from the rusted back of a sunken plane before I turn and shout, “It’s not a river, mate, it’s a bloody sea.”

The Jam Jar

B_flower blue Another month, another piece of Furious Fiction. July’s challenge was 500 words which 1. start with a question, 2. end with a BANG (literally) and 3. contain the words jackpot, jam and jungle.

You can read the winner and shortlisted entries on the AWC Furious Fiction site.

Here’s what I wrote:

“What’s the difference,” I said, “between an eccentric relative and one who’s just garden-variety crazy?”
“Asking for a friend?” Great-aunt Hypatia’s glare scorched me, but she was bound by blood and seal and covenant to answer my questions, however frivolous, so she said, “Aesthetic classifications of the relevant aberrant behaviour are dependent upon observable misalignment within age, wealth and tannin consumption.”
She wasn’t bound to give answers I could understand.
“Huh?”
Her smile widened. She wasn’t bound to answer questions she couldn’t understand.
“Tell me what that means, auntie.”
I pushed aside the jungle-dense drapery of vines and unlocked the door into the smallest of the gardens. She followed, still smiling like an overfed sphinx.
Nor was she bound to answer polite demands.
“What defines eccentricity?”
“One isn’t eccentric–” She made the word a sabre-rattle of syllables. Hypatia was always strongest amongst the plants she’d tended. “–unless one is old and rich and drinks a lot of tea.”
I knelt in front of the monkshood and began to clear the patch of earth I’d marked last autumn with a hawthorn stake. The Morency women had tended these gardens for two hundred years; if most of us were happier making poisons than jam, what of it? There were benefits. Hypatia was no more than a glimmer of light except to one of us.
I dug my strong fingers into the soil, questing down.
“So, Cousin Ransley.” I watched Hypatia’s lip curl. “Is he eccentric or dangerous?”
Fox-fire whirled in the abyss behind my long-dead great-aunt’s cornflower blue eyes as she realised I’d not asked my questions to vex her.
“He styles himself eccentric.” She weighed her words against the truth. “His mother was a Morency who took her luck with her when she left. She won the jackpot and married a millionaire. He’s rich.”
I brushed dirt from the unearthed jam jar and waited.
“He is not old enough, though. And he drinks filter coffee.”
“Not eccentric.” I sighed. “Dangerous?”
“Yes,” Hypatia hissed.
Her gaze followed the delicate brown tracery inside the jar.
“Then I’ll deal with him.”
Cousin Ransley stood beneath the fig tree, frowning at the wall.
“All alone, Illysia?” he said.
I glanced at Hypatia’s feral smile and didn’t answer. He gestured at the vines, set swaying by our exit.
“What’s in there? I’d have a wonderful water view from here without all this.”
“It’s a witch’s garden, Ransley, and safer if it’s walled.”
He threw his head back and laughed at the sky. Hypatia sneered as if she contemplated tearing out his exposed throat with her teeth.
“Witches? Do you know any spells, cousin?”
“Oh, yes. Your mother should have warned you.” I twisted the lid of the jar. “Abracadabra.”
He laughed harder.
“Abracadab.” Another twist. “Abracad.”
He jerked his head. Frowned.
“Abra.”
His mouth opened in a silent scream as I said, “Ab.”
I lifted the lid to let my cousin into the spirit jar and slammed it shut behind him.
BANG.

All that is needed

FF-JUNE-PROMPT-1024x683 On the first Friday of each month the Australian Writers Centre runs a 55 hour 500 word writing challenge called Furious Fiction. It’s furious fun! June’s writing prompt was an image (extract above – see the full image and the winner and shortlisted stories here).

The first thing I saw was a face in the window. So, here’s my 500 words worth:

All that is needed
The room is a symphony of light and symmetry. Marta steps back from the table and I lean forward. I would press myself against the glass if I could. I would draw close and closer still, a moth to the room’s bright flame.

She nods once, affirming perfection, and tugs the cloth from her belt. Transformed from menial to hostess, she opens the door.

Two waiters hurry in, hired so Marta can enjoy herself. They look young and rumpled in borrowed suits. The freckled one darts a glance at the window and I shrink back into shadow, but no doubt he only checks the bottles of wine on the sill.

The guests follow. Sebastian and Elisabeth. Arthur, immaculate. Charles, messy as ever. His bow-tie sits askew and a lock of hair waves like a parrot’s crest. Sybille and Frances whisper secrets. Fiona casts venomous glances at her cousins’ dresses, their heels, their effortless chic.

Grand-mère claps her hands at all Marta has wrought. Her diamonds catch and scatter the light as she turns, admiring. I feel her gaze pass over me and her smile dims. But she presses her powdered cheek to Marta’s, murmuring praise.

I don’t know the other five. Friends? Colleagues? One is a redhead in a tight dress which hugs her curves, snug as whipped cream. Sebastian admires her and thinks Elisabeth doesn’t notice. Two dangerous men, sleek as jungle cats, in their dark suits and matching ties. Another man, attentive to a middle-aged beauty in an emerald sari.

The women flutter, bright as butterflies, finding their places. The men settle like sombre moths beside them. Their chatter fades and they turn to raise their glasses to the guests of honour.

Teddy stands in the doorway, a pirate in a three-piece suit. For a moment, he is all I can see. He smiles at the room but his gaze avoids the windows. An ice queen clings to his arm – diamonds on alabaster skin, white dress and ash-blonde hair. She looks cold but not as cold as me. Then she laughs and pulls him with her to the window.

Her face is inches from mine. She doesn’t see me.

“What a view you have,” she exclaims, “although we’re only, what, five floors up?”

Against the wall, the waiter pales beneath his freckles. Does he see behind the reflection of blonde prettiness is a dark-haired girl looking in from the other side of the glass with eyes like coals?

Teddy doesn’t see me. He never really saw me. He went on with his life and left me here, pinned like a specimen fixed to a board. The windows are old and heavy enough to break the spine of anyone incautious enough to lean out. Although someone would have to release the sash cord.

It wasn’t the fall which killed me.

“To absent friends,” Marta says and raises her glass to me.

Everything is perfect. Everyone is here. And I am the ghost at the feast.

Micro fiction*: On Valas Rock the Seals Cry

“The sea was all he had and if he couldn’t escape it, he’d die.”

* Ah, selkies! I love them so. I wrote a short piece for a Gamma.Con story competition which had to be under 800 words and sci-fi or fantasy. I didn’t make the shortlist of ten (you can read them here), but I was happy with my tale.

So happy, in fact, that I revisited, reworked, and significantly expanded the piece and entered it in the Heroines Anthology #4 in 2022. Which is why the body of the original short has been removed. Fingers crossed for a good outcome for the reworked piece “When Seals Cry”.

Save

Flash fiction* – Taskforce Z

They come in the night.

They always do.

You wake, blinking against glare. Sunlight shouts off the white plastic shroud which encases your neighbours’ house.

You stand at the window, your fingers splayed on the glass like a gecko’s translucent pads. Your gaze traces the line of the temporary fencing to the front barrier, where a pale blue banner is attached to the metal mesh.

You can’t read it from your window, but you know what it says. You have seen dozens like it, scattered across the suburbs. The government insignia is white, and so are the words – Viral Response Taskforce.

First the plastic. Then the droning whine of the generator as it pumps in the decontaminants. Later, the demolition team will scrape the site bare, leaving a gap in the street like a missing tooth.

There’s no sign of the neighbours.

There never is.

*Another Tiny Treasure I wrote for Noted Festival. This one won’t have the same resonance away from Canberra, which currently has lots of houses like this – although it’s the Asbestos Response Taskforce at work, removing the houses which were insulated by “Mr Fluffy”. Creepiest name ever…

Flash fiction* – Autumn Witch

autumnwitch

She preferred maple leaves of fiery orange and yellow, or heart’s blood red. Sometimes, she found a perfect bruised purple leaf, veined with red-gold arteries.

She placed them all on her wide, white windowsills, for the sun to dry. Their memories of moisture evaporated, and they became brittle and bitter. As they baked, she seasoned them with regret.

No more dancing in the fresh breezes of Spring. No more whispering through Summer’s lazy heat. They crinkled, arthritic and crabbed, as she crooned to them of lost vitality, and stolen joy.

By the time the trees were bare, she had an army of clawed furies, which her winds could send to do her bidding. Their desiccated hearts yearned to scratch at tender flesh, and spill the hot blood which might, she promised them, be as sweet as the sap they remembered.

*Last week I mentioned writing some flash fiction for a Tiny Treasures event at Noted Festival. I thought I’d share my pre-prepared tiny stories here, rather than have them whirled away and lost, like fallen leaves…