Flash Fiction

The Newest Act In The Modern Circus

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Todd, phone to his ear, rifled through a stack of papers. When he found the one he needed, he glanced at his boss’ open door across the room and decided he could probably land it on his desk as a paper airplane.

As he folded, the hold music on the other line disappeared. The chipper voice was deafening after the tinny music. “Hello! Thank you for waiting. How can I help you today?”

“Hi.” Todd shifted the phone to his other ear. “I’m calling to check on the status of an order that was due last week but hasn’t been marked as shipped yet.”

“Ah, let me transfer you to our shipping department!”

“They just-” The hold music started playing again and Todd sighed as he tossed the folded report through the air onto his boss’ desk. Howard, also on the phone, quirked an eyebrow at Todd who shrugged as he turned his attention back to the email he’d been writing when Howard had asked for the report.

As he wrapped that up, a delivery woman stepped out of the stairwell. Todd flagged her down and pointed toward the meeting room next to Howard’s office. When she hesitated at the door, Todd called out “just go in. It’s just a group project.”

Todd shifted his attention back to his inbox before the woman had even touched the doorknob and started sorting through the messages that were piling up while he was stuck on the phone.

Instead of answering any of them, he took a moment to breathe and switched his attention to a different document. As he reflected on his attempts to punch up his resume in order to avoid getting another job like the one he’d grown to hate, he wrote “professional juggler” down under his Other Skills section. 

Crying At The Puppy Parade

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As Dean watched the puppy parade move across campus, he felt his eyes begin to well up with tears. He heaved a watery sigh as he pulled out a small packet of tissues and wiped at his eyes. As he tucked the rest away, he glanced around. Most attention was focused on the puppies, but there were a few people scanning the gawkers, clearly more interested in cute people than cute puppies.

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The Itch

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Lennard lifted one carefully trimmed fingernail to his neck and dragged it across the skin. The scrape shuddered through his body, briefly offering reprieve from the drone of his coworker who had launched down another useless tangent. The relief was momentary, though, and the burning demand to act returned worse than ever. If he kept scratching, maybe he’d be able to put that moment off long enough for Zach to get tired of talking.

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Sleep Paralysis

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Robyn’s mind drifted to the surface of consciousness. Something heavy was draped over them. Unfortunately, since they slept on their side, they couldn’t see what it was. They couldn’t turn to look, either. They were paralyzed.

Trying to stay calm, they slowly worked through their insensate body. Knees wrapped around a pillow, left arm curled into the corner of the sheet, torso propped up by pillows, and head supported by more pillows. Only their right arm was unaccounted for.

Pushing against the numbness, Robyn tried to raise their right arm.When nothing happened, they pushed through the building fear and realized the arm wrapped in the sheets was holding them in place.

When they managed to shift their left arm enough, the blankets loosened and the numbness began to fade. Feeling began to return to their body.

Just as they were about to try moving their right arm again, Robyn felt a light, puffing wind on their neck. They froze, paralyzed by panic, as something warm and wet fell onto their neck.

Fear took over and they wrenched free of the blankets. They sat up and fumbled for their lamp. When the light clicked on, their room was empty. Their bedroom door was still closed and their oscillating fan gently puffed at their hair as they panted. There was nothing in the room.Nothing had been sitting on them. It was just the fan and their sweat.

They rifled a hand through their hair as they breathed a sigh of relief. A moment later, they realized they weren’t actually sweaty. They raised a hand to their neck and it came away wet, a few viscous drops of liquid clinging to it. As they stared at their hand, they felt the frame of their bed shift as something beneath it moved.

Cubicle Fields Forever

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Darryl rose and left his office. He paced past the dark cubicles and down a dim hallway, looking for the one coworker he knew would be around this late. Greta usually visited him but, today, he thought as he counted rows in the next cubicle field, he’d visit her.

After turning down the seventh row, he found an office belonging to “Tim” that he was certain should’ve been Greta’s.

“Weird.” Darryl turned and found himself in the middle of the cubicle field again. The office behind him had vanished. Darryl rubbed his eyes and headed toward a looming office wall he could follow back to the hallways.

When he got there, he peered at the sign on the nearest office. “Regie? Z52BQ?” Darryl reached out to touch the plaque. It was real but, when he pulled his hand away, it said “Reachme.” As the hairs on his neck rose, Darryl spun to find himself in the middle of the lightless cubicle field again.

Darryl took off running and, when he finally reached a wall, sweat pouring off him, he glanced behind him to find nothing back there but endless dark cubicles.

Darryl looked forward again just as something loomed in the shadowy door of “Meatgyre’s” office. He screamed as a blazing light erupted from this figure.

When his vision cleared, he saw the tall, solid form of Greta holding out a hand. “Oh my god, are you okay?” Greta hauled him to his feet. “I was just about to leave and you startled me!”

“What?” Darryl looked behind him and saw the ordinary five-by-five of cubicles with offices on each side. “I was…”

“You shouldn’t wander around here in the dark.” Greta patted him on the shoulder and led him away from her office. “You might get lost. Or worse…”

Decorating A Haunted Office

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He hangs the decoration, a scrap of white with a face facsimile adorning the lumpy top, and then shifts his ladder five feet to hang another. They do not match his vision, but they match his wallet. He pauses, steps away, and returns, shifting the decoration once listed as “hanging ghost” half a foot away. He might not take pride in the look of the thing, but he takes pride in the look of them all. These imperfect pieces must be placed perfectly.

When he is done, the room is dark. Lights turned off to check the effect are now off in earnest. He cannot turn them on again. The building has gone dark while he labored, his coworkers gone and the thermostat set low for the night. There is no one left to see if his vision is visible amongst the clutter and decorations.

He takes one last look round before returning to this office and the one light he could turn back on after time turned them all off. He packs his things, glancing out at the bits of cloth and draped cotton that are visible from his drawing board, all while silently hanging his thoughts on the wall for another day. These mingled doubts, anxieties, and notes of pride will still be there tomorrow, when he can act on them. He does not need them now.

When he is gone, the decorations battle the scant airflow of the greater office, fighting to stay where he placed them. They were not made with pride or care, but they were placed with an abundance of both and what little power they have will be spent to show everyone else the vision he so carefully cultivated: a room haunted in truth by the death of a dream no one supported.