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Flash Fiction Light, Dark, and Odd: 150 One-Page Stories of Murder, Grief, Levity, and Love
Paperback
ISBN13: 9781546860518
Publisher: Createspace
Published: Nov 1 2017
Pages: 320
Weight: 0.81
Height: 0.72 Width: 5.25 Depth: 8.00
Language: English
150 One-Page Stories of Murder, Grief, Levity, and Love.
Flash, micro, sudden, short-short fiction written by Dave Kilgore. While there is no adult-only content in this book, many of these stories are meant for mature readers, and are not recommended for young children.
Samples:
Her breath stunk of alcohol and cigarettes. Her clothes, rumpled and dirty, a sleeve torn at the shoulder. She all but fell out of her car after slamming the front tires into a parking block and shouldering the driver's door open. She sucked down the last of her Bloody Mary and tossed the glass against the curb.
Carrying a purse and a leather briefcase, she staggered toward her destination, lit a Marlboro, burned it down in three puffs, and flicked the smoldering filter into the bushes before entering the building.
She examined her bloodshot eyes in a bathroom mirror and splashed water on her face. Rifling through her purse she found two single shot bottles of whiskey, opened and quaffed them both. She patted her hair down, adjusted her skirt, and forced a smile in the mirror.
She navigated the halls, no one questioning her, no one standing in her way. Not a soul would dare. The Devil himself avoided her.
She entered a room. Straight ahead were a desk and a blackboard. She dropped the briefcase and purse, palmed a stick of chalk, and etched on the board, Mrs. Gray. She then turned and faced twenty-five eight-year-old children who were sitting quietly in their chairs and yelled, What?
And no one said a word. Because everyone knew, Mrs. Gray's third-grade class was not the place to ask questions.
Certainly not on the first day.
AGATHA'S GARDEN
Agatha was kind, sweet, and gentle. And she loved her flowers. Every year, she entered the annual rose garden competition, held by the Neighborhood Beautification Association and organized by the snooty wives of the most successful men in the community. The contest decided who among them the others should most envy and try to emulate-at least for that moment, and perhaps the following week, provided the county bake-off wasn't scheduled too near that date.
It had been rumored, though not substantiated, that Agatha was a plain old farm girl who came into money late in life and failed to acknowledge that she just didn't belong. But she loved flowers, and for her, that was enough.
Agatha always fell significantly shy of first place. However, she had been rising in rank over the years. Some say it was because she learned a little more, worked a little harder, and took a bit more pride in her rosebushes as each season approached. Others, somewhat less charitable with their compliments, said it was simply a process of elimination. After all, the winners from the three previous years had quietly abandoned the community. Most certainly for scandalous reasons, like running off with an investment banker. Or a sheik. Or the tan, well-toned pool boy. But with less competition, Agatha just might have a shot this year.
And if she didn't win, there would always be next year, and one more scandal, and one more mound of dirt in the rose garden, right beside the other three.
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