Tag: #250wordstories

Posted in Challenges, Fiction, Flash Fiction

Milk Cow Blues

Posted on by R.M. Carlson

#unicorn challenge – October 4, 2024

Photo Prompt @ Ayr/Gray

She got out of bed and trudged through the living room. The place had been trashed. She supposed it happened last night. She was having a hard time remembering. She was so glad their daughter had been at a sleepover.

As she made her way through the house, it dawned on her that he was gone. His bed hadn’t been slept in. She opened the closet and his clothes were gone. A shelf in the bookcase was cleared out.

It was Monday, she remembered. The milk man delivered milk on Monday. She smiled and thought that they wouldn’t need half the milk they used in the past.

She felt embarrassed. It was 1975. The divorce rate in the U.S. was low. Divorce was still a social stigma. Most couples just stuck it out, supposedly for the sake of the children. Her own opinion was that couples married too young and didn’t wait to find the right person. That surely described her.

He’d asked her for a divorce last night. She agreed, but he raged and blamed her. She laughed when she thought of the milk on the porch and the old song, “Milk Cow Blues,” popped into her mind. She remembered part of the lyrics and it seemed she was living that song. She would not need as much milk delivered in the future. She walked to the door to bring in the milk and try to get back to her life.

NOTE: “Milk Cow Blues” was written back in the 1930s, but my favorite version is by Aerosmith

Thanks to C.E. Ayr and Jenne Gray for hosting the #unicornchallenge!

Posted in Challenges, Fiction, Flash Fiction

The Ghosts – #unicornchallenge – June 21, 2024

Posted on by R.M. Carlson
@Aye/Gray

In that moment, time stopped.

The elderly lady looked up and the shutters were open. Her heart skipped a beat. She had waited for this moment for 50 years.

She tried to pull open the door of the old, dilapidated building, but it was stuck. She pulled as hard as her old bones would allow and it popped loose.

The memories came flooding back. This corridor used to be light and airy and full of dancing children, including herself. That was so long ago that it left her breathless.

She got to the stairs and began to pull herself up by the railing. With every step, the past flashed before her eyes. Her father and mother waiting for her at the top of the stairs., Her sister racing up the stairs by her side.

The air was musty and the old woman had a hard time breathing. She tiptoed inside the sunny apartment.

Ghosts. She saw them all. Her family. Laughing and talking. She and her sister, so happy, so innocent in those days. She came here because she wanted some of it back, the innocence. Maybe it would bring joy to her life.

She found the boxes in one of the bedrooms. Her dolls. Her puppets. Her childhood books and records. As she looked at each item, she smiled and cried at the same time.

All that was left that was important were the ghosts.

Thank you to C. E. Ayr and Jenne Gray for hosting the #unicornchallenge.