I only started writing flash fiction this year and that’s thanks to the crazy, beautiful and inspirational people at Writers HQ. If you haven’t heard of them – how is this possible? – then check out their website and get signed up for some of their phenomenal workshops – https://writershq.co.uk/ There’s loads of freebies and if you do want to become a member (I sooooo recommend this), it’s not expensive and what you get back is worth every single penny.
One of the best things I’ve done this year is start submitting my wee stories. There’s lots of online journals and you’ll find a home for your work somewhere. This story, Untouched, found a home with Flash Fiction North and they also did a Featured Writers piece on me. Did it feel good? Ohhhhhhhhhhh, yesssssssssssss 🙂
Here’s the link and you can find the full story below:
https://www.flashfictionnorth.com/recentfiction?fbclid=IwAR3lZl5tED_2_cRgr2_Dw6ZHM4suMssvk5BvBETySF9uBorihqwHIf-SXko
I preferred to use my fingers. The ones that dug into the dark earth. The ones that formed strange shapes out of clay. That sometimes held your hand.
My fingers leafed their way through a book that never breathed a word about rules. Etiquette sounded sharp, staccato, brittle, like the prongs of a fork pecking away at a plate in the hunt for leftover food.
Scavenging for me was covering my whole body up to the waist in every substance I could find. Immersing myself full and free and in the moment. Dirt is easy to wash off while godliness sounds as dull and drab as that rainy day you’ve been saving up for. And then you have to leave it in that cupboard in case it gets spoilt.
‘Don’t touch,’ the voices said. ‘It might break.’
I liked to unravel knots, pull at a ball of string until it wraps its way around a maze of mismatched cities with streets that weave any which way and houses crouching beside towers that lean over backwards and sway in the wind. Sometimes my ball of string uncoiled itself all the way into the sea.
My fingers reached out to poke and prod at the unknown. My fingers squeezed whatever they came across and weighed things in the balance. My fingernails scraped at the lid of every pot and tin until, when desperate, my teeth joined in. Occasionally, I nibbled the top of your left arm when I managed to open a particularly tricky jar designed to be sealed forever. I couldn’t contain my delight.
Mine were the fingers that fumbled their way through wardrobes in the hope of finding fauns. Mine were the fingers that felt their way into a velvet glove. Mine were the fingers that rippled across a piano keyboard in an ecstasy of dissonance.
I didn’t stand on ceremony. Nothing was designed to be handled with care.
‘God put us on this earth for a purpose,’ the voices said, and I wanted to know exactly what this reason was.
In the bottom drawer, past the pencils and the corkscrew and the Christmas tree angel, was a pile of letters, still in their envelopes. My index finger winced as it caught a sharp edge. My fingertips flicked through the pile, getting a feel for the volume, then pulled the whole lot out and dumped everything down on the floor.
The same address was written in the same handwriting across each fluttering item. You lived there when we first met and the woman’s kisses came tumbling into our letter box. Her fingers folded each letter, neatly, perfectly precise, as smooth as her manicured hands.
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