Flashfiction – Page 10

Emma’s Garbage

Emma’s mother had been right about men.

Emma (not her real name) lifted the crinkly garbage bag with effort, and let it drop into the community bin, doing it fast and neat so that she wouldn’t have to breath in the foul stench of whatever else was in the dumpster. She closed it with a loud thud, took a few quick steps away and filled her lungs with the fresh dawn air.

She stood straight up, feeling good about herself, until she saw the slim runner-girl from the next block come down her apartment steps, toss her ponytail in Emma’s direction and take off on a run, her perfect figure clothed in her perfect sporting outfit, oozing self-awareness of the very fact. With a snort Emma turned towards her own building and began marching, having lost the nice feeling she had tasted momentarily after she’d dropped the lid on the dumpster. Continue reading “Emma’s Garbage”

Mori the Student

Everything, as it should be

A young guy named Mori went to Japan, to one of the temples around Kyoto, with the intention of learning meditation. He brings along an interpreter, gains permission to join the class of a Zen master and begins lessons. The master neither encourages nor discourages the presence of the interpreter.

A couple of weeks go by. Rising early, Mori attends daily meditation sessions, joins the communal meals, helps with cleaning tasks and other duties, same as everyone else at the temple, who were mostly novice monks. All the while, the interpreter explains things and relays instructions to Mori, who believes he is doing well and is on his way to becoming an adept meditator.

Then, unexpectedly, the interpreter falls ill and is taken away to another part of the compound. Young Mori is left in a quandary, thinking if he is not able to understand the Zen master’s instructions, he will need to stop. Continue reading “Mori the Student”

The Voice in the Well

There are places we should not go to.

There are no Gods and Goddesses down here despite what anyone else might have told you. This is a well, a very dry and old one, but it is the very bottom of everything there is, everything that you know of. They do not send those with hope or means this way. It’s only those without influence and a future that find themselves here. Round the stairs, down and down, did you look over to see the drop, as you made your way here? This is quite a distance from the surface, you do realise that? Look up. That pin prick above your head, at the very centre of the dark circle – that’s the sun. The outside. Everything you had known. Where all things possible are present. Things like hope. Expectation too. But not down here. Continue reading “The Voice in the Well”