tales from my travels
[I’m very happy to say I made the finals of this flash fiction competition with a ’50-word story about a hero’. I wanted to salute the small, kind gestures that transform the ordinary. Here in Japan, acknowledging another person’s humanity seems to be a way of life, even when it means reaching out to (quite possibly) the descendant of someone who was – not so long ago – The Enemy.]
https://www.writingclasses.com/contest/be-a-hero-contest-2017
The hard grit of life
Caught inside an oyster shell
Turning into pearl.
© Joanna Rubery 2017
Take one heart (fresh is best) and slice it down the middle.
Tenderize with disbelief, then marinate the bleeding halves in melancholia.
When mollified, rinse in ice-cold invective. Pat dry with opportunistic hugs.
Meanwhile, bring a pan of salted tears to boil. Simmer at blood heat.
After half a year, pierce cleanly with a skewer.
Spice with bitters and resentment, and sizzle till browned off.
Stew in thyme and wistfulness awhile, till the flame begins to flicker.
Let the half-hearts cool on sheepish embers.
Chop finely into pieces, crush, and spread thinly, on other people’s crumbs.
Serve with soured grapes.
© Joanna Rubery 2017
“Almost,” says my boss, throwing me a cloth. “Just wipe the mirror down.”
I look at the square of silver above the sink.
“Is it a mirror?” I ask her, “Or is it a portal to an alternate universe?”
“Get on with it,” she says, pushing the cleaning trolley. “One more room to go.”
I lift my finger and tap the sheen with one nail.
My alternate self taps back. And then I feel her – nail on nail. Skin on skin.
Outside, my boss sings off-key.
We both climb in the sink. Then, with one jump, we swap worlds.
© Joanna Rubery 2017
[I belong to an online writing group, and each month we write a story with a theme and a word count. This time, we were asked to write about ‘New Life’ in exactly 1000 words. This story is, in fact, an extended take on my microfiction story, Terminal.]
The iced wind seared my patchy scalp, and I coughed again, a raspy, racking ache. My fingers stung. Perhaps we should never have walked all this way to the hospital, but when I was little, March never used to be this bitter. I remembered sunshine. We’d even drive over to the beach sometimes, and –
“Mum,” sighed Amy, “How much longer will this take?”
I caught us frozen in the glass front opposite: my daughter, a sliver of sulky green; myself, a sharpened stick. It would be the last time I set eyes on either of us.
Clear sparkling water
Splashing shallow over stone
Like my love for you.
© Joanna Rubery 2017
[I’m very proud of this one, which came sixth in a recent microfiction competition hosted by Grindstone Literary Services. We were asked to write about a Snapshot in 250 words.]
I step on scarlet toes (“Sorry, love!”) and breathe in sugared scent. The girls are like butterflies, flitting under frangipani blooms.
“Madame?” He’s got a walkie-talkie. “Can I help you?”
“I’m looking for my friend,” I shout, above the bass. Then I see him across the street. A tuk-tuk swerves, and misses me.
“All alone?” I ask. The beer is sharp, cutting through the evening heat.
“I’m in love,” Pete tells me, through a haze of smoke and flowers. “Not with you.”
“Just as well,” I say. “With who?”
He nods across the road. “With Nita.”
I look over – the girls are glowing neon – and back to him.
“Nita from the Good Time Garden??”
“I’m obsessed!” he says.
A boy clatters in the gutter with empty cans of paint.
“Does she know?” I ask him. Pete isn’t young.
He shakes his head. “But I’m going to give her this.”
He smooths a photograph with tar-stained fingers. She’s laughing, he’s drinking something lime.
“I’ve written to her,” he says, draining his glass. “On the back. Dutch courage!”
Then he grins, gets up, and weaves his way across.
The fan above is broken. Something scuttles by my feet.
After a while, I spot him coming back, and then I see her, I think, on the balcony, a sliver of red. She leans out and drops something. It flutters into flowers.
“I think she was surprised,” says Pete, sitting down. “We’ll see. Fancy another?”
I wonder. I wonder what to say.
© Joanna Rubery 2017
Glass reflects us both
Standing under real green leaves
With fake emotion.
© Joanna Rubery 2017
[Update: I’m delighted to say that my story below has just been published in the glossy print May 2017 edition of Wanderlust magazine, so I’m bumping it back up the blog!]
“You have wrong visa!” shouted my new boss down the phone.
Jet-lagged, culture-shocked, and helpless in the heat, this was not what I wanted to hear. I’d come to Cambodia to teach, but I was already questioning a country that had a) no pavements and b) frogs for lunch.
“What do I do?” I asked, chasing an unknown creature under my hotel bed.
My employer sighed.
“Leave country and come back in,” she said, and hung up. Then all the lights went out.
Unanswered questions.
Undrunk tea, untaken paths
Unpicked in hot sun.
© Joanna Rubery 2017