Flash: Sixteen years

Photo by AllGo – An App For Plus Size People on Unsplash

Adam held up the wall, waiting, concerned. Beyond concerned, but not wanting to appear so. His child was on the other side of the door in this industrial nightmare, and all he could do is watch through the little window.

Sixteen years.

The world is fucked up when you only get sixteen years. Maybe Danielle wouldn’t test positive, but Adam knew in his heart-of-hearts she was already displaying all the signs of the Change. If he had money, any money, he would have bribed their way across the southern border. Mexico didn’t kill their Changed.

Not like the Free States of America.

His dark-haired princess looked over her shoulder at him while the officials waited for the test results. Only he could tell they weren’t waiting. They already had the results and were getting the shot ready. That wasn’t random fiddling.

He took his hand out of his pocket to flash “I love you” in sign language. It had been their signal of just him and her against the world for years. She flashed him a smile and the same hand symbol in return, two center fingers down against the palm, two fingers on the outer edges up and thumb out.

The doctor said something to the observing school official, a needle in the hand. Danielle turned back to what was happening in there.

(words 224, first published 4/25/2023 – from a picture prompt for a Facebook writing group. Aim is about 50 words)

By a Landslide Series
Sixteen years (10/11/2020)
Oopsie (11/8/2020)

Flash: Be Ninja

Acquired from the internet

Working late night pizza shift is interesting. The 12:21 am request gave me a challenge, but fortunately my parents always stored a ton of masks in the car from the COVID days, like a pandemic might break out at any moment over a decade later.

I pulled down the stocking cap against the cold and pulled up the mouth protection mask / neck garter. The electric car idled silently, wanting for the key to be back within its four-doors.

Five tween boys, and one very harassed male teenager who looked very much like two of the others, quietly answered the door after I tapped on the window. The buy-two-and-get-one-free special would not make it to morning with that lot.

The truly fun part was teleporting back to the car while they were busy juggling the pizza after I took it out of the insulated bags. My ability to hear the space I just left for ten minutes after a teleport made it perfect. I waved from the car before pulling out as the ten-year-olds muttered “Ninja” in awe.

(words 178; first published 4/30/2022 – created from Facebook writing group prompt)

Flash: Sledding

Photo by Jeremy McKnight on Unsplash

The drive out to the sledding hill hadn’t taken very long. When I had been the one in the child seat, it always took forever, but today we arrived in a blink of an eye. My twins, Annie and Zeke, turned four during the summer. Last year, the bump from an old trunk in our backyard satisfied them but not this year.

This year they graduated to Dannon Hill. Our township had been using it for over a hundred years. When the Dannon family could no longer maintain the liability and were going to sell it to developers, people raised the money and bought it from them to be a park. The township wouldn’t touch it when the association tried to give it to them, since it didn’t want the liability in our sue-happy culture.

Some really weird legal wangling arranged for the park to own itself. Sure you can sue the park, but all you would get is its assets … which is the park and a small endowment to keep it mowed. Then you get the liability because there was no stopping this being a sledding hill.

The kids and I have picnicked here often during the warm months, the local playground near our small millhouse was more paved than grass. They have run and tumbled down the gentle part of the hill dozens of times and helped with the cleanup during the fall, earning them the right to grown-up kid sled.

Last night they barely slept because of the snow.

“Is it wet enough?” they asked. “Powdery enough?” “Deep enough?” “Where are our sleds?” “Do we need better gloves?” The questions didn’t stop. My boyfriend, their father, went back to his apartment after the first hour. I got another three hours of it before I put them to bed with their outfits for tomorrow, now today, already laid out.

“Don’t unbuckle until the car is parked.” I said as I searched the street for a spot. The twins’ hands immediately left the straps they had started reaching for when I had slowed down. They knew I had no issue pulling away again if they broke that rule. I established the punishment early, as soon as they figured out how to unclick the belts on their own. The screaming matches for those two weeks were worth every moment of peace and sanity I have now. With two of them, I must be firm.

Cops directed traffic down a side street across from the sledding hill, and I slipped into the bank’s parking lot. They were closed for the storm.

“The engine is off and the key is out.” I announced, and my two Houdinis were out of the car before I had tucked my purse under the seat, pocketing only my wallet and keys. “Do not go to the back of the car until I am there.” I shouted as they closed the doors.

They waited impatiently, touching the bumper either side until I joined them in the back after checking for other cars coming in the parking lot. “It’s slippery because of the ice. I want you to keep a hand on the car until we are ready to start walking.”

“It’s not slippery at all.” Annie, my adventurer, rubbed her feet back and forth on the cleared pavement showing me.

“It’s slippery for the cars. See where the pavement is wet out there.” I pointed to the shiny black asphalt. “It’s cold enough for water to become ice.”

“Like the fridge?” Zeke asked.

“Yes.” I opened up the back and pulled out the two plastic sleds, one long pink with a Steven Universe star in the center and one star-spangled blue and shaped like Captain America’s shield. Zeke grabbed the Steven Universe, and Annie took the star-spangled one which she declared was a Wonder Woman sled the first time she saw it. “Cars can slip on ice just like we do, and when they do, they slide into other cars and people so we got to be really careful today crossing the road.” I put out my hands, and they each took one.

Sherrill was pressuring me to have another kid, but I only got two hands and he refuses to get married.

I don’t know.

I love him, most of the time. I love them always. But I just can’t do this alone. Him dropping by for dinner and an hour playtime isn’t enough.

I pushed him from my mind and joined the crowd gathering at the curb waiting for the cop to wave us across.

Once across safely, I ushered my kids to the gentler side of the hill. The high schoolers gathered with near the steep drop, which then went up a little, sending them flying to crash on the second part of the downslope until ending in a ditch at the bottom that unseated all but the most determined before continuing on flat ground for another forty feet and ending in old growth trees. I made it to the treeline only twice during my teenage years; the hill had been more ice than snow at the time. The teenage side had already matted down the fresh snow to a slick surface.

The young kid side of the hill had a slighter incline, and most of the really young kids didn’t have the weight to get through the flattening of the hill before the second downslope without an adult on the sled with them.

“Mom, ride with me,” Zeke begged as we got close to the area. As we arranged his long sled into place, Annie bellyflopped on her round one and pushed with her feet until she got enough speed. I got on the sled, holding the nylon ropes and digging my boots in while Zeke got between my legs.

“Are you ready?”

He looked up at me with total trust. “Yes.”

“We are going to go all the way to the bottom with me on the sled, is that okay? It’s going to be a long way back up and you are going to have to pull the sled.” I knew I would give in a pull the sled some, but I had gone over all the hill etiquette last year at home and throughout the summer. Mommy only carries the food was one of the rules.

“I’m ready.”

“Okay.” I pulled my feet into the sled and started pushing with my hands. My little man did the same. Soon we got up enough speed to move. The flat area slowed us down but my weight carried us through it and down the next slope. We bounced a bit in the ditch, but this side of the hill the ditch was less than a foot deep and nearly three feet wide. The high school side, the ditch ran as deep as four feet in places.

Zeke hadn’t made any noise on the way down, and his hands stayed on mine as I pulled the ropes back and forth. At the bottom, I used my feet to bring us to a gentle stop and got off to look at his face. He had a grin ear to ear.

“Again?”

“Yes!”

I handed him the rope to pull the plastic glider up the hill and trudged behind him, keeping an eye out for my daughter in her bright red winter coat. I finally found her scooting on her bottom to get to the second half of the hill. Getting off the sled means going to the side and walking to the top again.

Two more long trips down and up the hill, and my cautious kid was ready to attempt it on his own. Without my weight, he only made it halfway, but Annie soon convinced him to ride double on his sled and they made it all the way down. I remained on the top staring, keeping the gloved hands in the parka instead of nibbling on my nails.

“They’re fine,” a male voice said beside me.

I glanced sideways to see one of the first-grade parents standing beside me.

“I hope so.” I pulled out a hand and offered it. “Crystal.”

“Randal.”

After shaking hands, we both went back to staring at the children sledding down the hill and trudging up the hill, and laughing while doing both. Zeke was going down the hill with two other kids on his sled, and Annie had hooked up with her best friend of the month to double-team the hill.

“Which ones are yours?” I asked.

“The girl in the green jacket with the Brave Disney Princess is Aubrey, and her older brother from my first marriage is somewhere in that mess of teens. Jennie stayed home today.”

“Jennie?”

“My fourteen year old. I can’t figure her out.”

“She’s a teen. You’re not going to.”

He shrugged and sounded a little pained. “Last night she was all for this and this morning she refused to go, yelling and crying.”

“Did she start her period?” I asked.

“Fuck.” Randall looked off into the distance. “Maybe. It’s so unpredictable. I thought those things came every four weeks like clockwork, but hers are all over the place.”

“They usually are to start with.” I explained. “Has your wife helped you with it?”

“I’m twice-divorced, and since David’s and Jennie’s mom died last year, our relationship isn’t the greatest. I got a lot of time to make up for.” He did the eyes on Aubrey and check of the teen hill before continuing. “Two months of summer and one weekend a month isn’t enough.”

I nodded. “So what you might want to do with Jennie is see if she is pad only or can use tampons. That likely is the problem today. If she’s pad only, she probably was worried about leakage. First days can be very heavy. The combo of a tampon and pad would have worked well for today.”

“Thanks, I think.” Randall smiled at me. “Now I got to figure out how to talk to her about it.”

“Is Aubrey a weekend-only kid?” I probed, because after talking menstrual cycle, pretty much everything is open, and talking to him kept the panic at bay. My babies were sledding.

“No, I got joint custody. Me and Cindy didn’t work out, but we are still friends. We usually alternate months, but Cindy just had a new baby so I’m keeping Aubrey for a few months. Having her underfoot helps with the older two.” Randall glanced my way, and I noticed he had a gray-hazel eye color. “You got twins. That can’t be easy.”

“They are a handful, that’s for sure. It would be easier if they were friends with each other, but they are such different personalities.” I bit my lip as I eyeballed Annie figuring out how to spin the shield while going down the hill. Zeke had stayed at the bottom of the hill after his last run and was making snow angels with a group there. “Great kids though.”

“All we got to do is not screw it up.”

“Amen.”

A different type of scream went up on the teen side. I raced, slip-slide over as quickly as I could. I heard Randall crashing along behind me. Several taller bodies were gathered around one of the random trees on the slope. The ones the teens try to get close enough to touch.

“Let me through, I’m a nurse.” I said shoving the well-padded bodies aside. “Nurse, coming through.” I saw Randall’s glove move one of the teens aside. A boy lay crumpled on the ground, his leg driven into the tree at a very wrong angle, blood coming out from heavy jeans with a bit of white bone visible. Not something I usually see working at a general practitioner’s office checking weight and height, but I was trained for this. I pointed to Randall, “Get the officer and have him call an ambulance. Tell them compound fracture of the leg, unknown other injuries. Will need to transport person up the hill once the legs is stabilized. Got it?”

“Is David going to be okay?”

Of course, it was his kid. Story of my life when shit hits the fan. “He’s going to need surgery and stabilization. The sooner the better. You taking picture with your cell phone, call 911 now! And you,” I point to another kid who wasn’t freaking out. “Get the officer. Move!” I unzip my parka, tossing it aside. The nylon gloves won’t stop the blood long, but they are better than nothing.

Seeing the same gray-hazel eyes as his dad open, I change my voice. “Hey David, my name is Crystal Hughes. I’m a nurse. How are you doing?”

He made a low moaning sound. I saw his lips try to form words.

Conscious, responsive, I check off the list in the back of my head. No gushing from the wound, only seepage. That is going to take some metal to get it all back the way it should be. I listen to the kid on the phone with 911 try to explain things why I continue the assessment. The eyes have gone pinpoint, merciful shock reducing pain and blood loss, dangerous shock dropping body temperature. “Randall, help Dietrich tell the 911 operator what is happening. Direct any questions you don’t understand to me.”

“David, I need you to stay still for now. The ambulance is on the way, and they will be able to tie everything down so nothing gets damaged further before they move you. I know it hurts.” I pressed my hand into his right hand. “Here, hold onto me. Your dad’s here and an ambulance is on the way.” His hand gripped mine tight.

“I am Officer Daniel Bailey,” cut through the chatter around us.

“I’m Crystal Hughes, a nurse.” I said, not moving my eyes from monitoring my patient. His lips were going white and his skin had sweat forming. Come on ambulance. “Get a path clear from the street to here for the ambulance crew.”

The officer gave politer orders than I had been using on the teens, directing them to get a good walkway. Some of them hand shovels, and he had them clearing the excess ice away. “Anyone here parked on the street above?” he shouted. Those he grabbed to get a parking spot opened up.

“Come on David, you can squeeze harder than that.” I teased. He redoubled the bone-crunching grip as multi-colored lights flashed above.

“I’m Juan Ramos, a Paramedic.” The next words the EMT said were the most blessed words in existence. “I have the scene.”

“I am Crystal Hughes, a nurse. You have the scene. Patient is responsive, but nonverbal. His name is David. Shock, compound fracture of the lower left leg, looks like both fibula and tibia, blood loss. Unknown other injuries. I have not done any stabilization, patient is as found. Parent is present and may know blood type.” I switch my voice, as I continue to stare into David’s eyes. “David, Juan is going to take care of you, but I am going to stay until you are loaded onto the ambulance. Your dad will follow you to the hospital with Aubrey, okay? Let go and squeeze once if that is okay.”

My stomach loosened as he did so. Responsive makes such a difference, especially for the next bit. “Juan and his team are about to move your leg and strap it onto a board. It will hurt. Squeeze me twice when you are ready.” The sweat grew, but David squeezed my hand twice. “He’s ready.” I stated in my nurse paperwork voice.

I watched one kid collapse into the snow when David started moaning and the blood flow redoubled. The teen moved within moments. I made a mental note to look them over later.

Straps quickly locked the leg into a fixed position, then Juan’s team slapped on the first of the bandages. I hadn’t dared press the bloody wound for fear of doing more damage than help; if it had been bleeding more profusely, my parka would have been shoved at it, but the trickle hadn’t been enough to risk shoving those shattered bones anywhere near the major veins. Next, they rolled his body and slipped the body board under him.

The three members of the squad each took a handle and carefully carried him up the hill. I paralleled them, telling David what was happening. Once they slid him into the ambulance which Officer Bailey and the driver had been guarding, Juan took Randall’s information, let him know which hospital David would be transported to, and got final signatures needed to work on a minor. Bleeding minor in shock gave us a lot of leeway, but not free reign. Randall could have stopped us at any time.

I waited for the ambulance to pull out and returned to where I had tossed my parka. The teen who fainted was taking some ribbing from her friends, but my checking her out ended that teasing. I watched Randall collect the green coated Aubrey and I waved as he left. I noticed my gloves had red splatter and removed them. I tucked them into the parka to be thrown out later.

The young portion of the hill had cleared out. Ambulances did that to an area, getting rid of those with children to guard and gathering the thrill chasers. My two were standing with Betts’ mom, Annie playing with her best friend while waiting and Zeke just looking worried. He takes after me so much it hurts.

“Thank you for looking after them.” I said to Betts’ mom. Someday I will need to learn her name but not today. As the adrenaline dropped from my system, I felt the after-action shivers start.

De nada.” She pushed her thick black hair over her shoulder. “What you do, it’s important.”

Gracias.” I looked at my children. So precious. That could have been them wrapped around a tree, may be them one day. I want to wrap them in cotton. “So, what’s next kids?”

“Ice Cream!” declared Annie.

I fake a laugh. “Aren’t you cold enough?”

“It’s never too cold for ice cream,” Zeke explained.

“Would you and Betts like to join us? I’m paying.” Judging by how much Betts ate at my house during the summer, I knew money was tight. I could see her hesitating. “Por favor, I’m really tired and could use the help. If you have the time.”

Si. I have time. They be tired after eating.”

“Naptime.” I gave her the secret smile between adults who understood just what that mean. In my case, times two.

“No, no naptime time.” Annie stomped her foot. “Ice Cream!”

Giving her the look, I said, “Please.”

“Please, can we go out for ice cream?”

“Yes. And Betts and Betts’ mom are coming with us. Now get your sleds, we will hold hands when we get to the road.”

(words 3162, first published 4/17/2022)

Writing Exercise: Start at the End

Photo by Daniel Lincoln on Unsplash – Adjusted by Erin Penn

Have you ever read a story out of order? Sometimes authors lead with the end of the story and the mystery is how the person ended up in that situation. “Dude, where’s my car?” and “The Hangover” are just two recent movie examples where people wake up after a night of debauchery wondering what happened to them and have to backtrack the night.

For writing, often a writer will drop readers in the middle of the action and in the second chapter backtracks a couple hours or days and fill in the backstory once the reader is hooked.

Today’s writing exercise is to create an out-of-order flash. Normally, this would be frowned on because the flash medium is too short for backstory and timeline confusion. But breaking the rules to learn a new skill is okay.

Often when setting up a story in this manner, the first action is set in present tense and the remembrance portion is written in past tense. When the action catches up to present, the verb tense returns to present tense.

Example starts: “I stopped digging when the hole was deep enough.” “Blood is not my color, but at least it was washing out.” “The hangover wasn’t bad until I moved my head into the sunlight. When I opened my eyes, I realized it wasn’t sunlight.”

Remember the mystery is how the person got from a “normal” state to their present craziness when writing timelines out of order. This focus keeps the reader on the hook until the end.

WRITING EXERCISE: Write out three things that will happen in a flash in time order, and then write the flash with #3 as the first piece of information presented.

***

My Attempt

Flash Title: Too Big
I stopped digging the hole when it was deep enough. Mud covered me from head to toe which covered the blood. I hoped the mess would wash out, but burning everything remained an option. I had a stack of wood under a lean-to close to the house from clearing underbrush this summer which would provide a good firestarter. I didn’t want to run around starkers at home, but I’ve done that before chasing kids when I was younger and fitter and the young escape artists were slippery from their baths. Somehow the clothes would be taken care of before I went inside.

I wasn’t tracking evidence inside my home.

I guess I should start at the beginning.

Yesterday was normal. Wake up, take the kids to school, drop the spouse off at work, run errands, do the laundry at home – walking the dog between loads and picking up after the kids and setting up for dinner and paying bills and the hindered of other tasks needed to keep a house of six people alive. I work weekends while Samantha works weekdays, that way someone is always home with the kids. It does mean the two of us don’t spend time together much, but considering number five is on the way, we do spend enough time together for some things.

Then I got a call from school. Mardi had gone missing with two other children off the playground. I don’t remember getting to the school, but the time between me hanging up the phone and signing in at the office was four minutes. The school is five miles away.

She was still missing when I got there, police were arriving behind me. One of them may have been following me for speeding. Don’t know, don’t really care, but I didn’t get a ticket for it. The two other missing kids were eleven year-old girls, dark hair, dark skin, just like my Mardi. She takes after her mother but has my high cheekbones and narrow nose from my Native American ancestors. The two other girls were also mixed races.

The police didn’t like that pattern at all.

Well, long-story short, since this story should be about 500 words. The police have the bodies of the human traffickers. Well, the low-level guys.

Their boss is too big to fail.

The clothes burned fine once they caught fire, and Sam hosed me down once I got out of the backwoods. Not my woods, mind, the woods owned by the guy too big to fail. One of my buds who wasn’t able to help me today already is calling in an anonymous tip about a suspected body being ditched.

Too-Big-to-Fail is going to have a bad day tomorrow. Worse than mine was today.

(words 459, first published 02/25/2020, 

Geeking Science: The Aliens Among Us

Photo by Thanh Tran on Unsplash

Why do I love writing about children so much? Because they are the closest to alien thinking we adults experience. Concrete vs. Abstract thinking is such a big gulf.

I love the mene of working with children (babysitting, being a kindergarten teacher, being a parent) is like being an ambassador to beings from another planet and teaching them how to assimilate to our culture.

No, eating fire or dirt is not the best nutrition option on this planet. Sorry, your ambassadorship, but gravity works a bit different here – if you throw something, it will break. Your excellency, I don’t mean to imply anything, but what exactly were you thinking when you did this?

Part of it is everything really is new to them. They are still testing if gravity is consistent everywhere, why are some things good to eat and others not, and what is all this history that happened before they got here that they are expected to understand. Children really need diplomatic attaches to survive in the alien world they’ve been thrust into.

Terrell (in Honestly and Home Cooking Part 1) reacts differently to Mr. Troy’s disability, and very much needs all the adults in his life to keep him together and dressed. Scott (in It’s Dirty and Memory of a Lifetime) is slightly younger than Terrell and goes off the rails a lot more. I don’t think I will ever do a POV inside a child’s head simply because I cannot conceive what they are thinking. 

Things like – a child believes that by staying out of their bedroom, bedtime won’t happen. Because bedtime is associated with the bedroom. Or how my niece K (mentioned in my editing rant this month) didn’t want to write the character having problems because she really couldn’t dissociate herself from the character and she didn’t want to deal with the problems.

The cognitive difference between concrete and abstract thinking is fascinating. I love using fiction to explore it. And I sometimes let the difference in thinking bleed into exploring alien creatures, such as in Grass.

All of the amazement and exasperation in the differences between adults and children especially comes out in classic teen question “What were you thinking?” We expect the adult-sized children to understand cause-and-effect (which they do) and apply it to every situation, especially complicated ones (which they can’t) that we adults know from experience and shared stories is a beyond-dumb idea. They don’t have experience, their friends haven’t survived through the experience to tell the story, and they just don’t think that many steps ahead.

“Look mom, we did think it through. I made sure there was a mattress for when we fall.” “But mattresses have springs. You bounced!” “Mattresses have springs?”

These aliens live among us.

How about you? Are there aspects in children – from baby, through toddler, to teen – which make you geek? Do you have any stories to share?

Bibliography

“Cognitive Development in the Teen Years”. Stanford Children’s Health. Last viewed 10/2/2019. https://www.stanfordchildrens.org/en/topic/default?id=cognitive-development-90-P01594