Stay Safe - Flash Fiction by Cheryl Snell

 

Stay Safe

Flash Fiction

by Cheryl Snell

I had stopped feeling safe so I locked the doors and pulled the curtains.

Let’s just read about what happens out there, I said to my husband. We don’t have to stand in the middle of it.

 Read? You mean newspapers? No radio, no TV, no computer?  

That’s right. Nothing that comes out of a talking face to ambush us with emotion.

I set about making the house serve all our needs, so there would be no reason to go out. That desire needed choking. I covered the couches with soft pillows plush as clouds, painted the walls all the blues of the ocean. I covered the lampshades with silk in the colours of the sunset. I filled corners in the rooms with fake palm trees. We might have been on a beach somewhere, on permanent vacation.

Soon, we forgot about the newspapers. We let them pile up on the driveway. We calmed down, but then my husband got bored.
With me? I cried.
Of course not. I just miss my life at the office.
Go then. Get out, I said.

In the empty house that suddenly seemed too big for me, I put a cover-up over the bathing suit I had taken to wearing while I did housework. I heard splashing coming from across the lawn, so I peeked out at the neighbour’s swimming pool. It shimmered in the moonlight, and a dozen guests were standing around it, drinking tropical drinks swizzled by pastel umbrellas. Nobody was wearing a mask.

The neighbour caught me spying and held his glass up to me in a toast, or as an invitation to join the party. Why not? I was already dressed for it. But I yanked the curtain shut instead, ran upstairs, and climbed into the center of the big bed, waving my arms as if they had water-wings attached. I was safe again in my small space.

That’s better, I said, to nobody.

 

Cheryl Snell's books include the novels of Bombay Trilogy, and poetry collections from Finishing Line, Pudding House, and Moria Books. Her work has been included in anthologies such as a Best of the Net and Pure Slush’s Lifespan series, and most recently her words  have appeared in the Drabble, 365 Tomorrow, Spillwords,D Cafe Irreal, Literary Yard, New World Writing, and elsewhere.