Category: Flash Fiction
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1606: Brigid’s Diary – A Six
Part 13, Brigid’s Diary: The Abbey of Saint-Roman Beaucaire, July 1836, Camouflage The Beaucaire Fair moved like the Rhône in flood, bodies and bargains braiding into one slow current, and Felreil folding his foreignness into the merchants’ black coats and polished leather while quick fingers rehearsed their small rebellions at the height of a purse.…
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0906: Brigid’s Diary – A Six
Brigid’s Diary: Part 12.2, Arles, Spring 1836 Under the Floorboard The shouting started next door: boots on stairs, a man’s voice like a stomp, the scrape of furniture across wood, and the thin-pitched sound of children when they learn the house is not theirs. I tasted blood where I’d bitten my lip without noticing, salt…
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0306: Slightly Dangerous
(an off-piste Everywhere Poem gone for Six) “How is it in there?” asks a man. “In a word, chaos,” I tell him,“but worth it; the olive oil is half price,” and I close the boot of my car while his wife claims my empty trolley. I hate this placebut always return,navigating the demonic ritualsof warehouse…
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0206: Brigid’s Diary – A Six
Part 12.1, Brigid’s Diary: Arles, France, Spring 1836 The Yellow House and the Thin Law We took rooms at 2 Place Lamartine in a yellow house that looked like warmth from a distance, and up close smelled of damp plaster, fried onions, and bodies worked too hard for too little. Around us, the neighbourhood spoke…
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26 May: Six Sentence Story
The Accent of Exile Brigid’s Diary: Part 11.2, Avignon, Spring 1836 I crushed a sprig of tansy between my fingers when the fishmonger’s voice split the morning, “Hear her English accent; she stirs rebellion,” and a bitter, cold metal scent spooled in me like warning smoke. The market thinned into silence so quickly it felt…
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19 May: Six Sentence Story
An Undated Note Inserted in Brigid’s Diary Part 11.1, Avignon If this diary is ever found, know first that we did not leave England lightly; we gave it our backs, our hands, our winters, and still it asked for more …more hunger, more silence, more gratitude for wages that would not keep bread before a…
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12 May: Six Sentence Story
Part 10: Brigid’s Diary, Valence’s Saturday Market Spring 1836: Sun broke over Valence like pardon too easily granted; the Rhône ran molten and bright, the air rinsed so clean of coal smoke that it felt like a trick. Beyond it, the cathedral held its spine against the sky while the market spilled colour into the…
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2204: Six Sentence Story
Part 9: Brigid’s Diary, The Market at Vienne To Bear Witness We stepped off the boat at Vienne, and the town met us with a quiet menace — uneven stones slick with thaw, my hems dragging through muck, Felreil’s boots slipping as if the ground itself had learned mistrust. Saturday market pulled us by the…
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1404: Six Sentence Story
Part 8: Brigid’s Diary, Night on the Rhône — Half-Light and Wake That night on the river I learned how sound can become a weight, the engine’s pulse settling into my bones until sleep itself felt mechanical. The lanterns shook in their brasses, and the Rhône carried a smell of acrid silt and sulfur embers…
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0804: Six Sentence Story
The Steamboat — The First Descent Brigid’s Diary, Episode 06: April 1834 The steamboat called “Le Marsouin” shouldered the Rhône with a relentless thump-thump-thump, its side wheels beating water into obedience while the sound ran the banks like a bruise. The engine breathed deep and hoarse beneath us, heat and hiss rattling the wooden hull…
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