Flash Fiction Friday By George Berger

Tender Nothing

By George Berger

 

On a bleak and blustery late autumn day, in the quiet fog-shrouded valley beyond the old plum orchard, as fragile droplets of dew glimmered on the golden leaves of the trees, silent in the still dawn air, I found your father, dressed only in his threadbare blue bathrobe, his once-proud shoulders hunched against the weather and the world, trying to trade my iPhone to Mr. Jimmy's eldest son for what he desperately hoped was, this time, actually a bag of smack. I shook my dully aching head, my graying tresses making no sound against the soft collar of the old smoking jacket I wore over my pajamas, and smiled grimly, sadness and admiration warring competitively across my tired visage. I had somehow inexplicably loved that man once, I suspect; he had certainly caused more and stronger emotions to trickle through my chest than any of the other overgrown boys who had occasionally followed me, puppy-like, in those dream-like faraway better days of yore, when the sun was brighter and the air was cleaner and there were only three channels on the television.

Yet as I spied from an intermediate distance on him as his large and long hands trembled with nigh-palpable nervousness or anxiety or delerium tremens and he furtively effected the clandestine alchemical transformation of personal electronics into what was most likely once again equine deworming powder, I could not entirely successfully suppress the queerly petulant, frustratingly selfish feeling—in any other lesser woman it might have risen unchecked to the level of a personal opinion, but I had long ago trained myself rather better, of course—that while so very, and admirably, typical of your father, bless his firm and unyielding heart, this clandestine early-morning undertaking seemed a slightly excessively drastic ploy to deprive me of my dear and beloved Farmville.
Anyway, sweet child, be a dear and run down to the pawn shop for another phone while your father takes his nap this afternoon. And get another charger while you're there, if you'd be so kind; a goat ate the last one, the little monster. While you're gone I'll make those cookies you like, and maybe a pitcher of lemonade, if the ants haven't gotten into the sugar and your father hasn't drunk all the whiskey. Oh, and have your car washed, won't you, dear? All that mud looks absolutely vile. We do have standards to uphold, after all.

Welcome George! Thank you for participating in Flash Fiction Friday. This is an exceptionally descriptive piece of writing. I enjoyed the hint of humour hidden within the structure. I suspect this woman would be a force to be reckoned with, but a loyal friend to the end.

Tell us three things about yourself George.
1. I write because I can't help it.
2. If I was a character in a book I would be utterly excised in edits.
3. My super human power would be the ability to ignore that super human should be one word. :)

To connect with George and learn more ...
George Berger, author of Angles and Curves from Queerteen Press, blathering inanely on Twitter as @mendacities

 

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