The Car

We could appreciate grandpa’s love for that car but his desire to give it to the Grace Chapel left us confounded.

‘That chapel is one  thousand miles away?’

‘So what?’

‘How do we take it there? We can’t drive it; it may not survive the journey.’

‘Carry it on a trailer.’

‘Why?’

‘When I was a little kid, mother carried me to that church every Sunday; even when she was sick…….. certain that, with His grace, someday I would go there on my two feet……… I did.......on my eighth birthday.’

More than the words his eyes left us speechless.

                                                                                            Photo prompt © Al Forbes

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A post for FridayFictioneers and Sunday Photo Fiction on picture prompts.

Word count 100

Scaffold

As he climbed the scaffold a fear rose deep inside his heart. He felt he was climbing a spider’s net. It happened every time he climbed that scaffold.

‘I’m trapped in this net and forever.’

He was the brightest student of his village. Every teacher was proud of him. He had always wanted to be an engineer. He loved fiddling with machines and loved to dream of the day when he would make his own machines.

But it was not to be.

Father had slowly but surely turned alcoholic. The end was painful and traumatic.

Fifteen years later the only vivid memory of his childhood was that of a spider who had built a beautiful net in one corner of his pathetic room. Remorselessly it would eat the trapped flies and insects.

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A post for FFfAW on a picture prompt

The Flying Saucer

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“Don’t even dare to touch it,” said the boy to his sister.

“But it’s only a toy, let me play with it,” sister, who was four years younger, could not resist the temptation of fiddling with what she thought was a beautiful toy.

“It’s not a toy; it’s a flying saucer from the outer space. There are aliens in it.”

“No, it’s just a toy.”

“You think I’m lying. Go and touch it. But don’t you blame me if the aliens come out and kidnap you.”

The boy left.

His confidence had unnerved the little girl, ‘I don’t like aliens.’

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Post for Friday Fictioneers on a photo prompt

Word count 100

The Flower

The flower reminded him of something.

‘I must be dreaming. We live in a concrete jungle.’

Something disturbed him.

‘What dress was she wearing? No, it is not the dress; it was the flower……..yes…..she was wearing a flower in her hair.’ 

He looked at the flower, again, and pinched himself. It hurt.

‘It’s not a dream. But where has she gone? She is not even familiar with the place……. she would get lost…..surely.’

He felt that someone was shaking him by his shoulder.

In the dim light he heard someone saying, “Don’t be harsh on yourself, she will get through.”

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A post for FridayFictioneers on a photo prompt.

Word count 100

The Booty

“That’s the car of my grandfather.”

“Which car?”

“That car over there, besides that wall.”

“That junk was a car? What of it?”

“That’s the car in which my grandfather had run off with the booty.”

“Booty? What booty?”

“Yes, his gang had looted a bank. They had stolen jewellery worth millions from the bank-lockers. But then a fratricidal war broke out in the gang and my grandfather somehow contrived to run off with the booty. As luck would have it he was shot by the police. Still he managed to escape the police dragnet but he could not take the booty with him. He met my father and told him where the booty was. He had hidden the booty in a secret chamber in the car.”

“What happened thereafter?”

“Before he could tell my father where the car was, he succumbed to the injury.”

“How do you know that that was your grandfather’s car?”

“Father had spoken of  it a thousand times. Unfortunately he could not locate it when he was alive.”

“And you think the booty is still there?”

“No one, except me, knows where the secret chamber is. Only I can retrieve it.”

“Let’s go and get it.”

The man looked at his friend and shuddered. Friend’s eyes had turned hard and lifeless.

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A post for FFfAW on a photo prompt

Then and Now

                                                                                        Photo prompt© Erin Leary

She was utterly disappointed.

I too was taken aback; but more than that I felt let down.

During last ten years I would have spoken of my birthplace at least five hundred times and every time I had spoken of it as if it was Eden on the earth.

‘Everything is so ugly and tearful.’

‘……………….’

“The lake is like a cesspool, no?’

I was lost for words. An old man, overhearing our conversation, volunteered, ‘That’s development…… and the number of sick people in the town will shock you.’ 

We left the place but deep within I felt like crying.

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A post for FridayFictioneers on a picture prompt.

Word count 100

The Ducklings

‘Brother, look at this photograph,’ the child almost shouted in excitement.

But the elder brother was not interested. They had been scrounging the park for half an hour and still they had not been able to find even one worthwhile thing. He could feel the anger of his father who had gone berserk when, on getting up from his bed, he had seen them sleeping; they should have already been out in the park to pick empty beer and water bottles.

‘Don’t you waste your time picking silly things? Find something that father can sell.’

The child was not even six years old and sparks of curiosity often distracted him to the annoyance of his elder brother.   

‘Look at these little birds and their father.’

‘It’s not their father, it’s their mother.’

‘True; father would have sent them to collect empty bottles.’

Elder brother was dumbstruck.

The boys kept gazing with envy at the little ducklings.

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A post for Sunday PhotoFiction on a photo prompt.