Flash fiction 9: Circles

Another little story, written for the #2minutesgo challenge on JD Mader's website, Unemployed Imagination. If you fancy a go, head over to here on Fridays - www.jdmader.com/2015/05/2-minutes-go.html - cos you'll be welcome :) 

Cheers.

Circles

Shivering slightly, he drew his coat tighter around him.

It came full circle: the end in the beginning; the beginning in the end. Don’t start what you can’t finish, his father always said. Don’t talk with your mouth full. Don’t play with your belly button or it will pop. But Jay Senior did that all the time. And he always started what he never intended to finish, like his engagement.

A nasty piece of work was what Jay was. Not that he cared, or anyone else for that matter. Half his friends were class Bs. It was a word signifying nothing bad nowadays.

Tears fell in the rain.

A memory of his mother in the tumult, barefoot, wearing a thin white dress. Hair drenched, writhing like snakes in the wind. Waiting. She was always waiting, until the day she decided no more. That’s when Jay’s life shifted. The grey city became green fields. He gained a new father. He went to college. The sun shone and the rain evaporated.

Jay Senior talking with his mouth full seemed a lifetime ago, when little Jay stood so high, not even reaching his father’s chest. Today he stood over him, looking down as he threw a handful of dirt into the hole in the ground. 

Copyright Vickie Johnstone, April 2015