A bit of Flash...

This flash fiction piece was written for an entry into the Writer's Talkback one word challenge, which I am proud to have won many times, and this one is one of my favourites.  The word 'Alone' provoked the story, and I came up with something suitably dark.  I can't say my writing is ever happy-clappy - I love to delve into dark matter too much! 


Your Mother Loves You

Rain glistened like pools of quicksilver along the pavements.

Low cloud pressed against the surroundings, made the sky seem darker than it was.

A droplet splashed against his face and he blinked as though it was acid. He didn’t understand this darkness. He didn’t understand the chill coiling around him, couldn’t fathom the strange glare that made his eyes hurt.

The cool moisture on his lips and tongue tasted strange. It didn’t nourish or satisfy, and his stomach winced with hunger, the feeling growing, making his insides ache.

He was unable to move, cocooned in a thin blanket, and his back felt numb. A thin, bloody film covered his wrinkled skin. He shivered, fingers bunching.

He tried to make a noise, tried to cry, but his clogged lungs sagged, and instead he wept silently into the night, tears lost as the rain washed over him.

A minute turned into an hour, then two, then three. After a while, he stopped moving. Eventually he stopped crying.


‘Found him this morning,’ the police officer said to his sergeant, forlorn. He handed him the tiny body, wrapped in a cotton blanket. ‘Just a few hours old. His mother left him to die.’