SAFE GROUND: Flash Fiction by Nick

Flash Flood is continuing its 2019 National Flash Fiction Day celebration with a day of flash written on the theme of 'epiphany' by men at HMP Wandsworth who were participants of Safe Ground's Flash Fiction Project workshops.  You can read more about Safe Ground and the story behind this work in our introduction to this series.

Flash by Nick 

She had always adored him. For years they had known one another. She had watched him grow from the days when they were both at school, to now, a man with the world at his feet.

Somehow their lives had taken different directions from those heady years when they were both in their early twenties. She had married well, into a respected local family, and he had raced on, following his ambitions but had never settled down. 

Over the years their lives had continued to cross in one way or another and they had never really lost touch. While working in Zurich, her best friend had taken a job at his firm. A couple of years later they met, at her father’s funeral. It seemed like only yesterday.  

They immediately felt very comfortable in each other’s company. There was an intense warmth between them and almost a nervous energy.

She told him that she had left her husband and in a funny way that seemed to please him. They carried on chatting on their own and away from the hum of the crowd. They recounted tales of the years gone by. The more they spoke, the more they smiled.

The gathering was thinning out as, one by one, the bodies left the lounge bar of the Flounder and Firkin. They were almost the last two.

‘I suppose you’d better get going, if you’re going to make that flight,’ she said, looking down at his shoes. 

‘Wow, is it that time already?’

They gazed, fixated at each other for a few moments, knowing what they wanted to say but not sure how or whether they should. 

‘Look, this has been great, seeing you I mean, not the funeral.’ 

She chuckled a little.

‘Really great actually, and I’d like to see you again…soon…really soon.’

A broad grin spread across her face and her cheeks reddened slightly. ‘Yes, that would be lovely. I’d like that.’ They exchanged details and she reminded him again that he had to go.

They hugged. He took a few seconds to smell her hair, remembering what they had once been. As they parted, they looked at each other, then went on their separate ways.

He sat in the back of the taxi, staring through the slightly steamy windows, contemplating his wonderful epiphany. He had been around the world, his life running at full speed and the woman that he had been seeking may have always been there, right from the start.


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