HONORABLE MENTION, SUMMER 2022
THE SCREW TURN FLASH FICTION COMPETITION
BY JANICE EGRY
“Here, Mommy,” the child says. “The flowers are for you. I picked them.”
“Thank you,” I say and accept the bouquet. But I am not his mommy. I do not have a son. He is a cute little boy, but not mine.
I don’t know how I came to be here in this field of daisies. I look in all directions. There seems to be no end to the acres of blossoms dancing in the wind. How do I get out? I turn in all directions, searching. Just searching.
I remember walking down a dirt road. Where is it? Where is that road? I see no perimeter to this field nor any path through it. I recall dust rising up, disturbed by my hurrying feet, and the faint song of a solitary mockingbird slicing the hushed air. I remember that tears streamed down my cheeks, stinging chafed skin, and I picked up my pace to a trot. All of that comes back to me now.
In my hand, the blooms wilt on their sturdy stems. I wonder whether to keep them or toss them away. I turn in circles trying to decide where to go, which way might take me to that road.
The boy is gone! Where did he go? How could he have disappeared? His blue bib overalls would surely stand out in this expanse of bright white and yellow. He was taller than the meadow growth. I should be able to see him. But he did have a yellow shirt. That might blend in.
I seem to be the only moving creature in this place. No bees visit. No ants crawl beneath the thick flora. There are no trees here to provide respite or residence for birds. I do not understand, but I finally pick a direction and begin walking, letting the tired plants in my hand drop to the ground.
Funny. I have no sense of time. It must be the sameness of scenery along my way. Have I walked for hours? It seems so. Like treading through an expanse of butter and untinted oleo, a monotony of motion and color numbs my mind.
Oh, look! A sandy strip in the distance lined with mammoth shade trees. The road I’ve been searching for. Hooray! My feet burn, my tongue is stuck to the roof of my mouth, I cannot swallow, but I made it. Now will my memory return, and can I find my way home?
At the edge of this flowery field is a ditch, wide but not too deep. I can cross that. I lift my skirt and climb down, then up, with long steps. After feeling firm ground under my feet, I settle just for a moment on a granite boulder by the road. I never thought I’d be glad to be free of innocent daisies. Speaking of innocent, where did that kid go?
Shielding my eyes from the late-day sun, I gaze far down the road. A black sedan sits there—not moving, just parked under a tree. Maybe someone can tell me where I am. Maybe I can hitch a ride. I stand, brush off my skirt, and begin walking toward it.
What if it drives away before I get there? Picking up my pace, I run, once again kicking up dust on the unpaved road. The distance quickly dissipates, and I am there beside the car.
The automobile is familiar. Do I know this vehicle? Now I see that it is not just parked, but it has smashed into the wide trunk of an elderly oak, its front crushed back to the windshield. No driver, but a man in the passenger seat is bloodied and not breathing. Oh, no! I know him. My husband! My car. I must have been driving.
In the back seat, a little boy lies limp and broken, holding a handful of wilted daisies. I did have a son.
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Janice Egry graduated from Crane School of Music and taught music and special education before retiring to write full time. She writes poetry, short stories, personal essays, children’s stories, novels and novellas. Several are published prizewinners. The poem, “Silence of the Song,” was grand prize winner at the 2008 Dancing Poetry Contest in San Francisco, and can be found choreographed on their website. Her short story, “A Well-Urned Talent,” was an honorable mention in the Fall 2017 Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award competition, and was published in Volume I of our print anthology, 21st Century Ghost Stories. She resides with her vociferous cat, McKenna, in Dutchess County, New York.
