WINNER
The 2019 Screw Turn Flash Fiction Competition
BY WILLIAM WEISSINGER
Usually I’m eager to open whatever UPS has delivered —a new turtleneck, say, or an angle grinder. But not today. I know from the label what is inside. I slit the tape, take off the top layer of Styrofoam, and there she is. All that is left of my mother: a single place setting of bone china. The same red roses, the same green leaves, the same gold rim as the set in the china cabinet.
Did you know that bone china is more than forty percent the ash of actual bones? One supposes that the bones come from cattle, or maybe horses. Not the Family China. Just before her death, she told me the secret. She made me promise to follow the tradition with her remains, just as she’d done with her father and mother, just as they’d done with their forebears. The entire set is made from the cremation ash of Robertson ancestors. Our family crypt isn’t in the cemetery; it’s the china cabinet.
Her plate gleamed, eager in the afternoon sun. “Dinner?” it seemed to ask.
I hadn’t eaten from the Family China since she’d told me. Now, my stomach turned at the thought of eating from the dust of her long grey hair, the dust of her staring eyes. I folded the flaps of the box closed—what the hell? she seemed to ask—taped it shut and took it up to the attic.
I brought down some empty boxes, wrapped the entire set in old newspapers, packed them into the boxes, and carried them—the boxes, the generations of Robertsons—up to join Mother. As I closed the drop-down steps to the attic, I decided I was imagining the outrage from above.
I walked back to the dining room, cleaned up the shreds of leftover paper, and carried the trash to the garage. There was my car, waiting for me. No, I corrected myself, it wasn’t waiting for me—and that, I realized, was just what one wants in an inanimate object. It was merely there, and not constructed from the blood and bones of anyone. Okay, it had leather seats, but it wasn’t like I knew the cows. I drove to town for an early dinner.
Dinner merged with drinking, and drinking with games of pool. When the band in the bar got too loud I went home and was soon asleep.
I awoke from a nightmare—my mother calling me from the attic—and then awoke again to some odd sounds. I slept fitfully after that, and was wide awake at 6:30, when my coffee pot’s timer clicks on.
When I passed the dining room on the way to the kitchen, I glanced at the china cabinet. The shelves were stacked with the Family China.
I stood there, my heart racing. I looked down at the floor: no packing boxes, no packing paper. I ran back to the pull-down stairs and climbed the few steps it took for my head to clear the attic floor. Shreds of newspaper were scattered around the boxes, which had been torn open.
Could I have done this, sleepwalking? I looked at my hands and saw no scrapes, no contusions—nothing unusual but the green stamp on my wrist to show I’d paid the cover charge at the bar. That, and my hands were trembling.
I walked the rest of the way up to the attic, bent to pick up the mess, then stopped. Was I cleaning up evidence? “Officer, someone broke into my house and unpacked my china, carried it downstairs, and loaded it into the china cabinet.” No, I wasn’t calling the police to report this. I stuffed the shredded paper into the remains of the boxes and carried them downstairs.
I still hadn’t had my coffee. I had always used Grandfather’s coffee cup, back when I’d thought it meant that he’d used it, not that that it was made from his bones. Instead I used an old mug and stood before the china cabinet, just looking at it.
What must have been Mother’s place setting, judging from its brand-new sheen, was stacked all together at the top. Bits of cardboard clung to the edges of the saucer, and a cardboard shred curled up from the base of the plate.
I could feel the Family China urging me to open the door.
Then the door popped opened an inch.
I cried out, slammed the door, locked it, and ran up to my bedroom. I dressed in the first clothes to hand, and without hat or coat I ran out into the rain.
I was back in two hours. I’d had breakfast for my stomach and Irish Coffee for my nerves. I’d brought dish packs and rolls of packing paper from the U-Haul store. By noon I had the Family China re-boxed and the boxes in the back of my car, and I was showing the Mother place setting to Tom at the town’s one antique store. Tom was an old man, but when he smiled his youth flashed back for a moment. He wasn’t much interested—the new generation of brides, he said, isn’t into old porcelain—but for twenty-five dollars he agreed to buy the set.
I carried the boxes into the store, and left a lighter man. I had lunch in town, stopped by a friend’s house for a familiar face, and with the wine and the dinner they offered, I didn’t get home until after dark. Fancying a glass of wine with the football game, I headed for the kitchen. The china cabinet gleamed at me from the corner of the dining room. Its shelves were stacked with the Family China.
The soup tureen’s lid was askew, and stained with . . . what? Something dark. I took out the tureen. It was oddly heavy. I took off the lid. Inside was Tom’s head. His white-glazed eyes looked at me. “Wash us,” his lips said. “We’re dirty.”
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William Jay Weissinger’s fiction and poetry have appeared in The MacGuffin and regional anthologies. His nonfiction articles have been published in Sail Magazine and other magazines and newspapers. Bill recently completed his second novel, Burning The Banker. Bill is a retired attorney and an artist. See his sculptures at WeissingerStudios.com and check out his writer’s web site at WilliamWeissinger.com. He lives on San Juan Island in the State of Washington, USA.
