Step into a world of snapshot moments with my Seasonal Snapshot Series. Each micro fiction story in this collection is a glimpse into the magic I’m feeling in the season.
Perfect for a quick read, each snapshot captures a fleeting moment based on an emotion, experience, thought or prompt.
This month’s Seasonal Snapshot #1 of Festive Fiction was written in response to the Curtis Brown Creative (CBC) Winter Story competition on Instagram #CBCWinterStory25.
I followed the prompt set by Maame Blue as the first line of an original flash fiction story: The tree looked naked once all the ornaments were smashed…
Naked Joy
The tree looked naked once all the ornaments were smashed.
Stunned by the silent chaos, Gill clutched the doorframe. Now even her plastic pine had buckled under forced festive cheer. Deep-green tinsel twisted around lower branches and drooped across the carpet. She kicked it aside. They would be here soon, wanting a winter wonderland when the best she had was a summer setting.
Craving calm, she observed the fever tree outside, its bark a pale-lime glow in the African sun. A weaver was crafting a nest for inspection, ruby eyes bright against his masked face and lemony body, as he flitted between thorns. If the nest was not perfect in placement, construction, or greenness, the female would tear it apart. Talk about expectations.
Back to the shattered stew on her floor. The window had been open during the night’s gusty thundershower and one explanation was simple physics – the tree wobbling on its rickety tripod stand.
More probable was Portia, her senior pug, brushing against it after her midnight drink of water and then fighting with it – or with Santa Paws bumbling around in the dark. He wasn’t the youngest either. The fruit mince pie she’d left out – hoping he’d be generous to Portia – was untouched. Clearly he preferred shortbread, or a cooler climate.
Portia waited at the door.
“Okay, let’s go potty, and then you can bite open your present.”
She left Portia to sniff and circle on the lawn. A sassy zik-zik-zik sounded above the weaver at work, as his emerald nest shimmered in the sunlight. He was weaving her tinsel through the twigs, grass, and plant fibres.
Joy lifted inside her, unexpected and naked.
Photo by freestocks on Unsplash