{"id":492,"date":"2018-04-17T22:34:41","date_gmt":"2018-04-17T21:34:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/?p=492"},"modified":"2024-10-17T17:08:01","modified_gmt":"2024-10-17T16:08:01","slug":"flash-fiction-martin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/2018\/04\/17\/flash-fiction-martin\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Monday morning.
There\u2019s nowhere I need to be.
And nothing I have to do.
Once, this was the dream. But seeing as I never got round to putting something by for the proverbial rainy day, it\u2019s the farthest thing from.
No matter how much I might have hated the day job, at least it gave me purpose. I\u2019m not going to find much of that strolling along on this actual, non-proverbial rainy day in these depressing, gray woods, but maybe the fresh air will do me some good.
Yeah, right.
It\u2019s not fresh air I need; it\u2019s a job. And quick. The shitty severance I got isn\u2019t going to last pissing time.
I\u2019m laying the ground work for another sleepless night or ten, doing the mental arithmetic of just how much time pissing time amounts to, when I step ankle-deep into a mud-filled puddle.
Well, of course I do.
Cake, have some icing.
I squelch-limp over to a long-fallen tree and take a seat on one of its broken boughs. I don\u2019t bother taking the shoe off. What\u2019s the point? It\u2019s forty degrees outside. Not like waving my sock around is going to help it dry any. I sit there long enough for it not to matter anymore. Long enough to drift off into my own little world of opaque pointlessness, a world so sealed off from this one I do not see or hear the little boy in the brightly colored raincoat until he\u2019s standing right in front of me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\u201cHello,\u201d he says.
\u201cHi,\u201d I say back.
\u201cMy name is Martin,\u201d he says.
\u201cIs it?\u201d I say. \u201cThat\u2019s unusual.\u201d
\u201cIt is?\u201d
\u201cWell these days, it is,\u201d I say. \u201cUnusual in that it\u2019s so normal. Which is not a bad thing. How old are you, Martin?\u201d
He thinks about this. \u201cSix.\u201d
\u201cSix, wow.\u201d
\u201cHow old are you?\u201d
\u201cToo old,\u201d I say.
He just stares at me, the way young kids do. The only sounds are those of the trees swaying in the breeze and the rain as it lands in the puddles.
No birds.
No dogs.
No people.<\/em>
I look around the place. Except for myself and Martin there isn\u2019t a sinner. I\u2019m opening my mouth to ask him where his parents, parent or guardian are, or is, when he beats me to it.
\u201cI\u2019m lost.\u201d
\u201cOh no,\u201d I say, offering a sympathetic smile.
\u201cAre you lost?\u201d he says, underlining the \u2018you\u2019 so that it sounds like there are several o\u2019s in the word.
\u201cMartin, you have no idea how lost I am.\u201d
\u201cLucky I found you then,\u201d he says.
\u201cI guess it is,\u201d I say.
\u201cYes, we can help each other find our way back.\u201d
\u201cI think that\u2019s a great idea,\u201d I say.
He nods excitedly.
I imagine he\u2019s come from the direction his back is facing, so I stand up and start walking that way, checking to make sure he\u2019s by my side. I stop myself from taking his hand. If whoever\u2019s he\u2019s with does come crashing out of the trees looking for him, I don\u2019t want them to think I\u2019m some kind of psycho-pedo-kidnapper or something. It\u2019s only Monday and I\u2019ve got enough to deal with already.
After the promise of such a pleasant exchange, we walk along in silence. From time to time, I can make out Martin\u2019s voice counting his footsteps.
Now and again, I have to help him across a stream bed or clamber over yet another felled tree. Conscious of my one soaked-through shoe, he points out puddles and patches of mud to help me preserve my still-dry one.
\u201cHow come you\u2019re not in school, Martin?\u201d
He looks back around at me, breaking off from his count, and says, \u201cHow come you\u2019re not in work?\u201d giving the \u2018you\u2019re\u2019 that underline for effect again.
Touch\u00e9. Cheeky little bastard.
\u201cThey got rid of me; didn\u2019t want me anymore,\u201d I say.
\u201cSame here,\u201d he says, looking up at me, smiling.
\u201cWere you good at your job?\u201d he says.
\u201cThe best,\u201d I say. \u201cI just didn\u2019t have fun doing it anymore.\u201d
\u201cMe too,\u201d he says.
He\u2019s a smart kid.
\u201cSo, if you\u2019re not in school, what do you do all day?\u201d I ask him.
\u201cI play.\u201d
\u201cAll on your own?\u201d
He shakes his head and looks up at me, counts down from three to one aloud, each number synchronized with a step and, instead of ending on zero says, \u201cWith my friends.\u201d
The ground beneath my feet sinks a little before completely giving way under my weight and I plunge into darkness, followed quickly, as I hit my head on the ground, by unconsciousness.
Christ-Almighty pain is the smelling salts that bring me around. My leg is twisted in a way nature never intended. I\u2019m lying on my back in a puddle of something that\u2019s not water looking up at the hole I just fell through. The pit I\u2019m in is about eight feet deep. With two working legs I\u2019d have no problem getting out. With just the one, my chances are zilch. There\u2019s an eye-watering stink down here my concussion is only coming to terms with when I clock Martin peering over the edge, regarding me the way one might a goldfish in a bowl. Indifferent, let\u2019s call it. He\u2019s flanked by another half-dozen little boys, all cast from the same angelic, butter-wouldn\u2019t-melt mold.
\u201cLook at his leg,\u201d one of them says.
\u201cYeah, cool,\u201d says another.
\u201cHe\u2019s all wet,\u201d says a third voice.
\u201cAnd cold,\u201d says a fourth. \u201cHe\u2019s shivering.\u201d
\u201cLet\u2019s warm him up then,\u201d says Martin, producing a lighter from his raincoat.
It\u2019s then that the haze clears and I realize what the overpowering smell down here is, and what the puddle I\u2019m lying in consists of.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Monday morning.There\u2019s nowhere I need to be.And nothing I have to do.Once, this was the dream. But seeing as I never got round to putting something by for the proverbial rainy day, it\u2019s the farthest thing from.No matter how much I might have hated the day job, at least it gave me purpose. I\u2019m not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-flash-fiction","category-short-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=492"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1407,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492\/revisions\/1407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grahamwho.com\/grahamwrites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}