‘Another Noah, Another Ark’

“Noah was a perfect righteous man in his generation.” (Genesis 6:9)

Arielle and Sophia had their inside arms and hands locked as they peered through their rain-muddied bedroom window.

 “I bet”, said Sophia, lifting her free hand to finger a tiny scratch on the splattered glass, “as everyone’s so sad about Noah, there’s  even more rain in the house than there is outside.

“But I can still see the mark Mom thinks was left by the stork when he brought me home eight years ago. I wonder if tears leave stains, too.”

“Umm,” nodded Arielle, who was Noah’s twin sister and had just past  her sixth birthday.

“There are also two bigger marks underneath, from when the stork came back with Noah and me in two baskets and they banged on the glass as he flew in. Dad says he made a really big noise and things have never been quiet since.”

“Until now. I can’t do anything ordinary. I just want to sit down and make my head empty. I feel  bad all the time,  like when I’m very sick.”

“Me, too,” said Arielle, coughing hard to stifle another wave of sobs. “This sounds funny. But I feel like Addy did when we sent her to the doll hospital. Sort of broken. But we can’t mend Noah. He’s not here.

“It wasn’t fair when we were split up at school. If I’d been with Noah, he would not have been hurt. I wouldn’t have let it happen. I would have looked after him. We weren’t only twins. We were best friends. But instead, I heard loads of screaming and felt eleven burning, shooting bangs all over me  in the same places where Noah was killed.

“Do you know, Sophia, lots of things are made like twins? When I couldn’t sleep last night, I thought of the bits in  our bodies which are made in twos.”

“Like eyes, ears, arms and all that?”

“Hmm. I think God wants us to have two of lots of things so when one bit’s not well, the other can  do extra work.”

“I can help by being your extra bit if you like. Don’t forget, I’m also your best friend,” said Sophia, giving her sister a squeeze.

“I want to tell  you I was a little ‘bit’ jealous when President Obama visited and took your picture of Mom smiling and put it in his pocket.”

“I like Mr Obama,” said Arielle. “He’s also really smiley. And I’ve got one more nice thing to remember about Noah.”

“What’s that?,” asked Sophia, as they shuffled, arms still linked, from the window to sit on the bed.

“Well, when I did get to sleep I had a dream which started with the rain. Then the sun came out and I saw Noah on a cloud which looked like a big boat on the sea.

“He was sort of in charge of a long line of children and a man there said, ‘Hey Noah, you’re such a good kid, I want you to look after the others.’ Then he grabbed a girl who looked like me and told Noah to hold her hand.

“You’ll laugh when I say Noah started talking like a taco factory manager. But he wasn’t mean and didn’t boss people about. He just quietly put everyone in twos and asked them to follow him inside the boat.”

“Then what happened?”.

“I woke up crying. But for a second I felt sort of cosy as the dream was like everything was good. But,” added Arielle, “please don’t tell Mom, Dad or Michael about it. They won’t believe me. Let them find out when they meet Noah again for themselves in the sky. He’ll want them on the boat, too.”

“That won’t happen for a long time,” said Sophia. “But when it does, we’ll get Mom to make him a party.”

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*** With sincerest condolences to the families of those murdered in the Sandy Hook Elementary School Massacre. – N.I.W.

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Natalie Wood

(Copyright, Natalie Irene Wood – 21 December 2012)

 

‘Eating Mangled Cherries’

Ingrid had spent almost five minutes fighting her way to a seat on the late afternoon tram between Manchester and Bury. Soon she wished she hadn’t bothered.

“Are cherries in season?,” asked the man by the window, as she sat down heavily, pushing her  parcels between her knees.

“I can smell them,” he continued. “They  are very strong. I like them – lots. But I don’t like  people who smell of them.”

Ingrid turned to snatch a  hasty look at him. Although elderly, in fading grubby clothes, he seemed quite spry. She peeked again.

He was blind. 

She did not reply and tried to swivel aside. Dignified silence was best.

But the man persisted. “Are you Jewish? Jewish women always smell like cherries. Sort of mixed-up sickly sweet and sour. You’re Jewish – aren’t you? I’m sure you are. I can smell you.”

Then he lowered his voice, slid his sightless eyes sideways and waggled his tongue.

“Whenever I’m asked ‘what do cherry blossoms smell like?’, I always give the same answer. Do you  know what that is?”

Ingrid shuddered, still silent.

“What do you think?”, he persisted.  “You don’t know?, he mocked in the same lewd, gruff whisper. I’ll tell you. I say ‘they  literally smell like vagina.’”

Ingrid was cornered. A rat in a trap.

The man’s monstrous crudity was an unprovoked assault – a verbal rape – she was helpless.

Worse, the weight of the extra passengers embarking at Victoria Station had pushed her deep into her seat and against his bulk. She could not move and was terrified by  what may happen if she made a scene. In her imagination, she saw other passengers  sympathising with her assailant, turning her from victim to villain. The reality would never be truly conveyed by the tram’s CCTV camera.

Finally, she spoke.

“We are strangers so I’ve no  more idea of what you can see than you have of my appearance. I can only guess that you knew I was a woman because of my tread and  by how I sat down.

The man grunted.

“I know a little about people with poor sight from my close relatives. My late grandmother ended her days in a home for the blind and my aunt, my mother’s older sister, is registered blind. Other people often remark that their dark, sour tempers were – are – caused by their sight loss. They suggest that  the bad gene has been in the family for so long that it  poisoned Grandma’s personality. I don’t buy that.”

“What d’ya mean?”

“People in my grandmother’s family develop problems with their vision gradually for different reasons. But there are many people who are either born blind or who lose their sight in other ways and yet lead full, happy lives without causing pain to those around them.

“Last week I heard  two women who are close friends and blind since birth talking on radio about their condition. They were very matter-of-fact and jolly. One said she loved smelling flowers. Their one strong dislike is other people’s ‘political correctness’.

“Then there was the local young blind man, Gary Thompson who died when he slipped off the platform at St Peter’s Square and was crushed when he fell under a tram. It was a horrible incident made worse because he had been a volunteer safety adviser for the tram service.”

“I remember. He’d been out with his work mates for a Christmas party. I bet he fell because he was drunk.”

“You enjoy being nasty so I’ll ignore that,” said Ingrid. “But I want to tell you something else before I get off at Heaton Park.

“By chance I knew Gary. He kept himself very busy in many ways. We worked together at the Imperial War Museum North which sometimes hosts events relating to the Holocaust. He wasn’t Jewish. Neither am I. But I  know some Jewish people and they’re like everyone else. They want to get on with their lives without having to apologise for just existing.”

Then as the tram slowed to a halt Ingrid scooped up her belongings and fled  onto the platform.

But as she hurried by she caught a glimpse of the tram leaving the station. Her persecutor was at the same window, eating cherries. Mangled cherries. Her cherries. A bunch she’d left behind.

Technorati Tags: #fridayflash,Flash Fiction,PerfectlyWriteFamilyTales,'Eating Mangled Cherries,'Manchester Metrolink,Safety Adviser,Imperial War Museum North,Blindness,Antisemitism,Verbal Assault,Cherries

Natalie Wood

(Copyright, Natalie Irene Wood – 14 December 2012)

‘A Flasher’s Foreword’

As this is the format, I’ll be brief:

 

With thanks to my parents, without whom I would not be possible.

To the Web, lacking which, this publication would be  impractical, nigh well improbable.

Then you, my three readers, who find my stories ludicrous, even farcical.

Forgetting neither my publicist who ties my lips tight, nor Levi Strauss whose apparel keeps me well buttoned and solidly zipped.

Last but not least, there’s our fine borough council, which  offers companionable solace at  public convenience.

From me and the boys who keep hanging on: For this relief, which beggars belief, much thanks!

Technorati Tags: #fridayflash,Flash Fiction,PerfectlyWriteFamilyTales,A Flasher's Foreword

Natalie Wood

(Copyright, Natalie Irene Wood – 14 December 2012)