An unpleasant surprise waited in my letterbox today. It was an envelope I had posted only two weeks ago. Now here it was, back again: a paper boomerang.
I turn the envelope over in my hands, run my fingers along its crumpled edges. The creased paper matches the furrowing of my brow as I inspect the address. Yes, I had copied it correctly. So why now has it been returned to me?
Sure I had written the letter to an old friend, and yes I know we hadn’t spoken in awhile but still, I thought we were on good terms. I had thought they’d be happy to hear from me. Perhaps I was wrong?
It was then that I noticed something scrawled hurriedly in the bottom right-hand corner. It was a single word. A horrid, clinical word. The kind of word that makes your stomach drop and your mouth go dry.
I suddenly feel as though a door I thought was wide open has been slammed in my face. I had missed my opportunity to send something sooner. My eyes fill with tears as I realise that missed opportunity was in fact my last.
The word in the bottom right-hand corner was Deceased.
Word count: 203
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What is Flash Fiction?
Flash fiction is a genre of fiction, defined as a very short story. While there’s no set word count that separates flash fiction from more traditional short stories, flash fiction stories can be as short as a few words (while short stories typically run for several pages).
Flash fiction is also known as sudden fiction, short-short stories, micro-fiction, or micro-stories.
Backyard tales 