Writer Wednesday | Flash Fiction by Paul Jessup

For this Writers Wednesday we have Flash Fiction from Paul Jessup who we recently reviewed and interviewed. Enjoy.

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Jill dreamt of days with rain. She dreamt of hours with water falling from the sky. She dreamt of soaked skins and wet bones beneath, her clothes stuck tight and mouth open wide. A big fish mouth, trying to swallow the whole world.

In her dreams the sky water tasted like cinnamon.

In her dreams the oceans were not dry

In her dreams dust did not run from the faucets.

In her dreams she was never thirsty.

Mack was her best friend. He was a water finder. A dowser. He carried a sack full of sticks that rattled like bones. Each stick was shaped like a Y, and cut from ash trees when the ash trees still grew and shaded the earth with their branches. Now the only shade is from the ruins of skyscrapers, empty iron skeletons rusting in the pale red sun.

Jill’s parents had adopted Mack when he was six, and his parents took to the fever and were cast into the shadows. He says he can still see them, hiding in the shadows. They carry dead animals in their hands, and they howl and scream his name.

He picked up the dowsing pretty quick. Some days he didn’t even need the rods, he could just hold his hands out and the little specks would call out to him, sing to him from beneath the rotten earth.

He was the most important person in Jill’s tribe.

The second most important was the rain caller.

Her name was Marybeth. She taught Jill her trade in the off hours, in the hours when traveling was light and the sun did not bake. There were dances involved. Singing, chanting. Sexual things she could not speak to the others. They would not understand. They could not understand what the rain wanted.

But Jill understood.

It was her calling.

It was why she had dreamt of rain.