Cold Calculus
by James C. Clar
The sea did not finish him, not then. He came ashore clinging to a barrel stave, hauled onto a gray New England beach by men who argued over whether he would last the night. Fever burned away his pain and his memory. When he woke, he knew knots but not faces, tides but not years. He could measure rope by the span of his hands. He slept fitfully, always with one eye open.
They asked him his name.
He tried to say something aloud, failed, and said nothing.
“We’ll call you Elijah,” they declared … unaware of that name’s irony.
Along the coast, silence was considered more an asset than a handicap. A ship’s chandler on Water Street hired Elijah because the man needed help and Elijah, despite his age and bad leg, seemed quite capable.
“You ever kept accounts?” the chandler asked.
Elijah studied the ledgers. “Your sums are off,” he said simply.
The chandler frowned. Grudgingly, he rechecked his books. Elijah was right.
Elijah was exacting, obsessive even. Coils aligned, nails were counted twice and barrels were tapped and re-tapped. He corrected customers without recrimination, out of experience he still could not recall.
“No,” he would say, finger firm on the counter, “you’ll want thicker line and more oakum. You think you won’t now, but you will.” Men listened. He could inventory a ship’s hold with just a glance.
Most evenings at dusk, he’d prop his leg against the pier and watch the tide as though it somehow owned him an explanation, or a past. Peace thereby found him in small doses. The days passed, each closing like an account balanced at last.
I met him by purely accident, in the doorway of the shop, on a morning when fog rolled down the street in waves. I recognized him at once, though I said nothing.
“Lamp oil?” he asked, as though reading my mind. “Take extra wicks. It’s the little things that make or break a voyage.”
I came back, often. We spoke of the weather, of prices, of ships that left port but never returned.
“You’ve been to sea,” I said once, probing carefully.
“I must have been,” he said vacantly. “Sometimes at night, I almost remember.”
If Elijah had a fault, it was that he was too meticulous. It was as though he were correcting some larger error, one he could no longer fathom. Ships with white hulls unsettled him. The word whale closed his mouth like a snapped rigging.
The end, when it came, came suddenly. Fire started on a moored brig; tar, canvas and decking erupted. A boy slipped on the slick planks and fell between hull and pier. The crowd shouted.
Only Elijah, alone among us, dared move.
He flung off his coat and, struggling mightily with only one usable leg, he seized a line, and swung. “Hold fast!” he cried. His tone now was commanding, imperious. He reached the boy and shoved him toward waiting hands. Heat roared. A spar fell.
He looked up once, as if checking the sums on a final column. In that instant, a curious expression crossed his face. Was it resignation or recognition?
The sea, at last, finished what it had started.
I stood long after the smoke thinned, silently mouthing a name I had not spoken aloud in years. Now, I truly do remain alone to tell his tale. Some nights I lay awake and wonder, in that last instant, did memory return and drive his sacrifice as atonement? Or did the cold calculus of the universe finally exact payment of a debt long overdue?
James C. Clar is a writer and retired teacher. Most recently, his work has appeared in Flash Fiction Magazine, Flash Digest, Bright Flash Literary Review, After/Thought Literary Magazine, 365 Tomorrows, Antipodean-SF, The Magazine of Literary Fantasy and, of course, Sudden Flash Magazine,
The Kiss
By Jim Harrington
“I ain’t gonna kiss no pig on the lips.” Thomas straightened to his full six feet and glared down at his wife.
“But we really need the money,” Bobbie Jo said.
“Then you kiss it.”
“That wouldn’t be very ladylike.” Bobbie Jo squinted at the platform where the pig, wearing a pink tutu and dark glasses, waited. She crinkled her nose and continued. “Besides, it’s a girl pig.” Bobbie Jo grabbed his arm when he started to stomp away and pressed her body against his.
“Pleeease? We really, really–”
“I know. We need the money.” Thomas stared at the pig and felt his resolve melt until it was as soft as his wife’s breasts. Without another word, he plodded toward the stage, ignoring the laughs and hoots from the crowd, and climbed the three steps to the top of the platform.
He followed the carnival barker’s instructions and got on all fours. The animal raised its snout, like it knew what was about to happen.
Thomas touched his lips to the pig’s and held the kiss three seconds longer than the required five.
“We have a winner!” the barker announced and handed Thomas five one hundred dollar bills. Thomas bounded off the stage without acknowledging the roar of the crowd and headed straight to Bobbie Jo.
“Here’s your money,” he said, then turned and trod off.
“Where’re you goin’?”
“Away.”
Bobbie Jo stood with her feet apart and her hands on her hips. “You ain’t leavin me cause I made you kiss a pig, are you?”
“Nope,” Thomas said over his shoulder. “I’m leavin you cause the pig’s a better kisser.”
Credit: First published on October 27, 2008 in Every Day Fiction
Jim Harrington lives in Huntersville, NC, with his wife and two dogs. His stories have appeared in Flash Fiction Magazine, Flash Phantoms, The Yard, Free Flash Fiction, Short-Story.me, and others. More of his works can be found at https://jpharrington.blogspot.com.
Interview With the Genie
by R.K. West
There are three things that nearly everyone asks for. The first is money. They used to ask for a million dollars. At some point, that became ten million; now it has jumped to a billion.
The second request is beauty/youth. The old want to be young again, and the young want to stay that way. Everybody wants to be better looking: taller, thinner, with a more conventional nose and smoother skin. Bald guys want hair, and those with hair want it thicker, shinier, and not so much on the arms.
In third place is love/sex. Many don’t bother to ask, because they assume that if they have the first two, the third will follow naturally. I wish them luck.
No one remembers to ask for health, unless they're already sick.
Sometimes they want vengeance on their enemies, through misfortune or death. I don’t do death, at least not directly. I can inflict unemployment, lost love, intractable itching, public humiliation, sprained ankles, and acne. But I usually remind the aggrieved that living well is the best revenge, and it makes more sense to spend a wish on enhancing one’s own life, rather than to fritter it away on something that offers no real personal benefit.
Now and then, I meet a noble soul who just wants world peace. I have to explain that it’s outside my purview, because it involves too many people and places. It would take a power much greater than mine to change geography, alter weather patterns, redistribute resources, stifle religion, and probably kill a few thousand politicians and businessmen along the way. Sorry.
R.K. West is a former travel blogger who sold everything, spent two years on the road, and now lives next to the mighty Columbia River.
A Companion For Agnes
by Ron Wetherington
In the two years since her husband died, Agnes had lived alone, but with no feeling of loneliness. This had abruptly changed. Suddenly, Agnes felt imprisoned. She feared living alone. She mentioned this to her friend Sharon. “Me, too,” confided Sharon. “Then I met Charlie. He’s a remarkable companion!”
“Companion?”
“I’ll send him around tomorrow,” Sharon told her.
As Agnes was having tea the next evening, a gentleman appeared in the chair opposite. “I’m Charlie,” he said gently. “But I can be Charlene if you prefer.” He briefly morphed. “Let’s see if I can help you.”
“Some tea?” Agnes smiled.
Ron Wetherington is a retired professor of anthropology. He has published a novel, Kiva (Sunstone Press), and numerous short fiction and creative nonfiction pieces. Read some of his work at https://www.rwetheri.com/
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