Friday Fictioneers — What to believe?

lucy-sol

Darryl stared me straight in the eye. “He swam off with a mermaid on Christmas Day.”

I jotted two words on my pad — Deluded? Denial? — and drew a circle around them both. “Wasn’t it rather cold?”

“His heart was frozen anyway. No job. Mum didn’t want him anymore.”

“So what did the mermaid have to offer?”

“A new life.”

If that’s what you want to call “suicide”, I thought.

Darryl slid a photograph across the table. It was of some clothes neatly folded at the end of a jetty and a silver tailfin sticking up out of the water nearby.

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Friday Fictioneers: 100 word stories
Photo prompt: image (c) Lucy Fridkin

Author: Sarah Potter Writes

Sarah is a British eccentric who writes offbeat fiction, haiku and tanka poetry. When stuck for words, she sketches or paints instead. She's into nature conservation, sustainability, gardening, dogs, natural health, and reading. Her sociability is something that happens in short bursts with long breathing spaces in between.

26 thoughts on “Friday Fictioneers — What to believe?”

  6. Dear Sarah,

    This will give the therapist much to consider, won’t it? I echo Neil, we writers live in a fanciful world of our own creation. Personally, I do whatever the voices tell me. 😉
    Imaginatively clever story. You had me in the scene.

    Shalom,

    Rochelle

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. Glad you enjoyed it, Iain:-) I like to imagine the words “delusion”, “denial”, “suicide”, and “mermaid” (all with question marks) spinning around in their heads for a long time without resolution!

      Liked by 2 people

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    1. The beauty and fun of 100-word stories is that you can leave readers guessing without also leaving them feeling short-changed. I’m not so sure about novels that are too open-ended, though.

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