Short Story Sunday: The Devil's Locker (for CBY)

 

It was bittersweet for Eduard Boivin to see the bowlines thrown across the gap to the deck of the Napoleon III. It was a chilly day in February 1866, yet the sea birds saw the steamer off with their cacophony of farewell caws. He glanced at his pass again: Le Havre to Valparaiso. He had no idea of what he would find in this new world of which he had heard so much. He overhead a man comforting his daughter in German. He promised her that they would live in a big house at a lake, and that she would be able to play with all her dolls again in no time; for now they need to sleep in her trunk. He thought about his own luggage stowed somewhere in the bowels of the ship and instinctively patted his coat. His greatest treasure was still there, in his inside pocket. He only hoped it would survive the journey south. He breathed in the smell he would come to associate with his last moments in Europe: salt, smoke and snowdrops.

 

Short Story Saturday: Overthinking

The strangest things triggered a chain of thoughts in Celia. Today it was the act of squashing garlic with the blade of her knife, the heel of her hand thumping down on the clove until it burst out of its skin with a satisfying pop, before peeling back the papery layers that made her fingers sticky with juice. She remembered doing the same thing one night at Suann’s house. They’d been preparing bolognaise from a recipe Suann’s friend had copied for her. The paper, although now safe in a plastic sleeve, was dotted with leftover ingredients from other cooking expeditions.

Short Story Sunday: The Bridegroom's Oak

For three months, Norah tried to ignore her grandmother, but the elder lady, having lived through more than Norah could imagine, was persistent to a fault.