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Flash Fiction Friday: The Revival

By Tania Runyan 5 Comments

flash fiction marlin

Occasional Fridays, poet and Every Day Poems editor Tania Runyan carries her keyboard into world of flash fiction, writing quick pieces using prompts from The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction. We’re exploring surrealism at Tweetspeak for the month of November, and today’s story from Tania has some of those unexpected juxtapositions we’ve been talking about. 

______________________

A blue marlin hung on the wall of Mario’s. Every Friday night she watched it while waiting for take-out pizza with her dad. The fish’s yelping mouth. The sad marble eye. The fin like a giant blue staircase.

“Why won’t it move, ” she said.  She said it every time.

“Fish need water, ” he mumbled. He was quiet every time. He stared straight ahead or peeled his fingernails, crescents falling to the carpet.

She thought of the swordfish swimming through miles of pink pebbles and castles and treasure chests. She thought of the other swordfish who must have loved him and played light-saber games with their noses.

“Pepperoni up, ” the waiter said.

Her father walked up to pay.

“Bye, Daddy.”

He didn’t look back. She looked at the marlin. She took a pitcher of water from a table and climbed up on a chair.

“Stop, ” the waiter said. “Stop it right now.”

She tossed the water on the marlin. The waiter yelled. She tossed again and again and through the arc saw her father’s wide-open eyes.

Photo by Rookuzz, Creative Commons license via Flickr. Post by Tania Runyan, author of A Thousand Vessels.

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Tania Runyan
Tania Runyan
Tania Runyan lives in Lindenhurst, Illinois, a sort-of suburb, sort-of small town, where the deer and the minivans play. She's a 2011 NEA fellow and mama to four poetry books—A Thousand Vessels, Simple Weight, Delicious Air, and What Will Soon Take Place—and three (much cuter and noisier) human children. Tania is also the author of five non-fiction books—Making Peace with Paradise, How To Read a Poem, How to Write a Poem, How to Write a Form Poem, and How to Write a College Application Essay. Visit her at TaniaRunyan.com
Tania Runyan
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Filed Under: Blog, Fiction, poetry, Short Story

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About Tania Runyan

Tania Runyan lives in Lindenhurst, Illinois, a sort-of suburb, sort-of small town, where the deer and the minivans play. She's a 2011 NEA fellow and mama to four poetry books—A Thousand Vessels, Simple Weight, Delicious Air, and What Will Soon Take Place—and three (much cuter and noisier) human children. Tania is also the author of five non-fiction books—Making Peace with Paradise, How To Read a Poem, How to Write a Poem, How to Write a Form Poem, and How to Write a College Application Essay. Visit her at TaniaRunyan.com

Comments

  1. L. L. Barkat says

    November 9, 2012 at 11:34 am

    I love this. It’s so creepy-wonderful.

    My grandfather used to have a big blue fish with a sword-type nose or something, on the wall at his house. That fish gave me the shivers. I get that, about wanting to do something to make him less ominous.

    Maybe I should have poured water… 😉

    Reply
  2. Tania Runyan says

    November 9, 2012 at 12:39 pm

    Thank you! Deep down inside, we all have a swordfish story to tell.

    Reply
  3. Peter Raynard says

    November 10, 2012 at 6:03 am

    I really liked this story too. You not only need to be careful what you tell children but it says so much about their relationship.

    Reply
  4. Tania Runyan says

    November 11, 2012 at 10:10 pm

    Thank you, Peter! I’m so glad you enjoyed it.

    Reply

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  1. Tweetspeak poetry" Is Poetry Going to the Dogs? says:
    August 13, 2016 at 5:41 pm

    […] spaniel would eat anything. Anything. He’d leap at fireflies and Japanese beetles, loose pepperonis from a teenager’s pizza party, paper, and anything—anything—found on the floor. His favorite […]

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