'At the Arrivals Gate' by Suzanna Lundale

“You will love it here!” That’s what he’ll cry, when he welcomes her finally. He will wrap his arms around those shoulders again and painstakingly apply little kisses all over her face, and she’ll giggle.

“I know I will,” she’ll say, between giggles, joyful to be with him again, joyful to be on the threshold of a new life.

“I’ll grab your suitcases,” he’ll offer with giddy nervousness, turning toward the carousel, eager to get the suitcases and get her home where he will greet her properly. 

“I’ll come with you,” she’ll laugh, and interlace their fingers more tightly to show him she will never let go again. Not then, not ever.

And wrapped in each other, they’ll wait, only half-watching the bags go by, because the future will be in each other’s faces, and they will have waited so very long to get there.

'It will be blindingly obvious' by Jeremy Boyce

 It will be blindingly obvious to everyone because there will be an incredible flash, brighter than the dawn of creation or a nuclear bomb. Time will briefly stop, no birds will sing and clocks will not tick, or tock. All normal activity will be stopped and public transport will be suspended, the Stock markets will have a bank holiday, taxes will neither be demanded nor paid,commodities and futures given a day off at the beach, where no seagulls will fly and waves will not break on the grainless sand because the tides will stop pushing and shoving. Beneath the surface fish will take a break and have a much needed nap, all their predators doing likewise. The sun will stop spitting fire and the moon will be neither waxing nor waning, the universe itself will stop Quantumly expanding and all the black holes will suddenly turn white. The plants and trees will stop growing out of respect, and their flowers will not fade, so as to add joy to the occasion. Everybody will be happy and smiling and the bees, butterflies and other pollinators will collect pollen and nectar all day long untroubled by wind, rain or insect repellant. The mosquitos will stop biting and wasps will be happy to play among themselves, not bothering the festive barbeques or picnics. There will be no sand in the sandwiches and the dropped ice-creams will always land cone side down. On this day I will know I have found true love.  

'Death do not us part' by Donna M Day

Ghost stories don’t usually end with “and they all lived happily ever after” and I guess this one doesn’t either as we’re not technically living but happily ever after is ours and no one can ever come between us again.  

'Searching For' by Leia Butler

I will look for you under my bed, between forgotten single socks and fluff, and will spend too long evaluating if I'm looking at a spider or a hair band. And nobody will be there so I'll turn to my cupboards, and poke through a packet of pasta. I will not find any friends within the fusilli, but I'll have run out of other places to look. 

And I will wonder if every day of my life going to be like this, looking for something I am never going to find. Like the reason I don't know you anymore, or the set of keys I'd promised I wouldn't lose again and I'll realise I've forgotten what I was looking for anyway.

I'll abandon the search while the kettle boils, unable to remember the last time I had to buy new teabags. And I'll knock over my mug but that will be fine, because I'll still have three more and that's a good position to be in when you never have guests.

'In the Foreseeable Future' by Voima Oy

In the future, there will be no war, no tears, no more pain. It will be peace and green fields and sunflowers. We will return to the world of our dreams, where there will be no words. And I will find you there, you will be dancing in your flowered dress, among the smiling crowds walking down the green streets of the future, and the sun will be shining on your hair.  

'He Won’t Admit It But He Knows What Will Happen' by Melissa Flores Anderson

I will arrive early and look around the airport for a bathroom, will pull out my toothbrush from
my carry and will scrub the stale taste out of my mouth and will spritz a bit of that fruity perfume
on my neck. I will straighten the spot where my hair will be frizzled on top and will apply
another layer of lip gloss so my lips will shine. I will step into a stall to empty my bladder and
will reach into the v of my dress and dip my hand into the cup of the pink bra to adjust my
breasts upward, and they will settle back into the ideal position to create cleavage. I will wash
my hands and the industrial antibacterial soap will mingle with the perfume, and I will walk out
to check the monitor for his gate number.

He will be 20 minutes out, up above the clouds still, and he will look at a picture of me on his
phone. He will remind himself that he is not going to kiss me again, he will not touch me, he will
not want me, he will stick with his plan to convert me back into a friend. I will wait in a gray seat
and will look at the time on my phone.

He will depart from the plane and will find me near his gate where I will be standing in the same
dress as before and he will look at my unsure eyes and his resolve will crumble and he will pull
me into his arms and he will love me again.

'The Endangered Species Quarterly (Special Edition, Spring 2025)' by Kate Axeford

 

 ‘Humans have destroyed our habitats: the fightback starts now.’

This will be the battle-cry of a takeover editorial by the Gorilla Army. Weapon advertisements will proliferate. Giant Pandas will pose with AK47’s and Rhinos will pose in chef’s hats, showcasing easy recipes for Dirty Bombs. Whaling ships will discover the inefficacy of harpoon guns as Blue Whales spout plutonium – fountains of diamonds shattering the surface of tepid, algaed oceans. 

            Under the banner: ‘It’s full-scale war on the illegal wildlife trade,’ an armoured pangolin will put the true horror into horoscopes by predicting how captured poachers should be punished. Paws, claws, and beaks will press frenziedly on voting buttons to decide whether these men should be:

a)     a} Sold alive at markets for their body parts to be made into medicine/s.

b)   b}   Crammed in filthy cages and smuggled across several continents.

c)    c} Shot / snared in the wild for their skin / teeth / bones to be owned or worn as trophies.

d)    d} Retrained in conservation to provide an alternative income for their communities.

But it’ll be the centrefold, a close-up photo of the Pygmy Three-Toed Sloth, that will really  bring on the goosebumps. How sweet she’ll snore, curled up alone by that Big Red Nuclear Button. Just one more nap in the mangrove trees before her Final Act.

 

 

 

'Some Memories Will Be Erased' by Lindsay Bamfield

 

When Planet Earth reaches a population of fifteen billion, the chosen ones – the Utile People – will board the astrojets and head through the endless galaxies for Planet Kainos. The astronauts, coders, scientists, engineers, agriculturists and constructors will have gone first with the guard forces to build the massive infrastructure. They will be followed by the medical and social scientists and once everything is ready, the remaining Utile Persons will follow. Those who don’t qualify will be left behind on the melting Earth where plants wither and die, where waters swamp land and the rest burns.

The Kainos teachers will never tell their pupils about those forgotten souls but some distant memories will be passed down in strictest secrecy to children whose parents want them to have knowledge of mankind’s brutal actions. One girl will wonder whether she has relations still surviving in some pocket of safety. She will wonder if it will ever be possible or legal to communicate with them. She will picture families with children who have brothers and sisters and cousins. She will imagine animals that her forbears have whispered about down the generations.

She will reach old age and eventually die ignorant of those who will thrive on a planet that survives when those that destroyed it had themselves been destroyed. Planet Kainos will lose the whispered stories when thought coders erase people’s illegal memories. Those thriving on Earth will never forget their stories from centuries back as they tend their land and carefully nurture it.

'Mother Goat' by Julia Ruth Smith

 

She’ll see a rare family of goats stuck to the mountainside like magnets. She’ll laugh out loud at how odd they seem, all shaggy white and long beards. Just a family hanging out in the shade. She’ll make a note to tell her son about them when she gets home.

 

She’ll stop at a petrol station to stretch her legs, the south wind as hot as suffocation. She’ll see a teenager smoking beside his father who is smoking, and she’ll reach for her phone.

 

‘Yeah, it’s hot here too Mum. The dog barks at night. He misses you.’

 

‘Do YOU miss me?’ She’ll hear a chair scraping in her living room.

 

She’ll tell him she’ll give him fifty kisses when she gets home. ‘Fifty euros, you mean.’ He’ll laugh.

 

The father will cuff the back of his son’s head in jest. He’ll point towards their van. He’ll stub out his cigarette and pull up ill-fitting jeans. The boy will do the same.

 

‘Mum, I have to go now? Dad and Linda are taking me out for pizza.’

 

She’ll drive further along the coast, see a goat all on her own, chewing dry grass, trying to swallow. Trying not to cry.

'Nobody Dies at the End' by Martha Lane

 Not much is going to happen in this story. But it will always be my favourite.

It will start predictably. Comfortingly boring. At the beginning. With the sun rising, and sleepy eyes shaking off heavy dressing gowns. Between smooth uncreased cheeks, a haze of morning breath, a perfume sweeter than roses.

Breakfast will be savoured at an uncluttered table, not over the kitchen sink. And cutlery won’t be plucked from a dishwasher somebody promised to empty days earlier.

Teeth will be brushed without claggy white smudges across fresh-ironed shirts. No one will mention the toilet seat, or any lingering smells. No one will tease. Everyone will be happy.

Lunch will be packed into matching brown paper bags, aesthetically rolled at the top. Not chucked into the bottom of rucksacks. And the food? All fresh, all delicious. Nothing past-its-best, pilfered from the back of a cupboard.

At the doorway we will hold each other tight, no one in such a rush as leave anything unsaid. No one will assume.

I love you.

Can’t wait to see you later.

Goodbye.

We will kiss. A leg bending at the knee, a foot playfully flicked towards the sky. You will drive away – me, waving on the doorstep. I won’t turn my back before you’ve rounded the corner and tut at the crumbs decorating the kitchen counter.

I won’t use our Christmas tea towel that we never took out of regular circulation to wipe them away. I certainly won’t use it to mop up soap scuzz from around the base of the tap while cursing that you hadn’t done it. I will sit serenely, flatteringly lit by sunlight, and sip on a cup of tea that is the perfect temperature.

And of course, we will see each other again.

'The Next Step' by Lisa Thornton

 

I will have shoes stored in the cellar for when the tornadoes come. Because that’s what the news reporters on television say people are missing. When survivors unhuddle and climb out of the holes their homes used to cover, they are barefoot and step on broken glass and boards with nails in them. Because when you’re in your house, stirring mac and cheese or typing a lesson for your art students or using your 12-year-old thumbs to leap your avatar from floating platform to castle to cloud you are in socks or bare skin on wood planks. And then there is a sound. A loud roaring or if you’re lucky an alarm first and you run downstairs without grabbing anything first.  

 

I will pack my son’s new red Adidas that cost half my paycheck, the smelly black lace ups my husband wears to mow the lawn, and my old Birkenstocks. The ones with the tread gone under the right toe which shows how I walk, apparently, dragging my right foot along the ground, left tread intact. I will set all three pairs in the corner furthest from the window. I will make sure our backs are to the old wall and we are facing north, so that when we climb out safely with our shoes on into the impossibly sunny and still day to view the wreckage of our town, we can stand on the rubble of our old lives and see Interstate 55. The eighteen wheelers whizzing down from Chicago on their way to Los Angeles. The train tracks cutting in front of the John Deere place. I will make sure we can safely access the future.

NFFD 2023 Prompt #14: In the Foreseeable Future

 

 In the Foreseeable Future

 

Welcome to The Write-In!  This year, we're celebrating the 2023 National Flash Fiction Day Anthology theme of time.  Throughout National Flash Fiction Day, we'll be posting one time-related prompt on the hour every hour from now until midnight (BST), for a total of 25 prompts in all.  You have until midnight on Sunday (BST) to submit your responses for possible publication here at the Write-In.  We'll start posting responses on Sunday, 25 June 2023....

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Write a flash completely in the future tense.

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If you’re submitting this to us, make sure to note that this is a response to Prompt 14: In the Foreseeable Future.

You can submit responses until 23:59 BST on Sunday, 25 June 2023 for a chance to be published here at The Write-In.

You can claim the badge for this prompt until 23:59 BST on Sunday, 2 July 2023 by going to the here (hosted by the NFFD website).