Points of Light

June 13, 2024Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Adversity, Difficult times, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, hope, Labor, Micro Fiction, Rescue, Waiting 21 Comments

“They will not come.”

Mara stilled her neck from shaking. Gabrielle did not need confirmation as much as she needed hope. “Oh, but they will,” she soothed.

Gabrielle shifted and sighed in half voice, half moan.

“Are they coming more frequently now?” Mara inquired then laughed at the teen’s raised eyebrow. “The contractions, I mean. Not the others.”

“They can all come once and done,” Gabrielle sputtered between clenched teeth.

Mara chuckled but her eyes searched the darkness. Gabrielle’s stamina would not last long.

A light wavered in the distance. Became three points. Mara exhaled. Finally, the sign of hope.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt © Lisa Fox

Patience

May 18, 2024Na'ama Yehuda Life and love, Muse and Flow, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Family, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Historical fiction, light, Micro Fiction, Patience, saying goodbye, Things Kids Say, Waiting 21 Comments

“How long will you be away?”

Pa patted Patience’s head. A rare affection from someone whose love was measured in ensuring there was grain and cloth and warmth enough for the lot of them.

“As long as the Lord deems right,” Pa responded.

“Hopefully the Lord deems it right quickly,” Patience blurted, bracing for reprimand. Children ought not question God’s plan.

“Amen if so,” Pa murmured, surprising her. He shouldered his rucksack, touched her head again. “You are the eldest. Help Ma and tend your siblings. And,” he added, “keep the tower lit, may its light lead me back home.”

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt: Dale Rogerson

Her Own Shadow

November 12, 2022Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Meditations, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, coping, Difficult decisions, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, life-change, Micro-fiction, Photo prompt, Shadow, Waiting 47 Comments

Evening light filtered through partially open curtains. Outside the porch’s floorboards sighed. A car’s engine coughed into life. The scent of crushed leaves and motor oil drifted on an errant breeze.

She sighed.

There will be time to sort through the tangled mess inside her heart, to sweep up shards of life, to breathe out the echoes of words she wished to never have heard.

Not yet.

For the moment, she just sat.

A shadow of her former self.

In a house that wept emptiness.

And let the space behind her eyes

Hold her as she waited

To be found.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo: © Dale Rogerson

When The Weather Allows

January 14, 2022Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, children, Family, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, hope, Micro-fiction, Mothering, Patience, Seafaring, Waiting 38 Comments

“When will they come home?” Lizbeth’s voice penetrated Mauve’s daydream. It was rare to find rest in the middle of her day, and Mauve couldn’t help a touch of resentment at the interference. Guilt smothered it. The wee bairn could not help wondering. She missed her brothers as much as Mauve did her sons.

“When the weather allows it,” Mauve gazed at the sea. The maker and breaker of everything. She loved it. She loathed it. She couldn’t see a life without it.

“Tonight?” Lizbeth pressed against the rail.

“More possible tomorrow,” Mauve swallowed a sigh. “So we shall hope.”

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt © Bradley Harris

Blue Sentry

July 3, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: CCC, Flash Fiction, flowers, Impatience, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, Personification, Photo prompt, Sentry, Waiting, Window 11 Comments

“Can you see them?” Lizzie swayed with anticipation. The waiting has been endless. Endless. Endless.

There was no response.

“Blue!?” she prompted.

“Hold your horses,” Lily soothed, always one to keep the peace. “He takes time to formulate and produce.”

Lizzie knew that, and that it wasn’t proper to press others to do what they physically could not. She tipped her head in guilty acknowledgement.

Still, she wished someone else was standing sentry. Not that Blue had any say. They were each placed where they were placed, and had to make the most of it. Slow as time, Blue would have to do.

And yet, it was so hard to wait.

Especially when she was finally dressed in all her finery and wanted to show it off before any got wilted.

“Car,” Blue said.

Finally! Lizzie wriggled.

“Such Impatiens,” Petunia rustled. “No finesse. All is hurry hurry hurry with them.”

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Writing In The Sand

May 7, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Meditations, Memoriam, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: CCC, Coming Home, Creative writing, Flash Fiction, Grief, Loss, Micro-fiction, Patience, Photo prompt, Seashore, Waiting 18 Comments

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She shifted her weight and sand squeezed warm between her toes. Heated not by sun – the orb still far too distant in such early spring – but because she’s been standing still so long that the permeating chill under her soles relented to the constant pulse of lifeblood in her veins.

A bird called. Another bird returned. An insect buzzed a disharmonious song. It will be summer soon.

She felt her chest rise in a breath and her eyes skimmed the expanse of shimmering ground, patient, waiting for the tide.

Today, perhaps, he’ll come.

Today, maybe, he will return home from the wild, where waves rose high and ships dipped low to the ocean’s floor.

There was a writing in the sand. A code left by the crabs. The gulls. The seaweed.

She waited. Wavelets licked her feet.

Perhaps today something of him will wash ashore.

For Crispina’s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Water Wait

January 28, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Fasting, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Grumpy, Micro-fiction, Patient, Photo Fiction, Thirst, Waiting, Water 42 Comments

“Who put it there?” Moe grumbled.

The waiting room was almost empty, but it only added to his resentment. Don’t people know it is cruel?

Alisha looked up from the small screen that consumed her waking moments and too many of what should have been her sleeping ones.

“Put what where?”

At least she was sort-of-paying attention.

“That,” he put as much contempt as he could manage with a parched brain into the word. He hated clinics. Especially this one.

“Oh, it’s yours,” Alisha handed him the water bottle. “Nurse said to have some. Told you no need to fast.”

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt © Marie Gail Stratford

Waiting

December 19, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Current events, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Poetry, Reflections, Writing Tags: Creative writing, Current events, Emergency, hope, Hospital, Languid, Micro-fiction, Poetry, Surgery, Waiting, Weekend Writing Prompt, Worry 18 Comments

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(Photo: Martha Dominguez de Gouveia on Unsplash)

He drooped as hours

Lingered

Without any

News.

He tried to read but

Worry clogged his

Views.

He paced awhile but

Found his feet too heavy

As his hope grew

Weak.

The moments stretched

Their languid

Endless

Streak.

“It’s done,”

A soft voice filtered

To him

Through the mist.

“She’s resting comfortably.

So is your newborn son.”

For Sammi‘s Weekend Writing Prompt: Languid in 57 words

Waiting To Travel

December 9, 2020December 9, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Grief, Harbor, Longing, Micro-fiction, Patience, Retirement, travel, Waiting 50 Comments

He left the house each morning as he always had, a bag with his lunch slung over a shoulder.

The harbor was no longer where he had to be, but work never was just an employment. It had been his world. Even more so since Marissa left to roam the realms beyond this world.

To him her current travels were as real as the ships that left for unseen places only to return with goods that others had stacked for his crane to unload.

One day he will sail to where Marissa was.

Till then, he watched each day unfold.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Watch Out

November 26, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: CCC, Creative writing, Flash Fiction, friends, imagination, Micro-fiction, Omen, Photo prompt, Pigeons, Siblings, Waiting, Watch 14 Comments

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“See that thing?” Holly whispered.

“What thing?” Harold mumbled, eyes barely lifted from the miniature screen of his new smart-watch.

“That thing!” Holly covered her brother’s wrist with her hand. “Over there.”

Harold sighed and looked around. Old metal fences that once cordoned lines of people. Rotten concrete. Musty dankness. A deserted skating rink. What’s to see?

“Nothing,” he shrugged.

Holly exhaled exasperation. “That bird,” she hissed.

“Oh. A brown pigeon. Unusual coloring.”

His sister’s fingers tightened around his wrist and he grimaced at the pressure on his watch. It was new. She’d ruin it before he could show it off. “Hey, let go! What?!”

“I don’t care about its coloring. It is staring at us!”

“It’s just a bird.” He scrutinized the gate. His friends were very late.

“Yeah? Bet you won’t say that when it calls millions of its friends to dive in and peck us to death!”

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge