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INSIDE OUT by F. E. Clark

9/9/2015

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Picture
Photo by Rebecca J. Allred - Artwork provided by Dib: “Kindergarten Self-portrait”
INSIDE OUT

The atm machine disappeared, it left a hole in the wall; they just bricked it up.  My mam used to get her money there; it caused us a lot of extra walking that machine being gone.

Soon my new red trainers wore down, long time before I got a new pair.  I loved those red trainers.

Anyway, afterwards they used red brick, set back from the grey granite, as if you could still see inside the wall.  I guess they just ran out of money, or didn’t care to add the facing bricks to finish it off. 

Seeing inside, I remember, that got me thinking.   Five years old and fascinated by the interior of everything that came my way.  Blood and spit and puke and crap and piss – yeah ok - but what was really inside? 

Did our dream monsters, live in our heads?  Could you tell by our faces?  If we looked fierce – was this us, really us, or something inside showing? And, if a whole money machine could disappear, well, what else could be there one day and gone the next?

Of course I know now that the neighbourhood was changing and the bank had just moved on, but I can clearly remember my puzzlement.

I wore my superhero pjs inside out, tried to see down my own throat with my mother’s make-up compact.  I watched everyone closely, especially the grown-ups.

And I saw.  Sharp teeth arguments, death skulls, many fingered fists.  I saw my first aura near the time the atm disappeared.  Boiling anger, seething frustration, broken depression.  I took to wearing my sunglasses continually. 

When did it stop?  It must’ve been when I got sent to the new family.  I lived in the grey world for a long time then. 

Why bring this up now?  Well, I’m not sure if it began with the new trainers – red of course - or the red brick of my new house.  Yeah, it’s a thing for me – new place, new trainers. 

Whatever, it’s back.  Don’t believe me?  I can see your spirals of pain, sparks of joy; I can see your gleaming avarice. 

I can see you inside out.


*
This story was my response to the flash fiction contest - Flash Frenzy at The Angry Hourglass - which gave the above image as a prompt, with a 360 word count limit.  Delighted to have been given an Honourable Mention - judges comments can be viewed here.
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