Flash Fiction: A Hole Away from Home

In recognition of me starting my Masters program in Writing Studies, a piece of flash fiction(?) from my early years as a writer.

Recently, while sifting through some ancient papers of mine, I found this curious paragraph of flash fiction written, by hand, when I was in middle school. It’s probably the oldest piece of my writing I still possess (excluding a rather tepid poem called “Arizona Highway”). I have no idea why I had written it — it’s not even a complete story — but here it is presented for cyber-posterity:

“Jimi loomed through the splintered door of his shed in the backyard. It was a cramped wooden shack with no windows, whose unshingled roof leaked terribly when it rained. All the furnishings, two rickety chairs and a table with one leg too short, often had damp surfaces that stained Jimi’s clothes whenever he’d touch them. There were still clumps of sawdust strewn about the dirt floor which he’d not bothered to sweep up long after he had completed building the simple table. The plywood walls were bare except for some moss growth at the bottom, severely warping the boards so the slightest draft easily invaded the dwelling. There was a ceiling lamp with an aluminum shade, swaying from the rafter, whose bulb often burned out because of the moisture. In such an event, Jimi had set a dozen candles on the tabletop, using cracks in the two-by-fours as holders. Lighting all the wicks at a time, his shed glowed with the flickering flames, always in danger of being blown out by the intruding wind, but by some miracle never did. Streams of melted wax would slowly drip onto the table and solidify into one colorful pool. Jimi would watch this pool for hours on end, observing its silent creep across the tabletop. He liked the peacefulness of this small, dim place. He especially liked to listen to the rain pelting its roof during a storm. It soothed him and made him forget about his parents harassing him whenever he was inside ‘their house.’ His shed was his hole away from home.”