His Secret, and Hers

/ Liz H

His long spatulate fingers, joints knobby as cherry pits, cup a bouquet of fresh dwarf roses. He shifts from foot to foot within the grove of birch trees, anxious over his late arrival at the graveyard.

For twenty years he’s delivered a secret miracle to a grieving woman. For her part, she’d never remarried. He honored her devotion.

His pale blue gaze darts, beady under heavy brows. He swallows and decides, Adam’s apple pitching up, then down. He swoops, scooping up dead roses, replacing them with fresh, breathing a prayer.

“I thought it was you,” she whispers.  “I hoped.”

 

© Liz Husebye Hartmann (2018)

Carrot Ranch Prompt (05/10/2018): In 99 words (no more, no less) write a story defining “the charisma of cranes.” For centuries, cranes have inspired art and philosophy. You can write a crane story or create something new out of the phrase. Go where the prompt leads.

Microfiction Madness Story Prompt (May 2018): Write a 100 word or less story based on the picture.

 

10 thoughts on “His Secret, and Hers”

  1. You sought out crisp language to describe the awkward and unlikely crane suitor, filled the lines with tender and brave acts, and delivered the punch of love and hope. Well-done!

    And, before I forget to mention this to you — I thoroughly enjoy clicking on the link to your website because the banner is not only stunning but has also begun to work on my imagination in thinking that the unseen crevasses below hide the Valley of Trolls. Excellent platform branding.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  2. Pingback: Charisma of Cranes « Carrot Ranch Literary Community

Hello!

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.