Fiction / Flash Fiction

FFfAW: The Flower Thief

Uday14 Comments

 

This week’s photo prompt is provided by Sonya, owner of the blog, Only 100 Words. Thank you Sonya!

 

Berta Collins was 73 years old and had an uncanny obsession with the sunflowers growing out of her fence. The neighbours gawked in amusement as she trudged out of her house every morning at the exact same time, and counted each flower by tapping the petals softly with her index finger. But one August morning, the neighbours had to scamper out as they heard Berta let out a huge yelp at the time of her morning ritual. “M-my flowers!” she growled, with a devastated but angry look on her face. “Who st-stole it!! TELL ME RIGHT NOW!!”

The Georgesons, who lived right opposite to Berta, were watching the whole ordeal from their porch. Mrs. Georgeson remarked, “Poor Berta! Who’s the little devil who stole from her garden I wonder!”

Her son Lucas quietly said, “It was herself.”

“What?” She knew little Lucas would never make up stuff like that. “But why would she do that?”

“Dunno. I saw her pluck two sunflowers last night.”

“Well that’s what Schizophrenia does to you.” Mr. Georgeson said coolly and dailed a number on his phone, a number that belonged to Berta’s step-son.

This post is written for the below challenge. Click on the image to read other entries.

14 thoughts on “FFfAW: The Flower Thief”

  2. Interesting twist. Reminds me of one of my faovurite Korean dramas “It’s Okay, That’s Love”.
    *SPOILERS!! if you ever intend to watch it, don’t look below!!***
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    The series is about a famous writer who keeps getting followed by this kid who sort of idolizes him and begs him to look at something he wrote. Over the course of the story, every time he comes a little bit closer to brushing the kid off to make him go away, the kid comes back abused by his father. The writer finally starts telling people about this kid and his abusive father to explain why he comes back from rescuing him and was all beat up because the police wouldn’t save the kid, had a car wreck to avoid hitting the kid on the bike, was late because of getting in an argument with him, etc. One of his flat mates finally begins putting pieces of the puzzle together after seeing him talking to someone who wasn’t there. And then some of the things he said didn’t make sense. When they finally got the CCTV of the “fight” between the writer and the abusive father, the police found him rolling around in the ditch fighting himself. That’s when it all came together AND with evidence — he’s schizophrenic. The writer’s flat mate and girlfriend both happened to be psychologists, so while it threw a challenge at them that they never would have considered with him (because he’s so freakin’ perfect to see him under normal conditions), they make the decision to hospitalize him so they can help him. She decides to stay with him in spite of his mental illness, even though she knows how hard it’s going to be because she’s seen her patients endure it together. And he finally comes around to admitting he’s sick and going along with the treatment, until he can reach a point where he tells the boy (who represents his younger self) that it’s time for him to leave. It’s an amazing story. 🙂 … Let’s hope this flower lady can also come to understand that her neighbors are trying to help her.

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    • So cruel of you, Melody, to write a big comment and put a disclaimer like that lol 😉 Well I couldn’t resist so went ahead and read it anyway and now I really want to watch the show, the spoiler notwithstanding! 😀 There is an Indian movie with somewhat of a similar concept, for all I know they’d have copied from that Korean drama!

      Anyway, thanks for reading my story! 🙂

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