What do you mean, ambience? Do I not make a perfect Imam Bayildi? Do you even know what that means? The Holy Man Fainted: that’s the English translation. A dish so delicious the imam fainted when he sampled it. Aubergine stuffed with tomato and onion, slow-braised in olive oil. Delicate and beautiful—a taste of home. One mouthful and you are back among the olive groves on a cedar-scented evening, bright stars pricking the cloth of night. Now this, my love, is ambience you can’t buy. I tell you, the guests will come without any fancy decor.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

The face she wears is not her only face. Though she performs the role well, smiling and agreeable, every now and again the skin coruscates for a moment and I glimpse an altogether different creature beneath. This thing has teeth.

She will come for me one day—I know it.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

Look, mate, I’m not runes—I’m Cadoc. What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing, grubbing around in the dirt beside me? I’ve had a nice kip these last three thousand years, and then you come along. Some eternal rest! I would’ve preferred eternal feasting, but we can’t have everything, can we? Anyway, bugger off and leave me in peace. Oi! You can’t be lifting my skull. Put me back right now or I’ll curse you unto the tenth generation with the magical lore of the Celts. Oh, all right, I don’t know a curse from a warding spell. But show some sodding respect, mate.

Oi! 

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

When the world went dark, I was frying bacon and eggs. I didn’t even notice for an hour. The breeze continued to stir the sycamore leaves, and the dog next door barked insouciantly. Only when I needed to make a phone call did I discover the internet and power were down. Annoying, but not terrifying. It would be back up soon. Wouldn’t it?

When the taps ran dry, I began to panic, to the rising clamour of gridlocked motorists leaning on their horns.

My neighbour is a prepper. Pulling out his radio, he called, “Can you hear me?”

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

They don’t celebrate Christmas. No lights, no inflatable Santa in the front garden. The lack of ostentation is ostentatious. What kind of person doesn’t embrace the festive season? A bad person, obviously. These are bad people, and bad people should not live in the best house on the street. I think they may be foreign.

Comings and goings disturb the peace at all times of the day and night, and giggling on the darkened porch. Low morals, definitely.

It’s my duty to report them, that’s for sure. Then maybe I’ll get to move into the best house on the street.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

To the side of the trash, they’d stacked a red easel among the desiccated pot plants and old paint tins. On the easel, a hyper-realist painting depicted a cabin in the snow. I couldn’t help myself. Turning as I walked up the path to the door, no footprints showed. Of course—I was in a picture.

The cabin was empty, and the back door stood open. In the yard, a row of desiccated pot plants and old paint tins flanked an easel with a painting of a wooden house.

I couldn’t help myself.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

When the tendrils began to fall, it felt like light warm rain. At first. Only later did we realise what they can do. In the beginning, all was joyous, like snow on Christmas Day. We experienced bliss as the things dewed our skin. It was rapture.

Now we know that they secrete chemicals that trigger our neurotransmitters. Perhaps too late we’ve started to resist. Our homes are sealed tight, and we go out now only in hazmat suits.

But I’ve made a terrible discovery. The tendrils are not sentient—they’re weapons. After them, something else is coming.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

There’s a rhinoceros in the woods. I know—I saw it grazing quietly, supremely indifferent to the fact we don’t have rhinos here. Either my sighting’s mistaken, or we’re wrong about the rhino’s range. This dilemma must be where that awful phrase “my truth” comes from.

Truth is truth. But then we must consider the chain of deduction too. Perhaps a zoo escape? That would solve my existential crisis.

Phoning the zoo would verify the possibility. But if the escape didn’t happen, my crisis returns. Maybe better not to find out.

I’ll make a nice cup of tea and ponder

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

He was in the presence of a miracle. Not the burning bush kind. No angels swooped down with fiery swords. But a miracle nonetheless. The air coruscated, and nothing was quite like it had been a moment before.

A voice which issued from no mortal mouth sounded the bell of his skull. “Go forth and slay my enemies.”

That was disconcerting.

Though feeling a little foolish, he answered, “I’m really not sure that would be the right thing to do.”

“So be it,” the voice replied. “Many are called, few are chosen.”

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

The sun rises through a sulphurous sky on a desolation of gantries and cranes. This is no spaceport, no futuristic capital—everything is grandiosely functional. And yet, tough men built great things here, proud of their skill, and easy in their laughter. But no more ships will slide down these slipways.

How did it come to an end, all this? A world has vanished, not just of things, but of communities. What will we do now, us welders and fitters and engineers? Who will value us? We are passing into history.

I do not care to go gently.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here