Furious fiction February

I've decided to join the Furious Fiction monthly competition and to post my short stories here after each round. With any luck there will be some improvement discernible by the end of the year!

The "prompt" for February was: the first sentence must be 3 words, the story must contain a first of some kind, and there has to be a candle.

Here goes....

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Being dead’s ok.

I mean obviously it’s not ideal, but someone else always has it worse, you know? And at least I didn’t die of something horribly embarrassing—no auto-erotic asphyxiation or aneurysm on the toilet seat. Nope, just a run-of-the-mill homicide. Janie thinks that’s why I came back like this. Unfinished business or some such. But everyone knows Janie’s an idiot. It’s equally likely it was just some cosmic mistake, a wrong turn on the highway to oblivion.

I digress.

If I kept a diary, today would be marked with hearts or stars or some other sparkly shit. Big day. Lots of straining muscle to be seen on pasty white, hairy legs. A few plumber’s cracks too. A hatstand, a corner desk, two armchairs and a couch shrouded in stained linen. Fresh quarry!

Being dead’s ok, but it is super boring. So far, I’d give it a solid zero out of ten, would not do again. If I exclude Janie—and most people would—I haven’t had a real conversation in almost a year. Like, just because I’m dimensionally challenged, suddenly I’m not worth talking to? Most breathers can’t even acknowledge they perceive me at all.

But they do. I make sure of it.

She is here with me now, in the room. No power connected yet, so it’s a candle she lights and places on the dining table for illumination. Rookie mistake. I wave my arm through the flame and it wavers, then fails. She lights it again. I extinguish it. I can do this all night.

She looks right at me.

Must be a coincidence. No breather has ever seen me before. I wait for her to strike another match. She raises her eyebrows, sharply.

‘Will this be a regular thing with you?’ she asks, tipping her head towards the curl of black smoke rising from the candle’s wick. Her voice is tinged with annoyance rather than fear. That’s a first.

I gesture down the length of my semi-translucent body. ‘Will this be a regular thing with you?’ I ask.

She smiles and shrugs one shoulder. ‘I guess we’ll see.’

She relights the candle and her stare challenges me to interfere again. I feign disinterest. She rummages through her shoulder bag and pulls out a book—its cover is creased and there’s a thin layer of plastic peeling from one corner. She pulls a bookmark out from around the middle before opening to the first page and reading aloud:  

‘Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that…’

My gaze travels over the new assortment of furniture in the room. They are just objects, I suppose there’s room enough for them in my little home.

Maybe being dead really won’t be so bad after all.