Creative Writing Short Stories

Barren (A Flash Fiction)

There she lay.

Celeste allowed her body to sink into the sand, wishing and hoping that she would be buried in it.

There was no one on the beach, seeing as it was a gloomy, humid, day. No one nearby. She was alone.

At some point, when she didn't even realize she had done it, she stood up.

When she did, she felt sand all over her. Her black dress was damp and sandy. Her dark brown was now stiff. The skin that was revealed and open to the world was surrounded by sand, despite her small effort in shaking it off. She stood there, facing the ocean, barely breathing, barely alive.

It had been one week since she'd found out. Her hand wandered down to her stomach, lying gently where her baby should have been. She hadn't even known they were there, until they were already gone.

Ocean Kai. That's what she had named her baby. She'd never know if Ocean was a boy or a girl, and that simple fact pained her. She blinked and left her eyes closed for a moment too long, and in that awfully long moment, she could imagine her baby in her arms.

Celeste knew it was a school day, and she knew her mom would be getting a call home that she ditched, but she no longer cared. It took everything inside of her to decide to not go. Why should she change her mind then?

Once she realized she was standing, she started to pace. She didn't know the time, but she knew she had been at this beach for a while. To her time was both slow and fast. Life was too slow when she was miserable, and when she had her few moments of joy, life went much too fast. Time would not let her grieve, either, for the times when she was numb, also went too fast.

She wanted to die.

She was empty.

Despite her carefulness, she still got pregnant. And it was still too late. She miscarried before she even knew her baby was there. And she would have kept that baby.

Her toes curled into the sand, and her hands balled into fists. A tear rolled down her cheek. Oh, how she wanted that baby. After being told at sixteen that she would likely never have a child, she had no hope. And then this baby fell into her lap but left so quickly. She wasn't given time to think about telling her family, or the baby's father. She hadn't thought of how she would juggle school, work, and the baby, or where the baby would sleep. She was given none of that fear, but she wanted it more than anything. She wanted a baby, but not any baby, but that baby. Celeste wanted the sleepless nights, curdle-y milk throw up, the smelly diapers, the crying, the worrying.

She then thought about her niece, who was only three months, and had no attachment to her, no memories of Celeste yet. Celeste thought of her mother, who had been emotionally and mentally abusive to her own daughter, often blaming Celeste for things that she had no part in. Celeste knew it wasn't her fault her father participated in adultery. That thought brought her to her father and her step family. He would recover. They would have more children. He had the tendency to replace his lost children with new ones. She even tried to think about college, the life beyond it, but she couldn't imagine her future.

She plopped onto the wet sand, and did nothing but stare for a while. Almost out of nowhere, a small hermit crab appeared. It's small shell was in the sand, and the poor hermit crab was ferociously waving its legs through the air.

Celeste gave the crab a weak smile, lifted it, and set it down the right way. The small crab tried to run away, but less than five seconds later, it toppled over once more. Celeste giggled, and helped the crab again, but the cycle continued. For nearly ten minutes, the crab taunted her.

Celeste sighed and lifted the crab to meet her line of sight. "You're done too, aren't you?" The crab had pain layered behind its small eyes.

She set it back down, ready to help it again. But then a wave was bigger than she had anticipated, and her legs got wet, and the crab was washed away.

She knew she would only be going back home to benefit other people, not for herself. She tried to think of reasons to continue, to try to get better. But it took her too long to come up with a single reason.

It was decided. She positioned herself to run, and run she did. Her body raced to the ocean, like a magnet.

There was a big splash, but no one heard it. And no one ever would.

Her phone, her wallet, her keys, her car. They all stayed on the beach. As they would for some time to come.

But none of that mattered to her, because she was submerged in the Ocean. She let everything go.

There, she lay.

And there, she sank.