Greta says they are coming for us.
Greta is never wrong.
She knew a fire would destroy the town hall. Told everyone she ran into at the grocery store. The idiots arrested her two days after it burned down. Of course they had to release her the next day—she had an airtight alibi. She was at her grandmother’s house, up in Denton, the night it burned. There was no way she could have gotten back to town to set a fire. Plus, the Fire Marshall declared the cause of the blaze was an overloaded electric circuit in the attic. Given that, and the fact that she is short for her age, seven, and could not have reached the attic trap door even with a ladder, they released her with apologies, and a recommendation that we contact a child psychiatrist.
She also called old man McGrudder’s heart attack. He was down in Florida, on vacation with his wife, when she started crying over her morning cereal. We asked what was wrong and she said Mister McGrudder’s heart was going to break. Judy and I exchanged worried glances, and told her he would get over it. After all, Missus McGrudder wasn’t all that great of a catch in the first place. Of course we didn’t say that out loud.
“No he won’t,” she insisted, and pushed her bowl away. Later that day we found out from a neighbor that Scott McGrudder had a massive coronary while playing an afternoon round of golf. We were stunned, and frightened. What the hell was going on with our little girl?
Then, last week, while shopping at Toy Barn she began screaming, out of the blue. Half the store gathered round before she became coherent, crying about all the people that were going to die. We tried to quiet her down, but she kept on and on about it. Helen Gauss recalled her prediction about the town hall and asked her who was going to die. “The people on the train!” she wailed. “A momma and her baby!” It was all we could do to hustle her out of there before the crowd got ugly.
She’s just a kid, for Christ sake.
An Amtrak Metro-Liner jumped the tracks in Pennsylvania the next day. We were horrified when we heard the reports that seven passengers were killed, including a woman and her three month old baby. Folks in town have been avoiding us ever since.
Sheriff Atkins came by the next day, Sunday, just as we were sitting down to eat. We asked if he’d like to join us, but he graciously declined. He asked if he could talk to Greta. We resisted, but he was fairly insistent. While he was as gentle as he could be Greta did not want to talk about the Amtrak accident, and ended up in a melt down on the living room floor. By the time he left we were all stretched pretty thin. Judy just pitched dinner—none of us could eat.
Today Greta stopped coloring and looked up at us at the kitchen table.
“They’re coming for us.”
“What…who? Who’s coming, sweetheart?”
“The mean men.”
My stomach dropped to my knees. Judy and I looked at each other. Then without a moment of hesitation Judy took off for the bedroom and started throwing things into a suitcase.
“What are you doing?”
“We’re getting the hell out of here,” she told me, never pausing.
“Wait. I’ve got a job. We can’t just…”
She whirled around and glared at me, her face distorted with a mix of anger and fear. “They’ll take her away from us, Kevin!”
“No. No. That’s TV crap. She’s just a little girl.”
“They’ll take her away from us and we’ll never see her again.”
I looked at the doorway. Greta was standing there, watching us.
“I’ll miss you, Daddy.”
I grabbed another suitcase and dashed to her room.
~
Author’s Note: I know this type of story has been done a million times before, but I kind of liked the way it played out. Hope you did not find it too cliché.
~
(c) 2010, by J. M. Strother – All rights reserved.
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I didn’t think it was cliche. I really liked it. A modern day Cassandra, doomed to prophecy only evil tidings. Only this time, it’s too bad that people believe her…
Great story!
Cliche? Not in the circle of stuff I read. This kind of struck a nerve with me because for a short period in my life, while in high school, I was just like Greta. It’s freaky. Peace…
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by J. M. Strother, Catherine Russell and Julie, Tia Brink. Tia Brink said: RT @jmstro: I know it's a bit early, but my #fridayflash is up at Mad Utopia: Insight. She's just precocious. http://bit.ly/csJsLM [...]
Nice job! The last line is chilling. Creepy kids are the best!
Good ending to a good story. Well done!
I genuinely enjoyed this. It’s fantastic in its delivery, not at all cliche. Good stuff, IMO. Well done.
For me it’s the child’s perspective that gives it such depth, particularly her last line.
Not cliche at all as far as I’m concerned!
Greta predicted that “they” were going to come for the family – she didn’t say they would get the family – I’m hoping this means they got away in time!
chilling. Nicely done.
This was a fabulous story. My heart clinched at the end. I really would like this extended into a book.
This was awesome, not cliche at all!
This is really well told, I like the way you create the different scenarios to reveal each episode, the way you present the child’s very real emotion, the parent’s predicament and their ultimate faith in her. Really good.
Maybe it’s been done before, but this worked for me. I liked it a lot. It reveals just enough and leaves just enough to the imagination.
I agree with Mazzz – she says they’ll come, but she doesn’t say they’ll succeed. Who knows, maybe Greta’s “I’ll miss you” was a prompt to action in the nick of time? I hope so!
Wonderful, not cliche at all. My heart’s pounding a little bit, though.
…Yes. Yes, they got away in time.
Great story, Jon.
I really liked this story, especially the “I’ll miss you, Daddy” at the end. It kind of makes me wonder if you can escape fate, or if no matter what they do, the mean men will still find them.
I’ve always been one who believes we make our own future – not a great believer in inescapable fate. That’s not to say one way or the other what happens to Greta and her family in this case, just where my natural inclinations would tend to take it if allowed to run with it. But one never knows.
~jon
Sweet. Love the ‘gotta go’ ending. Thanks.
Nope, not cliche at all. I hope they make it, I’m nervous for them. We’ve actually had these experiences in my family throughout generations. My dad got beat when he was thirteen for telling the neighbors that his older sister died. She was killed in a car crash that day. Anyway, people don’t want to know the truth I don’t think, or are scared of it. This is one of my favorites of yours.
Sad, creepy and a parent’s worst nightmare. It gave me the jibblies since I kept seeing my kid as Greta. Great voice and well told. Not at all clichéd since the usual ending for this is “Daddy’s going to die,” “The milkman dropped dead!” Your ending made me forget that convention, I was too caught up in the story.
What you’ve done here is so difficult to achieve in flash. You’ve made us care about your characters and root for them. There are no new stories under the sun, just different perspectives. This reminded me a bit of “Firestarter” and that was a whole book.
I enjoyed this very, very much. Chilling, evocative, and a story I’ll remember. Well done.
I didn’t find it a cliche. Freaky, but a great read..:)
Fine fine little piece, John. It immediately raised the question, Can we escape our fate? This kind of story (and that question) are indeed standard stuff of sci-fi fiction, but I for one never tire of them. This is an excellent treatment of it, given how short it must be.
Wow, that one gave me chills. Great story. I’ve known people who could do this and there is only trouble if you don’t listen to them.
Jon this was fantastically well told, just dripping with threat and menace.
I love the way she ‘called’ a heart attack – that’s something that purely works in an American idiom, in ‘English’ English you couldn’t do it – we only know what ‘calling shotgun’ is from films & US TV.
Fabulous
Marc Nash
I did not realize that “calling a heart attack” was purely an American idiom. The English language is certainly a fascinating construct, isn’t it.
The first Harry Potter book was not Americanized when it was initially released in the US. I thoroughly enjoyed settling down some British idioms, thought it added something to the overall enjoyment of the book. I was sorry to see the publishers “fix” subsequent books in the series.
Dear Publishers,
Readers are smart. We can usually figure these things out from context. Quit stealing the charm.
~jon
My favorite line: “I’ll miss you Daddy.”
Chilling stuff, Jon.
Very well-written, Jon. As a mom, I completely relate to the way the parents felt.
Not cliche at all Jon, just perfect. This gave me chills, especially since my youngest son does this sort of thing quite often. Of course we don’t like to talk about that, (for obvious reasons).
I especially love the way you leave the end to our imaginations. Just because she says “I’ll miss you Daddy” doesn’t necessarily mean he’ll make it just because he’s decided to go with them. Though I hope he does!
You’re right, Jon, in that it’s been done before, but I also like how it played out. The writing was strong; the story was told in a unique way. Above all, the ending was quite striking. To me it’s quite open-ended. I imagine that the “mean men” are coming for Greta specifically, and that they’re not going to get up. If everything she sees come to pass, then no matter where her parents take her, she will be found. On the other hand, the sampling you give us is small, and it might be that she sees only the likeliest of futures; their actions could change what happens, and Greta could be safe. Interpretation rests a large part on whether “I’ll miss you” is a conditional statement or a prophetic one.
This type of situation and the questions about the fluidity of the future and accuracy of prophecies are a staple of speculative fiction and stories that employ them can run the risk of being clichéd, but your approach is unique, told in your own voice, and, if not strikingly original, at least not unoriginal.
#fridayflash is, being both short and rushed, very rarely contains the kind of development of ideas, characters, plot, and style to raise it far above and beyond other stories that are already out there. Given the constraints, you’ve done a fine job. The story is entertaining and thought-provoking. Your postscript note is totally unnecessary; there’s no need to apologize for a job well done.
Wow, thanks for the very thoughtful comment, Travis. You are right, everything hinges on the “I’ll miss you, Daddy,” line. Prophetic? Perhaps, but only time will tell.
~jon
I don’t care how many times it’s been done, there’s nothing like a great “prediction” story… just loved that Nicholas Cage movie with the predictions – darned if I can remember the title.
Anyway, yours seemed pretty fresh to me… I flew right through it and was dazzled by the ending.
Hey, there are no original plots, right? Only original people like yourself giving them new life.
That’s a fascinating concept. How a little girl with psychic powers would be coveted by certain groups with their own agendas.
Nice open-ended conclusion with a ‘to be continued’ feel to it. Very nice, Jon.
Thank you all for the kind comments. I did write it to intentionally leave it open ended, and it seems to have worked. I have notions running around in my head as to what happens, and I’ll never say never as far as playing it out more sometime in the future. But this is how it was intended to stand, and I think it worked out pretty well as is. I ended up really liking Greta, and characters I create I end up liking a lot tend to keep nagging at me.
~jon
You are to be commended that in such a small word count that you created 3 characters who we immediately engaged with. I think the whole prophecy/future yet to be written thing plays second to that, cheers.
[...] also called old man McGrudder’s heart attack. Read on… AKPC_IDS += "2740,"; categories: Weekly [...]
You certainly laid the tension on thick. With everything going on in the girls mind, it appears as though she isn’t going to have much of a childhood.
Are you planning on expanding this piece? I’d love to see what happens next.
Yea, maybe a child psychiatrist will be in order after all. It would certainly mess with a kid’s head to be able to see stuff like this coming.
I have no immediate plans to expand upon it, but you never know. If it keeps nagging at the back of my mind, I may. For now, it is what it is.
~jon
Love how you leave it open ended for the reader to continue the story on their own. I love writers who can spark the imagination of the reader!
I enjoyed how this played off fate and whether seeing into the future affects the present. The ending really makes the story where the girl realizes that the father isn’t going to come with them. An enjoyable read.
You did a fantastic job of breathing life into an idea that, you’re right, has been done before. The story is well constructed, and I don’t feel I know what is going to happen next. Most concepts have been done before, but it’s always possible to give a fresh take on them, with the right perspective. Very well done!
I really liked this one, particularly the Margret Atwood-esque not ending. Those always get me. Loved it.
That gave me chills… great post Jon.
~2