Flash! Friday, Vol 3 – 1: Shir-ash

Flash Friday, December 12, 2014

Every Friday our challenge is to craft a 150-word story (10-word leeway) based on the photo prompt. Here's the picture--and my post:

Wine Glass. CC2 photo by BlakJakDavy.

SHIR-ASH

159 words

Some say we’re the souls of the damned. We exist in eternal fire until Satan drags us above ground to help humans remember Hell.

Is it true? This roiling, folding heat that embraces me—it’s all I’ve ever known. I desperately want out, but I don’t know why.

After millennia of sliding past my fellows, persistently seeking escape from the fiery chamber, I find a fissure in the earth. In a rush I am expelled. I am transformed. I expand into lightness and float, sailing on cold currents, confined no more.

I drift for days, gradually losing altitude until I approach my final resting place of freedom. The grass? The river? No, I fall into another chamber of red. I float on the thick liquid. Sweet. Cool. I am alone.

Surely this is Heaven.

The chamber moves, sweetness crashing around me, crushing me. I’m thrown into a dark tunnel. Another, larger chamber of darkness awaits below.

Surely this is Hell.

Thanks for stopping by. Try your hand at flash fiction--it can be addicting!