Refuge
Today’s revised flash fiction was drafted years ago, but I can’t seem to find the original writing prompt it was attached to… So, I’m curious: What prompt would you create for this piece in retrospect
SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM TO SEE TODAY’S WRITING PROMPT
Refuge
When Sara emerged from her new makeshift, who-knows-for-how-long residence, she squinted, then blinked rapidly as the sun pierced her eyes, waking her up to a new reality.
She hadn’t been able to fall asleep until dawn, all alone… aside from the elderly couple and single mother with two small children who shared her new space, still strangers and now absent.
It must have been sometime long after the whimpers of mourning surrounding her had died down, sometime after the air had become sharper, crisper, that she found a sliver of sleep without rest. But now the sun was out in full force, indicating the day had already overlooked her, that time and everyone else went on without her presence.
She looked around for resources because that was the only thing she could think to do— what her body was telling her to do.
First, she had to find water. The air was boiling in the vast and empty landscape around the camp today and she was parched and ravenous. There had been no time to eat or drink when she had arrived at dusk the day before.
And second? There was no telling what she’d do second. Though she was acutely aware of the fact that no one here would really care about that fact— her potential loitering or productivity. That, and the fact that she was somewhere ‘near the Texas border,’ ‘near the desert,’ which is what they had told her then, when she was being processed like livestock as the sun was going down.
After her processing, she had dumped at least half a liter of sand from her sneakers. They had been brand-new just last week, a birthday present from her father after she had made the track and field team at her high school. And now, they were in tatters, matching the frayed hems and knees of her bootcut jeans. So, yes, her being near the desert did make some sense.
Or was it ‘at the Texas border,’ and ‘in the desert’? She couldn’t actually remember what the intake guards had said regarding her location, now that she was waking up in the sun. Not that it mattered anyway. The semi-penetrable walls surrounding her were too high to see over and she was thirsty, so very, very thirsty. Those were the actual facts she knew in her body to be true.
There had been no smiles or embraces then though— that she remembered. Just stamps and paperwork she couldn’t keep or understand and a vague wave of an intake guard’s hand indicating where she was supposed to lay her head… and the location of the water tent. Yes, those were facts. Yes, she realized, she knew where to get water.
At the spigot in the water tent, she got down on her knees and cupped one hand under it as she released the water with the other. It was hot, but not enough to burn her skin, so she drank. Then, she felt a pointy finger tap, tap, tap on her shoulder.
When she turned around, she saw a small boy behind her. He had thick black hair and had lost some of his baby teeth, but not his smile. He was grinning at her behind weary eyes that were attempting to convey something more pivotal than his words ever could. Somehow, she knew that to be true, felt it as true, though she didn’t know this boy.
As she shimmied to the side to let the boy get a drink, he giggled. But before she could join the boy in this simple moment of levity, she saw him, her father. He was standing near the entrance of the water tent, with one hand shielding his eyes as he surveyed his surroundings. She was sure it was him due to his profile and the special collector’s Yankees cap he was holding in his other hand, a bright oasis of green in any arena. And she knew he was looking for her.
Sara rose and stood still, letting relief and gratitude wash over her completely, even if only for this moment. There he was, at last, her refuge, in this place full of refugees.
