Flash fiction

Johnny lay in a clearing, damp, uncut grass around his head, staring at the night sky. At this moment, Johnny had everything he had ever wished for for the last twenty-three years.

To be outside. . . to be alone . . . to be free.

Johnny knew he couldn’t enjoy it for long; a lucky shot by one of the guards had seen to that. Even now, he could hear the search dogs yowling their way toward him.

But it didn’t matter. He could feel his warmth draining from the hole in his side. 'But still,' he thought, 'this is a natural coolness, not the conditioned, recirculated, artificial coolness of a prison cell.'

He studied the patchwork clouds illumined by the full moon, trying to pick out shapes like he had done as a child.

Tonight, every cloud looked like a key.

The dogs were getting closer. Johnny could hear the jingle-jangle of their collars, the grunts of their handlers.

But they wouldn’t find him in time. Even now, the clouds dimmed, and the dazzling moon faded into a hazy tunnel. Johnny knew that soon, very soon, he would be in a place without locks, without cages.

They would eventually find his body, he knew. 'Will they be disappointed,' wondered Johnny, 'to find my smiling corpse? To know that I had died happy? To know that I had died a free man?'

With that thought, the door unlocked. Opened. Johnny stepped through.