S.J. Pajonas's Blog, page 6

December 2024 Goals and November 2024 Wrap-Up

This month was very busy! I went to Las Vegas for work, came home, and hit the ground running with a million different things.

How did November 2024 go?

November feels like a blur. We started off the month with some cleaning and reorganizing in the house, and then I jetted off to Las Vegas for the Author Nation conference. What a week that was! I hustled from meeting to meeting. Seriously, I walked over 14,000 steps every day! It was a lot and then I came home and crashed for a day before getting right back to work. The rest of the month has been busy too. I wrote a lot of flash fiction, I worked on websites, and I did a lot of work on the Future Fiction Academy. We also saw Hadestown on Broadway!

Start the next book in the Amagi Series. I didn't start this because I decided to do flash fiction instead and I'm still reading the other books in the Amagi Series.

Start up the press that I've been working on. Man oh man, this has been a tough one. I finally gave up trying to use Elementor for this project and build the site up with PHP instead. I'm still working on it.

Get some more paperbacks onto KDP Print. Didn't happen.

Publish a few blog posts. My blog was busy this month with flash fiction. I hope you've been enjoying it!

Attend Author Nation. Did. Done. It was a blast.

Continue with my FFA, Brave New Bookshelf, and other business work including the new website. All done.

Stick with my workout schedule, Duolingo, reading, knitting, and TV. I did all of these things including starting a new knitting project!

Lol. People on YouTube are weird. This month got 4 thumbs up and 3 thumbs down. I have no idea why.

December 2024 Goals

And now it's time to set some goals for December!

Start the next book in the Amagi Series. Just like last month… Will she or won't she? That's the real question.

Start up the press that I've been working on. This is the month it has to happen because we are going full throttle on it in the new year.

Keep up with flash fiction 3x per week. I'm really enjoying making both the stories and the videos so I'll keep it up and re-evaluate it in 2025.

Make decisions about next year. I want to think about my goals and dreams for 2025. There's a distinct possibility that 2025 will be my biggest year yet!

Continue with my FFA, Brave New Bookshelf, and other business work including the new website. All still stuff I need to do.

Stick with my workout schedule, Duolingo, reading, knitting, and TV. Same old.

That's it for this month! Have a great December everyone!

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AI Image Rejects for November 2024

In the process of creating images for my flash fiction, I often generate a number of images before I find the one that strikes a chord with me enough to write a story about it. There's nothing inherently “wrong” with these images. Some of them are quite beautiful. Some of them are funny. Some of them are just damned weird. Lol.

Here are all of the images that I liked but still rejected for flash fiction in November 2024. All of them were generated with Midjourney. You can click on them to see them bigger (will open in a new tab/window).

The post AI Image Rejects for November 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

The Empty Throne – November 29, 2024

Note from Steph: I love this story! It's just a little bit unexpected. And the voice turned out pretty good for it.

The castle maintenance budget is a joke. Literally. I’ve heard the town council laugh about it. “Twenty euros a month to maintain a relic?” But I take their money and climb this hill every week, just to pull whatever weeds have pushed through the ancient stones.

Except today, something’s different.

The iron key sticks in the lock like always, but when I shoulder open the heavy door, the air inside isn’t stale. It’s… sweet. The morning light streams through the Gothic windows, carrying the impossible scent of roses.

“No,” I whisper, because roses don’t grow in abandoned castles. Roses don’t grow through marble floors and stone walls. Roses don’t appear overnight, turning empty throne rooms into gardens that would make Versailles jealous.

But here they are. Deep crimson blooms cascade down pillars, twist through window tracery, carpet the floor in petals. They frame the ancient throne like they’ve been growing there for centuries, though I swear on my grandmother’s pruning shears there wasn’t so much as a sprout here last month.

I check my phone’s calendar. Nothing special about today’s date. No royal birthdays or historic anniversaries. The kingdom’s been without a monarch for so long that most people think of the castle as just another tourist spot — when they think of it at all.

I step closer to the throne, drawn by a particularly perfect bloom.

“Hello,” a voice on my right says.

I turn and find a young woman in the process of picking blooms and adding them to a basket.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” I say, though honestly, I’m just impressed she got past the rusty gate.

“Neither are they.” She nods at the roses while adding another perfect bloom to her basket. “But here we all are.”

Her accent isn’t local. Tourist maybe? But there’s something in the way she moves through the room, like she knows every stone. “How long have you been coming here?”

“About three weeks.” She caresses a vine, careful to avoid the thorns. “Ever since they started growing. I thought I was hallucinating at first. Roses don’t just appear in abandoned castles, right?”

Three weeks. The same roses I’m seeing for the first time, she’s been watching grow.

“They like you,” I say, noticing how the blooms seem to lean toward her. “The roses, I mean.”

She laughs, and more buds unfurl at the sound. “They should. I’m their queen.”

I start to laugh too, but then I see her face. Dead serious.

“The throne’s been empty for —”

“Two hundred and forty-three years,” she finishes. “I know. I’ve been looking for it that long. Funny how you can miss something for centuries just because you’re searching too far away.” She sets down her basket and walks to the throne. “My name is Sophia Amaranth Rose, and I’m the last of the Rose Line. We tend to get a bit lost between lifetimes.”

The roses burst into full bloom as she sits down, and suddenly the maintenance budget seems like the least of my concerns.

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

You can listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/7LTD29c7pEw

The post The Empty Throne – November 29, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Chromatic Dreams – November 27, 2024

Note from Steph: The prompt for this flash fiction produced a lot of really pretty images! It was a tough choice. But sometimes, I look for the image that I know has a story behind it. And when I saw this woman, I knew there was something more there.

The barista’s thoughts are fuchsia today, all spiky and caffeinated. They stab into my temples like tiny disco lights.

“Just a black coffee,” I say, before she can suggest their new caramel-whatever that she’s so excited about. Her enthusiasm would be neon pink, and I can’t handle pink right now.

The cafe is mercifully empty for a Tuesday morning. Only two other customers: a student whose anxiety swirls around him in deep purple spirals, and an old man whose contentment glows a soft orange that doesn’t hurt to look at.

I press my fingers to my temples. Three people’s worth of colors and I’m already regretting leaving my dark apartment. But my therapist says I need to “engage with the world” despite my “unusual neurological condition.” Easy for her to say. Her thoughts are always a calm, professional sage green.

I take a deep breath through my nose and out through my mouth as I reach for my coffee. I give myself another twenty to thirty minutes before I’m out the door and heading home. There’s only so much of this I can take.

That’s when I see him through the window.

He’s waiting at the crosswalk, and hmmm, is there something wrong with my vision?

I look down at my shoes and recenter myself before lifting my eyes again.

Where everyone else blazes with their emotional color schemes — the jogger’s determined red, the dog walker’s cheerful yellow — he’s… colorless. Huh.

His thoughts move around him in elegant patterns of black and white, like an old film.

My headache vanishes so suddenly I gasp.

The crosswalk signal changes.

Please come in, I think. Please please please.

The bell above the door chimes.

And for the first time in months, the world doesn’t hurt.

I hold my breath as he crosses to the counter. He orders a tea. Earl Grey. His voice is as monochromatic as his thoughts — steady, clear, uncluttered. While everyone else’s mental colors bleed and splash into each other like watercolors gone wrong, his thoughts maintain crisp edges, precise patterns.

I try not to stare. Really, I do.

He catches me anyway.

“Something wrong?” He tilts his head, and the movement sends ripples through his black and white thought-patterns. Like rings in still water.

“No! No, just…” Think of something normal to say. “I like your… scarf?”

He’s not wearing a scarf.

Great job, brain.

His smile creates a new pattern, geometric shapes shifting like a kaleidoscope, but still purely black and white. “I’m not wearing a scarf,” he says.

“I know.” I close my eyes, mortified. “I’m just really bad at… people,” I say.

“Ah.” He sits at the table next to mine. Without asking. The nerve. The relief. “Too many colors?” he asks.

My eyes snap open. “What?”

“The colors.” He gestures around his head. “Everyone’s thoughts. They hurt, don’t they?”

The student’s anxiety purple spikes with interest. The barista’s fuchsia turns curious.

“How…” My throat feels tight. “How do you know about that?” I ask.

He shrugs, and his black and white patterns swirl, calm and clean. “I have a sixth sense about these things,” he says.

I narrow my eyes and he laughs. Oh, I like his laugh. It’s not a burst of vibrating blue like I would expect. It’s a sunny, white sky. I want to reach out and touch it.

But that would be weird.

Don’t do that.

“And, I’m a neurologist who specializes in synesthesia,” he continues, sipping his tea. “I’ve learned to control my thoughts’ colors and tamp down the color of others. I can teach you, if you’d like.”

The world holds its breath.

“Also,” he adds with another geometric smile, “I really do need a scarf.”

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/pLGl3r3QWpw

The post Chromatic Dreams – November 27, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

The Oldest Portrait – November 25, 2024

Note from Steph: This flash fiction is late getting to you, and I apologize! Claude was overloaded all this morning and the rest of my day was just bonkers. But here we go! I enjoyed this little story. :)

“Jules! You need to see this!” Marcus’s voice echoes through the limestone passage, bouncing off walls that haven’t heard human sounds in… well, maybe ever.

I duck under a broken stalactite, my headlamp casting jumping shadows. Last week’s earthquake opened up this entire system, and we’re the first ones in. The air tastes like wet stone and possibility.

“If you’ve found another fossil, I swear —” I round the corner and stop dead. My light joins Marcus’s, both beams fixed on what can’t possibly be here. Not at this depth. Not at this age.

A face emerges from the cave wall, as perfect as a Renaissance sculpture but weathered like it’s been here for millions of years. The eyes seem to catch our light and hold it, turning it to something older than illumination.

A wave of coldness flows over me as I sift through the various true or false statements in my head… and come up with nothing.

“That’s not possible,” I whisper, already reaching for my sample kit. “The surrounding rock formation is Pre-Cambrian. There weren’t even plants when these caves formed, let alone —”

“Artists?” Marcus finishes. He runs a trembling hand through his grey-streaked hair. “Yeah, that’s what I thought too. But look at the mineral composition. It’s not carved, Jules. It’s grown.”

I press my gloved hand against the cheek of the face, feeling the subtle layers of sediment. Like tree rings, but in reverse.

“Marcus,” I say slowly, “have you ever seen anything like this?”

“No?”

“I think —”

The face opens its eyes.

I stumble backwards, my sample kit clattering to the cave floor. The eyes — grey as the stone they’re made from — track my movement.

“Jules?” Marcus’s voice seems to come from very far away. “Tell me you’re seeing this too.”

“Witnessing,” the face says, except it doesn’t speak so much as vibrate, sending ripples through the limestone. The word tastes like dust and ages. “You are witnessing.”

My scientific mind catalogs details even as the rest of me screams to run. The face’s features are shifting, rearranging like sediment in a current. Male to female to neither to both. Young to old to ageless.

“Witnessing what?” My voice catches in my throat.

“The moments that changed you. Changed your kind. We remember them all.”

More faces are emerging from the walls now. A woman discovering fire. A child planting the first seed. A painter pressing their hand against a cave wall, making art for the first time.

“The earth remembers,” Marcus whispers, and the faces ripple in response. “It’s been recording our history in stone.”

“Not recording.” The first face’s eyes are kind now, ancient and new at once. “Becoming. We are what happens when a planet falls in love with its inhabitants.”

The faces begin to fade, melting back into stone, but not before I see one last image forming: two scientists in a cave, looking up in wonder.

Witnessing.

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/D7RJKSx5L50

The post The Oldest Portrait – November 25, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Pop – November 22, 2024

Note from Steph: The images that I got for this prompt were pretty widely varied, but this one stuck out to me. And the voice I chose for the video version of this is *chef's kiss*. Perfection.

The thing about being a guardian of imaginary friends is that you have to be very patient. And sturdy. Mostly sturdy. You try keeping your stuffing arranged while consoling a six-story-tall purple dinosaur who’s just been replaced by a PlayStation.

I’ve sat under this oak tree for… well, time moves differently in the In-Between, but I’ve seen enough seasons to wear the fur off my paws twice over. Each morning, I straighten my bow tie (because standards matter, even in metaphysical meadows), and wait to see who might pop into existence today.

Usually, it’s quiet. Most imaginary friends fade slowly, giving them time to accept that their children have outgrown them. But sometimes —

pop!

Ah. There we go.

A small unicorn materializes in my wildflower patch, looking dazed and translucent around the edges. Her rainbow mane is faded to pastels, which is never a good sign.

“Hello,” I say, keeping my voice gentle. “I’m Theodore. Though most friends here call me Ted. Or Guardian Ted, if they’re feeling formal. Which they usually aren’t.”

“I…” The unicorn blinks glitter tears. Her lower lip shakes. “I don’t understand. Emma and I were having tea just yesterday, and today she… she looked right through me.”

I pat the grass beside me. “Would you like to hear about the time I helped a superhero cape understand that being replaced by a real leather jacket isn’t the end of the world?”

The unicorn — her name is Sparklewind, because of course it is — settles beside me. Her mane is already looking brighter, which is a good sign. The flowers always help. There’s a reason I picked this spot, and it has nothing to do with the direction of the wind or the time of day.

“You’ve been here a long time,” she says, not really a question. Her horn catches the late afternoon light, sending tiny rainbows dancing across my worn fur.

“Long enough to need three bow tie replacements.” I adjust the current one. “But it’s good work, if you can get it. Helping friends find their way again.”

Sparklewind watches a group of imaginary robots playing tag in the distance. They were a package deal — an entire class’s worth of STEM project companions, retired en masse when the school got real robotics kits.

A tragedy.

“Do they all stay here forever?” she asks.

“Not always.” I smile, remembering the dinosaur who just last week found a new child who needed someone to keep the closet monsters in check. “Sometimes they find new children who need them. Different children. It’s not the same, but…”

“But it’s something,” she finishes. Then she turns those sparkly eyes on me. “When was the last time you went looking?”

“Me?” I laugh, but it comes out fuzzy. Stuffed bears aren’t great at deflection. “I’m needed here. I’m the Guardian.”

“Maybe.” She stands, her form already solid enough to cast a shadow. “Or maybe it’s time for a new Guardian. I hear there’s a little girl two towns over who really needs a teddy bear who knows how to listen.”

The surrounding flowers seem to nod in agreement.

Maybe it’s time.

pop!

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/w1AnUQFFWFg

The post Pop – November 22, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

It’s Melting – November 20, 2024

Note from Steph: I organized all of my Suno music that I've been making for these flash fiction pieces and made them public. You can listen to them all at https://suno.com/@sjplovesmusic

The ice cap calves another segment into the copper-colored sea, and I log it in my report. Specimen IC-2187, mass approximately 400 metric tons, expected dissolution time: 6 hours. The same as all the others.

What I don’t log is how the liquid metal seems to reach for the ice, how the ripples move against the wind, how the surface tension changes just before each piece disappears beneath those metallic waves.

“Dr. Chen,” my AI assistant chirps, “you’re anthropomorphizing again.”

“No, ARIA, I’m observing.” I adjust my atmospheric suit’s temperature regulator. Even after three years on Kepler-186f, I haven’t gotten used to how the metallic sea affects our equipment. “The dissolution rate is increasing. That last formation should have taken at least eight hours to break down.”

“Perhaps your initial calculations —”

“Were perfect,” I snap, then feel guilty for arguing with an AI. But I’ve checked and rechecked the math. The ice shouldn’t be melting this fast.

A sound like chimes draws my attention back to the water. The latest ice fragment is already half-gone, but the way it’s dissolving… it’s almost like…

“ARIA, replay the last ten minutes of surface monitoring. Focus on the liquid-ice interface.”

The holographic display flickers to life, and I watch as tendrils of metallic liquid reach up — definitely up, definitely against gravity — to pull the ice under.

“Well,” I whisper, “that’s not supposed to happen.”

I look from the ice to the sea and back again. Hmmm.

“ARIA, check on the planetary temperature readings, please.” Maybe it’s getting hotter?

“Current planetary temperature is holding at minus forty-two Celsius,” ARIA reports. “No significant change since last week’s reading.”

Ah-ha!

“Exactly.” I pace along the shore, my boots crunching on metallic pebbles that shouldn’t exist. “The temperature hasn’t changed, but the ice is melting faster. That violates about six different laws of thermodynamics.”

“Five laws,” ARIA corrects. “And technically —”

“Not the point.” I wave at the sea, where another ice formation is doing its disappearing act. “Look at the consumption rate. Three months ago, we lost twelve tons of ice per day. Last month, forty tons. This week?” I check my data tablet. “One hundred and twenty-two tons. Daily.”

“Perhaps the sea is thirsty,” ARIA says, and I swear there’s a hint of sarcasm in her algorithmic voice.

“Very funny. But…” I stop pacing. “What if it is? What if the liquid metal isn’t just dissolving the ice, but using it? Converting it?”

“Into what, Dr. Chen?”

“I don’t know. But look at the surface composition readings from the past year.”

A graph appears in my heads-up display. The metallic content of the sea has remained constant, but the molecular complexity has increased by 300%.

“It’s not just melting the ice,” I whisper. “It’s becoming more complex. More organized. Like…”

“Like it’s building something,” ARIA finishes, all traces of sarcasm gone.

In the distance, another ice sheet cracks and slides toward the waiting waves.

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/st2JMDChbrY

The post It’s Melting – November 20, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Life After Dark – November 18, 2024

Note from Steph: I took a week off because I was at a conference, and I think I'll continue posting flash fiction three times per week, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Hope you're enjoying it!

“As you can see,” I say, sliding the photos across my desk, “it’s a lovely three-bedroom Colonial with original hardwood floors and a recently updated kitchen.”

Updated kitchen, yes. It took five years to complete because the workers could only get in at night. Sigh. It’s been my most difficult temporally complicated property yet. I need to sell it.

The couple — the Harrises — lean forward, exactly in sync. They do everything in sync. It’s why they’re perfect for this house.

“The price seems too good,” Mrs. Harris says, tapping the listing with one perfectly manicured nail.

Because the house only exists twelve hours a day, I think.

“The sellers are motivated,” I say instead. Standard real estate speak for ‘it needs to go or I’ll be fired.’

“Could we see it this afternoon?” Mr. Harris asks. “Say around two?”

I wince. This is always the hard part. “Unfortunately, the house only accepts viewings after sunset.” I hold up a hand before they can protest. “I know, I know, it sounds strange. But trust me, you want to see this one in its natural habitat.”

They exchange that look couples get when they think their real estate agent might be crazy. I’m used to it. You don’t specialize in temporally displaced properties without developing a thick skin.

“I’ll tell you what,” I say, pulling out my special business cards — the ones printed for reading only after dark. “Meet me there at 6:47 PM. That’s when the house likes to make its best first impression.”

The streetlights flicker to life as the Harrises pull up in their sensible hybrid. Right on time. The house shimmers into existence between 443 and 447 Maple Street, its windows already glowing a warm welcome.

“I don’t understand,” Mrs. Harris says, squinting at the house. “Was it… was it not here when we drove past earlier today?”

“Must have been the trees blocking the view,” I lie, leading them up the front walk. The porch light hums to life as we approach. Good. The house likes them.

Inside, the hardwood floors gleam like they’re remembering sunlight. The Harrises drift from room to room while I recite my usual spiel about square footage and original crown molding. I don’t mention how the walk-in closet sometimes walks out, or that the kitchen window shows a different season depending on what you’re cooking.

“The previous owners,” Mr. Harris starts, then pauses. “Why did they leave?”

“They were morning people,” I say. Which is true. Hard to live in a house that doesn’t exist until sunset.

Mrs. Harris runs her hand along a doorframe, and the house lets out a contented sigh I pretend not to hear. “It feels like…”

“Home?” I suggest.

“Like it’s been waiting for us.”

I smile. The contract’s already materializing in my briefcase, the ink darkening with the sky outside.

Sometimes the house really does know best.

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/NFvBkz4VkYQ

The post Life After Dark – November 18, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Fragments of Memory – November 12, 2024

The dust rises with each step, dancing in the weak sunlight that filters through broken windows. I shouldn’t be here. It’s the first rule of memory collecting: never read furniture from your own past. But this house — this chair — has been haunting my dreams for weeks.

“Just a quick touch,” I mutter, adjusting my gloves. “In and out. No one needs to know.”

The wingback chair sits like a throne in the debris, its fabric grey with age and neglect. To anyone else, it would look abandoned, forgotten. But I know better. Furniture remembers everything: every conversation, every tear, every moment of silence.

I remember this chair being burgundy. Soft. Velvety.

My hand shakes as I peel off my right glove. The other collectors use bare hands for better contact, but I’ve always needed that barrier, that choice of when to connect and when to stay safely distant. Memories have a way of pulling you in, drowning you in other people’s lives.

But these aren’t other people’s lives, are they?

My fingers hover over the armrest. This is where I used to perch while Mom read stories. Where Dad would sit when he was sick. Where I last saw them both, before —

The fabric is static electricity under my skin. The memories surge up, eager, hungry.

Wait. Something’s wrong.

These aren’t my memories of the chair.

These are the chair’s memories of me.

And I don’t remember half of what it’s showing me.

Colors blur and spin until I’m watching myself at twelve, but not the twelve I remember. This version of me has long hair in braids, not the pixie cut Mom insisted on. I’m crying, begging someone — Dad? — not to go. The chair remembers how my fingers dug into its arms, how my tears soaked into burgundy velvet.

But that’s not right. Dad didn’t leave. He died. Here, in this chair, while I was at school.

The memory shifts like a kaleidoscope.

Now I’m sixteen, wearing a prom dress I never owned, and Mom is taking photos while a boy pins on a corsage. She’s alive in this version, her hair still dark, not white like it was in the hospital.

“Stop,” I whisper, but the chair has more to show me.

Graduation. Wedding dress fittings. A second marriage for Mom. Dad’s retirement party. A lifetime of moments that never happened, all viewed from this silent witness, this keeper of alternate possibilities.

I gasp and yank my hand from the chair, the scene dying in my head.

I’m not seeing memories.

I’m seeing a life I was supposed to have.

Something — or someone — changed my timeline. Stole my parents. Rewrote my history.

And this chair, this stubborn, burgundy sentinel, somehow remembered both versions?

Maybe?

My hand shakes as fumble for my phone. I need to call the other collectors. We’re not just reading memories anymore.

We’re finding proof of temporal theft.

And I think I know who stole my life.

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/5nuH6eKVN1A

The post Fragments of Memory – November 12, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Edge of Infinity – November 11, 2024

The walkway stretches out before me like an endless diving board into the sunset. This concrete shouldn’t exist, floating miles above a sea of clouds and turned amber by the dying light. Four minutes and thirty seconds until sunset.

I’ve watched others do this for years — walking these paths to fix their mistakes. Big ones, usually. Preventing accidents. Avoiding wars. Saving lives.

Me? I’m here because I said no to coffee.

“This is stupid,” I mutter, but keep walking. The air gets thinner with each step. “Of all the things to fix, Sarah, you’re choosing the time you turned down the only genuine guy who ever asked you out.”

But that’s not quite right. Jake wasn’t just genuine. He was kind and funny, and looked at me like I was a puzzle he wanted to spend time solving. He wore sweater vests unironically and helped old ladies with their groceries and probably rescued kittens in his spare time.

And I said no because I was still hung up on Chad.

Chad, who had the emotional depth of a kiddie pool and cheated on me two weeks later.

Three minutes now.

The thing about these sunset walks is that you can only change one thing. Ever. No do-overs, no second chances. One fix per lifetime.

“I could prevent the car accident that killed Mom,” I whisper to the clouds. “I could stop my brother from enlisting.”

But I keep walking.

Because sometimes the tiniest mistakes echo the loudest.

The end of the path materializes like a mirage — a small platform just big enough for two people. And there is someone else there, a familiar silhouette that makes my heart stop.

Jake.

He turns, and for a moment, I see that same gentle smile I’ve replayed in my head for three years. Then recognition hits, and his eyes go wide.

“Sarah?”

“I —” Words fail me. All this way to say yes to coffee, and he’s here. Actually, here. “What are you doing here? I came to fix —”

“My sister,” he says softly, cutting off my confession. “I’m here for Emily. The day she called asking for help, and I was too busy with work to answer.”

Oh.

The sun bleeds into the horizon. One minute left.

“Did she…?” I can’t finish the question.

“Yeah.” He looks away, then back. “What about you?” he asks.

I laugh, but it comes out wet with tears. “I came to say yes to coffee with you.”

His smile is sadder now, older. “That would have been nice.”

We stand in silence as the sun slips away. Neither of us moves to change anything.

Because sometimes the biggest mistake is thinking we know which mistakes matter most.

“Want to get coffee now?” he asks as the path begins to fade. “I know a place.”

This time, I say yes.

Image made with Midjourney.
Prompt provided by NoGENver, GoOnWrite.
Flash Fiction written by S. J. Pajonas with assistance from Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Listen to this story on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zDfoq2EeXZY

The post Edge of Infinity – November 11, 2024 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.