Rodak's Writings: The Interview: the Conclusion - a Flash Fiction

INTERVIEW: the Conclusion -- a flash fiction

Interviewer: Ivanka, I want to thank you for your candor in submitting to this interview and close by asking the question that's on the minds of people the world over: It is clear that your father has spun out of control. That being so obviously the case, why are not his wife, his sons, or you--his cherished daughter--doing some kind of intervention to save your father from himself, and our nation from further humiliation on the global stage in the process?

Ivanka: That's easy. Because he would have us all killed.

Interviewer: Oh my God! You can't mean that! Melania and Eric, sure. Don Jr. maybe. But surely not you, Ivanka!

Ivanka: [long pause] You don't get it. Especially me.

Rodak's Writings: A Flash Fiction

Flash Fiction

As Miss Kitty squatted to pee in the dust by the side of Main Street, her modesty protected by her long black hooped skirts, gimpy Chester struggled hurriedly past her shouting, “Mister Dylan! Mister Dylan! A cowpoke’s been shot over to Fern Hill!”

Hitching up his gun belt with a pout, the Sheriff peered over the double doors of the saloon to see what all the commotion was about.

Miss Kitty having moved on, a stray mongrel hurried over to sniff at the intriguing new muddy spot, still damp despite the heat of the sun at high noon.

The sheriff now shrugged and turned back to the bar, awarding priority to his still-foaming beer.

Resigned to being ignored, Chester stood asymmetrically without, thumbing through the pages of a dog-eared paperback.

On a hilltop half a mile out of town, a nameless cowboy quietly bled out unmourned, never having drawn his trusty Colt.

Rodak's Writings: Flash Fiction

A DONE DEAL

When I got a text that he had hit his wife, my daughter, and that she had not brought charges, I packed a few things and drove ten hours to the City.

I parked my car on the street where I could watch the entrance of their building, a brownstone townhouse a block west of Central Park, in the upper 80s. They had an apartment on the second floor.

I sat and waited for three hours, listening to cool jazz and watching hundreds of passers-by, pursuing their urbane lives frenetically as the squirrels in the park foraged for seeds and crumbs.

Finally I saw them coming down the block. At the top of the stairs, he held the door open for her. She entered without speaking, without looking at him.

I got out of my car, climbed the eight stairs to the top of the stoop and pushed the button for 2F on the intercom. She said, “Who’s there?” I answered, “It’s me.” The door was buzzed open.

I stood before them now in the front room of their cramped little flat. I looked into his eyes and without saying a word pulled the 9 mm from the pocket of my jacket.

She screamed, “Daddy! No!” But it was a done deal.

 I shot him once in the gut.

He now sat on the floor, several feet behind where he had been standing. He groaned, “Don’t shoot me again, please! It won’t happen a second time!” He struggled to his knees, his hands outstretched.

“You don’t get it,” I replied. “This is for the first time.”

The contents of his head made a hot mess of the wall behind him.