Story Archive | Cycles

This was my first published story. It was written in 1995 specifically for a magazine I found in Writers Market that only published words of exactly 250 words.

Originally published in Xtreme: The Magazine of Extremely Short Fiction, 1995.

Reprinted online in MicroHorror (www.microhorror.com), May, 2012.

Cycles

By Lee Wright

“Sometimes,” she said, “I can move things with my mind.”

He ignored her and wrestled the spare tire from the trunk.

“The power kind of comes and goes,” she said.  “Some days, I can only move light things, like clouds or leaves.”

She stretched out on the grassy bank and watched the dark clouds drift lazily across the darkening summer sky far above the lonely highway.

“It’s a cyclical thing,” she explained as he began to pump the jack.  “The power waxes and wanes.”

She plucked a daisy then began to dismember it slowly and methodically.

“I’ve done some research,” she said, “and do you know what I found out?”

He grunted, shook his head and continued wrestling with the lug nuts.

“Most women like me say their power is stronger at certain times of the month.”

She smiled thinly at his narrow sweat covered back and slowly stood.

As he lowered the jack, her shadow stretched out on the ground before him.

He inhaled sharply and groped in the gathering darkness until his hand came to rest on the tire iron.  But he knew it was already too late.  He hadn’t really been listening and he had forgotten about the cycle until he saw the long, dark, misshapen shadow.  He didn’t have to look up to know that the moon was full and his cycle was at an end.

As she fell on him, her howl ripped through the still country night, but no one was there to hear.

© 1995 Lee Wright