My latest in the Micro Bookends weekly flash fiction contest where they provide the bookends (DOCTOR) and (NO), respectively, and you supply 110 words max in response to the photo prompt. My entry:
Doctor, the white coat knight atop the white horse of life’s messiness, asked to traverse it, to translate it into something intelligible. The fragments that were people once look to the Doctor to piece them together again.
The new mother, hands stuffed with clumps of her auburn hair swamped with postpartum depression. Messy signature, abundant medicine.
A 12-year-old that fantasizes about slicing his sister’s breasts off at night. Messy signature, no real cure.
New patient, Belinda, 20something slipping into early stage schizophrenia, tried to kill herself. Messy signature, messy medicine.
Broken shells with messy lives look to the Doctor only to say, “Yes, you can be fixed,” but never, “No.”
