Taylor Gaede

10 Flash Fiction amie turned the apple in her hands, marveling at its smooth skin. She had meant to eat it once she reached the end of her hiking trail, but a shrub-choked mailbox rusting beside the path had beckoned her to this lost home. Thistles layered the black-and-white kitchen floor. Behind her was a stained floral sofa, a coffee table plastered with an old Sunday newspaper, and a rocker sopped with recent rainwater, molding. The back wall had crumbled, revealing a countryside set aflame by dying leaves.

She supposed she could eat now. No one would berate her if juice dribbled to the floor, or if she left the core on the counter.

Instead, she laid the untouched apple in the rocker, its surface reflecting the world in various shades of red. Then she left to find her path again. J