Flash Fiction Behind the Scenes: “Shells”

First, here’s the story (if you’ve already read it, scroll down for Behind the Scenes and some music).

Shells

The first mushroom cloud held a sick beauty. We watched as billowing death darkened TV screens. On the beach white foam sparkled between shells. I wanted to hold your hand, but tousled your hair to make you laugh.

More mushroom clouds. More cities turned into mass graves. More people huddled together to survive. More lashed out violently. I wanted to hold your hand, but made a silly joke.

Darkness consumed the world as we fled to shelters. Death spread in ash and clouds and black masks. I couldn’t see your eyes behind the fogged lenses. I promised you I wouldn’t leave.

One by one millions of voices fell silent to be remembered only somewhere in the midst of the dead or the fearful memories of the living.

Only broken shells remained. Shells of cities, shells of people, shells of souls, shells of prayers for forgiveness whimpered into the dark sky.

I’d waited long enough.

I slipped my hand into yours.

Nuclear Winter Recon. CC photo by Paul Hocksenar

Behind the Scenes

Like most of the other Flash! Friday pieces, I wrote “Shells” during my Friday lunch break. I’d been playing around with the theory that a nuclear winter will affect the northern hemisphere to a much more severe degree than the southern hemisphere. The first draft was someone describing how an unnamed nuclear war started and how the media slowly came to an end as the winter moved across the face of the earth and communication was interrupted as people died, leaving only a fading digital footprint.

I felt that this was too impersonal and tried to get a way to bring one person to the forefront and show the emotional impact on that one person. Lucky for me “Verwag my terug” by Die Heuwels Fantasties was next on my playlist. The first line: “Ek onthou dat ek net jou hand vas wou hou” (I remember that I only wanted to hold your hand) suddenly gave me the idea for the love story and how the rest of the nuclear war remained almost in the background for the character who only wanted to show her affection without quite knowing how to do it under the circumstances. By then the lines “Only broken shells…” had already been written, so it seemed logical to put them at the beach at the start of the story. 

Here’s Die Heuwels Fantasties with “Verwag my terug”