Flash Fiction Friday

A tiny story to read...

Hi friends, welcome to the first of my new posts featuring one of my flash fictions. I no longer send my work out to journals and competitions very often, so thought I would share them here. They will be a mix of old stories that were published in closed down journals or print anthologies, and new ones that are unpublished. I hope you enjoy my tiny tales.

Each Flash Fiction Friday post will also include the inspiration for the story and a prompt to get you writing too.

With love,

---

Purple With a Purpose

Photo by Maria Lupan on Unsplash

She just went mad for everything purple, seemingly overnight.

First, she changed her name from Mary-Jane to Lilac. From her former clean-faced beauty she took to wearing Pomegranate Margarita on her lips, Purple with a Purpose on her nails.

Gone were the usual jeans and t-shirts, instead she filled her wardrobe with a rainbow of long violet dresses.

Oil burners in every room scented her space with lavender. She painted every wall in the flat in an array of purple hues.

Breakfast was blueberries. Every other meal featured an aubergine. She sucked on Parma Violets in between.

She danced in the kitchen to a playlist filled with Prince and the New Riders of the Purple Sage. Every now and then some Indigo Swing snuck in.

But it was all just a distraction. From the bruises on her body. The deep purple smudges under her wild eyes. 

---

This story was originally published in the National Flash Fiction Day 2016 Anthology, A Box of Stars Beneath the Bed.

The inspiration for the story came from the names of nail varnishes, which I used as a prompt one day to get myself writing. Why not try writing a story of your own inspired by nail varnish names? There are some amazing ones! Find inspiration here.

---