Mudslide

The following “flash fiction” is my response to Charli’s challenge at Carrot Ranch Literary Community.  The challenge was to write a 297-word story about a mudslide. I let my imagination run wild with this one, and it weighs in at 297 words.

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Rachel sat bolt upright in bed. The clock on the wall said 2:15. She’d just had that dream again, the one about the mudslide.

She’d had it four nights in a row now, ever since she’d moved in with Jake. What would her shrink say about that?

Rachel looked down at Jake, softly snoring beside her. She touched his arm; he didn’t stir. What was he dreaming about? She closed her eyes and tried to get back to sleep, but all she could think about was the mudslide in her dream.

What was her subconscious trying to tell her? What could a mudslide possibly symbolize? Was it some kind of a warning?

She got up, stumbled out of the room, fished her phone out of her purse, and Googled “mudslide dream.” But before the search was completed, Jake came up behind her and kissed her neck, startling her. She screamed and dropped the phone.

They both moved to retrieve it. Jake got to it first, and it started buzzing as soon as he’d picked it up.

He looked at it and held it out so Rachel could see the screen. Caller ID said it was somebody named “Slim Dude.”

Jake stared at the phone, letting it buzz ten times, and then continuing to stare at it after the buzzing stopped.

“Who’s ‘Slim Dude’?” Jake wanted to know.

“My husband,” Rachel answered, turning away so Jake couldn’t see her face.

“You have a HUSBAND?!” Jake sputtered.

Rachel didn’t answer. She was thinking about her husband’s nickname, the one he’d gotten in prison, the eight letters in SLIM DUDE tattooed on his fingers. SLIM DUDE would never stop calling her. And he’d always haunt her dreams, even scrambled up as the horrible MUDSLIDE that her life had just become.

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Do you have any recurring dreams? Care to share?