Chris White

Chris is a freelance writer of many styles (but mostly magic realism and science fiction). He lives in Brisbane, Australia, which he is aware is on the other side of the world. He loves writing flash fiction more than any other length, but it’s short stories that pay the bills (but they don’t, unfortunately.)

Chris’ work is featured in Alien Sky. Follow Chris on his blog and on Twitter.

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Round 15 Winner

“Born of Shadows”

Born of shadows, born of night.

Born of stone, they wait. Patient, eternal.

“Ugh, those statues are too creepy,” she would whisper each time we walked passed; her eyes would dart, like mad nymphs across the canopy. Looking anywhere but there. “I always feel like they’re watching us. “ Each time I would fling a penny against the cowled masonry, waiting to hear the clink of metal-on-stone followed by its plunk as it sank beneath the water.

Make a wish.

Hope it never comes true.

Every day on my way to work, to the patisserie, to my apartment I would pass them by a dozen times, their cloaks revealing whispers of secrecy, of darkness. Every day another penny.

“I swear I saw one move…” her voice quavered, fearful.

I just laughed, flinging another copper disc their way.

Clink.

The smell of cold, of rain and decay.

The penny never plunked.