Here we are. The last day in February. The magical leap year day made up of all the little bits of time that didn’t quite fit into other years. I always feel like something special needs to happen on a leap year day. It doesn’t have to be good or bad or even something very large. Just something unexpected, like something got trapped in between all those minutes and hours we put in a box for the past couple of years escaping into the odd quiet moments of the day. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t. But I still like to think it. So lets see what today’s prompt brings shall we?
I will be thinking about why people think this man died for the rest of the day.
Thursday, February 29th: The lights flickered.
The lights flickered. John looked up. They stabilized but the storm outside still raged. Lightning flashed and thunder boomed. He counted the seconds between them and realized the storm was only a couple of miles away.
“Closer than last time,” he realized. The storm was moving his way. John pushed his hair back and stood up. He set his pen down on top of the notepad and stepped away. It was two long strides to the kitchen counter. There he picked up the large flashlight he hauled out that morning when he looked up and saw the steel gray clouds massing in the sky.
Even though he changed the batteries when he took the flashlight out, the old ones having gone long dead, John couldn’t help but turn the flash light on and then off again to double check that everything was in working order. The flashlight had a slight yellow tint to it from the age of the plastic lens, but if it was needed it would be enough to see by.
John turned it off and walked back to the kitchen table. He set the flashlight down within easy grabbing distance and cast an eye to the overhead light. It would be best if he didn’t lose power as he had things he wanted to finish before bed, but he was prepared if it came to it.
John settled back down in the chair and pulled himself back up to the table. He picked up the pen and looked down at his notebook. The page was blank. John started this letter more than two hours ago and thus far, he tore out and threw away nearly half the pages in the notebook. The trash can was filled with balled up papers. Hating the waste he reminded himself to fish them out and use them in the fireplace later. For now they remained in the bin as he could not have them littering the floor while he worked.
While not overly neat he simply couldn’t throw the discarded pages to the floor and leaving them balled up on the table made hm feel even more nervous about the letter than he already was.
‘Not that I’m nervous exactly,’ he decided. ‘I just can’t decide how to begin.’
How did one address a letter to someone you hadn’t seen in more than thirty years? Someone who thought you died shortly after the last time they saw you? Someone who had every right to hate you?
That John found was the sticking point. He was certain once he passed that point, he would be able to fill in the rest. He was just finding it difficult to move past that point. Dear Maddy didn’t seem appropriate. He wasn’t sure she held him dear anymore and the nickname seemed presumptuous. Dear Madeline and Dear Ms. Walker both sounded too formal. John stared at the page as the storm grew closer.
Ten til Midnight 