three micros
by Louella Lester
You Never Know
He is big. He is hairy. But let’s not go with first impressions. The sky might be muddy, but on closer inspection we see that he’s backlit by a swirl of yellow light. Maybe he’s just a soft greyish brown cat with his pointy ears and droopy face. Claws retracted. Maybe he wants to help those people draped along the ground, dripping with fear and sadness. He’s slow-walking. Floating along. Taking care not to tread on anyone’s toes. Preparing to put his soft arms about their slumped shoulders and squeeze them gently. Blow a bit of life back into them.
He Smelled of Fish
Why would a clowder of cats follow him about? He never fed them. Never bent down to pat them or picked them up. Never spoke to them like they were small children. Maybe that was why they climbed his legs, dug claws in, hung off his ribs. Left thin bloody trails when he gently sloughed them off. They worshipped him, made him their temple, though they knew his big head was a mask designed to hide his vulnerabilities. But he smelled alright and they felt safe around him. Knew that whatever he was underneath that cover, he was no dog.
One Foot After the Other
You wake up on a roof—no idea how you got here until you see the ladder, as spindly as a daddy long-legs’ legs, and there’s no one about, except the cat licking your face, not even down on the street below where it’s as bleak as a dystopian novel, so unless you want to die, slowly turn to mush up here, and become fodder for ravens or crows (you can never tell them apart even though people are always showing you the difference between their tail feathers and the bend of their beaks), so if you don’t want that, you’ll have to climb your way down and hopefully out of this one.
Photo of Louella Lester
BIO: Louella Lester is a writer/photographer in Winnipeg, Canada, author of the CNF book Glass Bricks (At Bay Press 2021), contributing editor at New Flash Fiction Review, and is included in Best Microfiction 2024. Her writing/photos appear in variety of journals and anthologies.