[Flash Fiction] The Orchard of Unfinished Things

Title: The Orchard of Unfinished Things
Genre: Speculative
Word Count: 162 words.
Notes: You can find more of my free fiction here.

At the edge of a town no one remembers leaving, an orchard grows. The trees are bone-pale, their branches glassy and brittle, chiming softly in the wind. Their fruit is impossibly round, impossibly smooth—golden as old parchment, dark as dried ink.

The girl does not know why she is here. Only that her pockets are full of unfinished letters, her breath lined with words she never spoke.

She reaches for a fruit, warm in her palm. It hums softly as she cracks it open. A whisper spills out—her own voice, speaking words she has never said.

Her mother’s name. A promise she never made. The beginning of a story with no end.

She takes a bite.

It tastes like endings.

And suddenly, she remembers—

The town. The road home. The way she once stood at the threshold, hesitant, waiting for the right words.

She should leave.

But the orchard is hungry.

And she has so many more words to give.