This is written to the text prompt here for “Sixteen Minute Saturday,” something I adapted for alliteration from Ty Barbary’s 15-minute Fiction.

Thanks to inventrix for the names and Rion and Freo for the quote.

Mike and Leann, Kelly and George, and of course Franklin Brown:

I can’t get service down here, so I’m leaving you a message in a text file, in case I don’t get…

Who am I kidding? I’m leaving you a message because I’m not getting out of here. Not unless the world flips, not unless the monster dies, not unless something goes south when it was supposed to be north.

They’re going to say, when they find my phone, that I shouldn’t have been out.

Everyone knows better. I knew better. Of course I did. I’ve heard the horror stories same as you have.

Don’t go out after dark. Wear dull things; they’re attracted to bright colors. I know. I know.

But this is a very bad night for me. It’s a bad night every year, and I try to hide it, and hope you guys don’t have it marked on your calendar.

(We told him not to go out alone. We told him not to wear that red tie. Especially not red.. But “it’s better to look good than to feel alive.” Damn him.)

I didn’t want to bother y’all for an escort. No, I know when Fade or Sophie say that, sometimes they mean “I’m sulking that you didn’t pay attention.” But I really mean it. This is my thing. This wasn’t your fault, and it shouldn’t be your problem.

So I needed to hear the sounds of other hearts beating, and I needed to feel other bodies around me. And I know all the places – all of them not just the ones the six of us go to together – all the places where you can get that no matter what the curfew or law.

(And any of a thousand other things. But you knew that.)

And here I am. The lights went out, three blocks from my favorite place to hide out. The lights all went out at once. I had enough time to get into a crash hole, but it’s not a very good crash hole. And I don’t think I’m going to

Shit

Shit

Not him. Not him.

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