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I Got Life
Nina Simone understood what it was to lack, but she crooned about having life. What we have lost can often define what we yet have — life. The world spins, seasons change, and generations pass on the baton.
Writers explored life and what it means to have it. Some stories offered insight, others humor, or unexpected twists. This collection has life!
The following stories are based on the June 25, 2020, prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story with the phrase, “I got life.”
(10-minute read)
I Got Life by Liz Husebye Hartmann
Pre-COVID, we met, early Saturdays, in the Midtown Market. Few stirred: lady mall cop, staff from the attached hospital, lone coffee shop doing brisk business, shops from around the world setting up. We were inspired by Heaven’s scents.
One restaurant owner allowed us space for a free-will donation; he’s a poet and painter himself. In another, possible future, we’ll enjoy his hospitality again. For now, we Zoom.
“Time?”
“Three minutes!”
“OK…prompt is ‘I got life.’”
Puzzled looks.
Anguish.
Biting pens, we gaze to a corner in our separate boxes. Pens touch paper. We begin to scribble.
We got this.
🥕🥕🥕
Result by Joanne Fisher
The scout ship jumped into a new system. Almost immediately the pilots launched probes to the nearest planetary body.
“Results should be coming up now.” said one of the pilots looking at the display in front of them.
“So far nothing.” the other pilot commented as she examined the results. As always, nothing promising… Suddenly there was an alarm and the screen went red. “Hey, I got life!”
They both looked through the window. There in the distance, just coming into view, was a small blue green moon orbiting the larger planet.
They now had somewhere to go to.
🥕🥕🥕
Planet Earth Is Blue by D. Avery
At first, before they sedated and intubated me, my eyes were open. They looked like spacemen.
Can you hear me Major Tom? They don’t know I can hear them. I can.
Though I’m past/100,000 miles/I’m feeling very still. I can’t move. I can’t speak. But I can hear them. They are worried about me. They are worried about themselves. They are scared.
Tell my wife I love her very much/ She knows.
They talk about how pointless it is, say I’m going down. I hear them. Can you hear me Major Tom?
‘Yes,’ I silently scream, ‘I got life.’
🥕🥕🥕
No Lazarus Me by Anne Goodwin
Nine weeks, they told me. Could’ve been nine years. Suspended in a solitary space capsule. Crashing violently to earth.
Resurrection bewildered me. Scarred throat sore from the breathing tube. Limbs learning gravity anew. Homegoing a second culture shock. Staff in scrubs a guard of honour down the exit corridor. Wheelchair-bound, I cringed at their applause.
I couldn’t scale the cliffs to seize the media moniker. I didn’t want to be a heroine. Lazarus. I wanted to be me.
Then sobbing in his arms, I got it. Comeback wasn’t me alone, it was everyone. I got life. We all did.
🥕🥕🥕
Now I’m Living by Susan Sleggs
I was a single military man
A lady here and there
Living the life
I thought of you
Even on the day I met the bomb
I lost my driver
I lost my legs
What’s the point in living
You wouldn’t want me
I met a fierce lady
She taught me to walk
I called her Clarice
She wasn’t you
I went back home
And by God, you did too
Twenty five years later
We’re together again
Today we held baby Emma
Her parents are moving to be near
Now I know why I have life
Four generations’ll do
🥕🥕🥕
Life Sentence by Jeff Gard
Closing his eyes, Marcel imagines there ain’t cinder blocks squeezing the bunk bed, creating a corridor so narrow he can’t walk in his cell without turning sideways first. He dreams of sky, sun, fresh air.
He can’t pretend the bed don’t shake when his roommate coughs and wheezes. He can’t ignore the face mask. When he inhales, it flutters against whiskered cheeks, contaminated air fogging his glasses.
“I got four more months,” his roommate repeats. “What you got?”
Marcel wants to disappear into the threadbare blanket around his shoulders. He’s sweating, but he can’t get warm.
“I got life.”
🥕🥕🥕
Private Percussion by Kerry E.B. Black
I’m a dancer hobbled by regulation. Still, I hum along to the private percussion my heart.
Momma secured an advantageous match for me, one with all the trappings of “making it.” So I try to live up to bejeweled expectations. However, I tumble from atop my stilettos, disused to the thinner, refined air.
I pull within a designer veneer until I’ve buried my old, rebellious self, but it’s like hiding muck-covered boots beneath my mother-in-law’s tea table. I notice guests wrinkle their perfect noses and feign ignorance.
And in private, I still tap out the percussion of my heart.
🥕🥕🥕
Full Sentences by Geoff Le Pard
‘Morgan! Morgan! Are you alright?
‘Wha…? Bloody hell, that was weird.’
‘You were screaming something.’
‘I think it was eating those cheese straws last thing. We had a huge fight.’
‘What about?’
‘What we should wear when we get to the Ranch.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Oh yes. I said jeans. You said a pin-striped suit and spats.’
‘Jeans?’
‘We fought. You died.’
‘Blimey.’
‘I was found guilty of murder, you of a crime of fashion.’
‘What was the sentence?.’
‘Since you’d got death, I got life.’
‘They threw away the key?’
‘They said I’d suffered enough and let me go.’
🥕🥕🥕
He Who Hesitates... by joem18b
I was on vacation in Virginia City when I stopped into an antique store to browse. In the back I found a stack of New Yorker magazines from the Thirties. I opened one at random and found a movie review of “The Wizard of Oz.”
Huh. Interesting. Put the magazine down.
Thought about it that evening. Returned the next day and headed for the back of the store. The stack of New Yorkers was gone.
Up front, I asked a handsome young fellow where the New Yorkers were kept.
“Sold the lot yesterday,” he said, “but I got Life.”
🥕🥕🥕
Hairy Thoughts by Bill Engleson
Simone!
Singing that song!
Hippie joy gone deep.
Soulful!
Hadn’t thought about this in years.
I took a bus to Seattle, late spring, 1970. June, maybe! I’d been bunking in with a friend, providing a shred of male influence to her house guests, first nations borders, teens, from isolated communities up the coast, on the island.
Its pretty much a blur. I was in such an in-between world, a lonely space, sleepwalking, trying to readapt.
So, off I went south to Hair, a local production playing at the Moore theater.
On my return to Vancouver, I got life back.
🥕🥕🥕
I Got Life by FloridaBorne
Once an eager student, the gangly girl finished her paper far later than the rest, eyes downcast.
“Your title is, I got life?” Mrs. Jones asked. “You have an IQ of 134.”
“My brother hits me if I talk like you.”
“We have two languages in the same country! The first is for people who want to have a good job, the second is for those who want to blame others for their failed lives.”
“I don’t know what to do?”
“What if I tutored you after school and called it detention?”
Sheena brightened, “I’d like that a lot!”
🥕🥕🥕
I Got Life! by Eliza Mimski
Miriam had grown up during the time when shaming fat girls was okay. She was heavyset in the middle and by the time she reached fifth grade she wore a C cup bra. Even though she loved to dance, loved sports, she quit because of the comments on the sidelines. But now, in her twenties, times had changed. Fat girls flaunted their bodies in yoga pants and form fitting tops. Miriam’s breasts, her large stomach jiggled up and down when she danced in nightclubs. “I got it! I got life!” she yelled as she kept time to the music.
🥕🥕🥕
Private Percussion by Kerry E.B. Black
I’m a dancer hobbled by regulation. Still, I hum along to the private percussion my heart.
Momma secured an advantageous match for me, one with all the trappings of “making it.” So I try to live up to bejeweled expectations. However, I tumble from atop my stilettos, disused to the thinner, refined air.
I pull within a designer veneer until I’ve buried my old, rebellious self, but it’s like hiding muck-covered boots beneath my mother-in-law’s tea table. I notice guests wrinkle their perfect noses and feign ignorance.
And in private, I still tap out the percussion of my heart.
🥕🥕🥕
Parting Gift by Simon Prathap D
Hey! Mr.Clown, Why you look sad?
I got this bag from a kid, that cried on my whole show, she lost her bag, it has cancer reports. she is just 17.
She will live.
No she won’t, My mom didn’t .
Let’s pray for her.
No, I got this life, with purpose, she never smiled today. I’ll never let her die without smiling.
That is not going to save her.
I am not going to save her, I will give her most happiest days of her life. No one deserves to die in pain. It’s my parting gift for her.
🥕🥕🥕
“I’ll Chase My Dreams! Find New Dreams!” by Saifun Hassam
Crystal clear mountain streams raced down ravines and clefts into the valley creeks. Water wheels turned furiously channeling water onto farms as they always did in springtime.
But this spring there were no farmers. Earthquakes had ripped through the coastal lands. The shores tumbled into the pounding thunderous seas. People fled. People died.
One lone figure stood near the broken ancient temple on the crest of a hill. His mind’s eye saw blue butterfly kites. He remembered children singing.
“I got life, got dreams! I’ll fly into the skies!
I got life! I’ll chase my dreams! Find new dreams!”
🥕🥕🥕
Let’s Do It by Donna Matthews
The little boy lying on his side pushed the car back and forth, whining, “I’m bored!” Rain on the windows and a virus lurking outside, the indoor day spread out before us like a neverending road to nowhere.
Play a game? No
Build a fort? No
Paint a picture? No
In defense, we’ve done these things. Life before the pandemic, a day stuck at home a delicious treat. Now, it’s more of the same with no end in sight.
He looks up at me, eyes pleading, “I got life to live!”
“Outside? Play in puddles?”
“Really?!”
“Let’s do it!”
🥕🥕🥕
I Got Life by Robert Kirkendall
Father ran out of the closet holding a board game. “Hey, look what I got. Life!”
“Another old people’s game?” son moped.
“Yeah, those those things are so passé,” daughter dismissed.
“It’s a classic!” father insisted.
“The kids these days just aren’t into board games,” mother said.
“But they’re so much fun!” father pleaded.
“We’ve already played a ton of board games because of this sucky quarantine!” son complained.
“We’re bored of board games,” daughter said.
“Then how about more stories of my high school glory days,” father said dreamily, “back when I…”
“Please! No more! We’ll play Life.”
🥕🥕🥕
I Got Life by Irene Waters
At sixty
the doctor said,
“Prepare to die.”
Not ready for death
she followed orders
special diet,
multiple pills ingested.
At seventy
the doctor said,
” Carry on.
Increase these pills
breathlessness will be gone.”
All good,
she thought
I got pills.
I got life.
At eighty
the doctor said,
“Things are worse.
Let’s experiment
for a longer life.”
Medication
replaced religion
giving life.
At ninety
“I don’t want to live.
Please Help me die.”
Stopping tablets
Not easily done
when the habit of living
is so strong,
pills taken.
No good,
she thought
I still got life.
🥕🥕🥕
Thank you, I Get It by Annette Rochelle Aben
When I think of all I’ve been through in sixty-three years on this little blue planet, I am in awe. The sad experiences that seemed they would tear my heart out. The happy times I enjoyed so much, they drained me of my energy. But I am not about to complain!
It has all made me the person I am today. Even though when you take a look at me, I may appear to be a bit worse for the wear, I am still here. No worries. And though there’s so much more to learn, halleluiah, I got life!
🥕🥕🥕
gone green and rainbow by JulesPaige
Used to up and left the building. Used to get a box full of mail, mostly junk. Nowadays days go by and nuthin’ honey. No cereal samples, no magazine subscriptions. Less stuff to toss. And because I don’t answer junk calls – I get less of them too.
I got life! My raised garden is growing, I completed a project, and I’m going out to eat tonight!
a tumble in time
chores, favors, fill the gas tank
sun shifts the shadows
six digit number on cell
out of country, hit delete
two hours til dinner
actually inside an
eatery…with friends
🥕🥕🥕
I Got Life by Pete Fanning
For weeks the crowds had swelled in numbers, a collective resistance simmering into rage as they marched the town. They were loud, boisterous, lighting fires and smashing windows, drunk on pilfered spirits as they arrived at officials’ quarters.
These final acts had pushed them too far. Treated as second class citizens, the wealthy had the nerve to say they lived too well. And now, led by Samuel Adams, the mob ransacked the Lieutenant Governor’s mansion, destroyed his possessions and looted the house of furnishings.
In the flames, a resistance was born. And soon, a new country would have life.
🥕🥕🥕
They Can’t Take It All by John Lane
The company can fire me because I argued to the supervisor that I felt running the bandsaw was unsafe. The mortgage company can claim a default on my mortgage because I don’t have a job to pay my bills. The bankruptcy court can take my home because I don’t qualify to have a plan. The bank can take my car for repossession because I don’t have the money to pay my loan. Landlords can refuse to rent to me. All these people can take everything from me, but one thing they can’t take. My spirit. Because I got life.
🥕🥕🥕
After the Boomtown by Charli Mills
Saxophone notes squeaked across the empty hard-packed street. Sophie swung her hips to the tempo, stirring a pot of slow-elk stew over a campfire. “What I’d give for carrots,” she told Hal.
He paused his playing. “You got seeds Miss Sophie. Plant a garden.”
“A garden means I have to stay in this god-forsaken ghost town.” She missed Italy. She missed rain.
Hal played lower, softer until Sophie dished them up bowls. “Won’t always be deserted,” he said when she handed him dinner.
“Got no customers. Got no gold. Got no carrots. Got no husband. But I got life.”
🥕🥕🥕
Got My Fingers, Got My Pal, Got My Hunger, Ain’t Got No Bacon…by D. Avery
“I’m hungry Pal. What’ve we got fer breakfast?”
“Outta bacon. Hens ain’t been layin’.”
“Dang, sure coulda gone fer some eggs an’ bacon. Mebbe you’d make me a smoothie?”
“Couldn’t even if we had the fixin’s. Yer fergittin’ yer blender blunder.”
“They was jist twigs.”
“Yeah, well, now ya know where birch beer don’t come from. S’prised ya still got yer fingers after thet. Shut thet fridge already, Kid. Starin’ an’ wishin’ ain’t gonna put food in it.”
“They’s a jug a milk. We got any cereal?”
“Thinkin’ we are a serial.”
“Aha! Here’s some cereal! I got Life!”
🥕🥕🥕
June 25: Flash Fiction Challenge
My son tells me its 55 days until his wedding. Then he asks, “Dad got his suit, yet?” Trying to get a 56-year-old brain-altered former US Army Ranger into a tailored suit for his son’s wedding is no minor feat. Never mind it was this same man who taught his son to dress up for flying back when the Hub worked for the airlines and we flew standby, dressed to take seats in first class. Now he tells his son he’s going to wear navy-colored sweatpants. Last year, the joking was funny. 55 days out, not so much.
So, my son is harassing me. (Not that I mind, if this is how I get my son to call me every day, I’ll happily be harassed.)
I thought I was on top of the game. I found a mother of the groom dress I liked and contacted a tailor I know through one of my good Keweenaw friends. Her sister designs and sews all her clothes, and they are stylish and vibrant. The tailor looked at the dress and said she could put various patterns together and make me a one-of-a-kind. My friend and I planned to drive to Chicago where her sister lived for a measuring session. Then COVID hit in March.
That’s when I decided to order the original dress. Except, the online bridal shop gets their dresses from China and they could not confirm delivery. At the same time, I ordered something small from China for the Unicorn Room and it still hasn’t arrived. So, I think it was a good call that I did not plunk down hundreds of dollars for an uncertain delivery of a dress. Still, I haven’t had such a fuss over a dress since my own wedding when a friend re-created a western chantilly lace wedding dress from a 1980s Este Lauder ad.
Finally, I found a dress online, in the states, and on the low end of my budget. When it arrived, I tried it on only to find it was too big. I mailed it back and re-ordered a different size, and now I’m worrying that it’s too plain. I’m the kind of person whose fashion sense vacillates between favorite threadbare flannel and blaze orange capris with flowy butterfly top. My gears are too plain and too garish, and I know my son would be horrified if I showed up with his dad in sweats and me in some sequined purple chiffon.
And if that’s not worrisome enough, when the Hub settled on the suit jacket he hastily bought while we were homeless, our son said that would be appropriate for the rehearsal dinner. I had forgotten about attire for the pre-event. In another tailspin, I began searching for a summer cocktail dress on Amazon (how’s that for desperation?). Don’t knock the soul-sucking warehouse of everything — they literally sell everything. I found three dresses and three pairs of sandals. Only one of the dresses would arrive on time so that’s the one I ordered. The shoes, British-made Clarks which I love for comfort and fit, will mysteriously arrive next week.
Then, today I received a package from another dress shop. Somehow, I had forgotten that I panicked over the rehearsal dress sometime shortly after the COVID lockdown began and it arrived today! Where my memory goes, I do not know sometimes. And I say the Hub is brain-altered. Well, aren’t we all. When I pulled the item out of the package, it was a slinky black dress. I’m flannel or eccentric, definitely not slinky black dress. I looked at the size and barked a laugh. I’m also definitely not a size Extra Small. Evidently, some extra-small gal is scratching her head over my extra-large flowy floral cocktail dress. Having taken months to arrive, I dreaded calling the company, but they were helpful and promised to expedite my order.
So when my son calls to check in on his dad’s progress, I hold back on the full naked truth of our wedding clothes snafus. And we did make progress thanks to a wedding shop in town that just re-opened. As of now, the Hub has rented a tux and ordered a suit online after talking to a specialist. Who would have thought it would be the boy to fuss over what to wear for his wedding? The eldest girl got married on an organic farm and butchered her own pig prior to the ceremony. No, that wasn’t part of the ceremony, just the commitment to harvest her own food for the reception. That, the Hub and I could handle. The other girl? She’s brewing beer on Svalbard with her partner and they have no plans to marry. If they do, we’ll need passports and parkas. Easier than finding me a dress or getting the Hub to agree to a suit, I assure you.
At the end of the day, I can take stock and declare, “I got life.”
It’s not the things. It’s not the clothes. As much as I appreciate the home and its fixings, being homeless taught me the value of life. There’s something empowering about declaring ownership over yourself. I got my toes. I got my arms, my hands, my thumbs. I got fingers. I got my head, my brain, my liver. I take in breath. I got life. Let Nina sing it to you, let her words crawl into your soul, watch her face, her body as she gives her life over to her song and piano. Write like you got life.
Things are looking mighty crazy out there in the big wide world, but if we got life, we got hope. This is a time to keep writing. I know the distractions are huge, but so is our capacity for art. Be oppositional — if you want to write a story one way, write it the opposite and see what pops up. You might be surprised. Let characters talk in your head. Don’t interfere, take notes. Imagine the world upsidedown. What would it be like to walk on the sky? Shake it up, shake your booty, dance on the page. And if you have any tips on how to dress up for a special wedding, I’ll try to pay attention.
June 25, 2020, prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story with the phrase, “I got life.” It can be told from any point of view. What meaning does it lend to your story? Go where the prompt leads!
Respond by June 30, 2020. Use the comment section below to share, read, and be social. You may leave a link, pingback, or story in the comments. If you want to be published in the weekly collection, please use the form. Rules & Guidelines.
Submissions closed. Find our most current weekly Flash Fiction Challenge to enter.
After the Boomtown by Charli Mills
Saxophone notes squeaked across the empty hard-packed street. Sophie swung her hips to the tempo, stirring a pot of slow-elk stew over a campfire. “What I’d give for carrots,” she told Hal.
He paused his playing. “You got seeds Miss Sophie. Plant a garden.”
“A garden means I have to stay in this god-forsaken ghost town.” She missed Italy. She missed rain.
Hal played lower, softer until Sophie dished them up bowls. “Won’t always be deserted,” he said when she handed him dinner.
“Got no customers. Got no gold. Got no carrots. Got no husband. But I got life.”