Ulitsa Chernyshevskogo
Grozny, Chechnya | Google Maps

He felt the thud of the hatchway as it closed and released a long breath. It felt as if he hadn’t breathed since that moment at security, the guard’s frown as he perused his passport and boarding pass and handed it back. The flight attendant smiled on her way past and he realized it was the first time he breathed—really breathed—in years.

Out the window, a row of beech trees darkened the horizon. As they taxied down the runway, he remembered his grandmother’s place in rolling hills of Vedensky.  He might never see her again. He might never eat her chepalgash, or stroll the grounds outside of Serdtse Chechni, or let his feet dangle from the bench swings at Ulitsa Chernyshevskogo.

What he would do was as uncertain as [and here the author makes a brilliant observation]. The only thing certain was life.

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145 words or so

This has been an edition of What Pegman Saw. To read more stories inspired by the prompt, click here.

Inspired by ‘Welcome to Chechnya’ Trailer Highlights Hidden Gay Atrocities.

A note: I wrote this story meaning to edit it sometime before it went live this morning. Then, I forgot about it.

Once I was able to get into my wordpress editor, I pasted in the original draft, which I am really unhappy with, but in the spirit of releasing perfectionism, I’m putting this out anyway.

Panama City, Panama | 360 Explora Panama

“I should be going with you,” he said, expression more glum than worried.

Before the law changed, he would always go to the day market with her. There he would watch not the streets or milling crowds, but her. Heaven forbid she make a wrong choice or a bad bargain. ‘Why did you pick those plantains and not the larger ones?’ ‘That fisherman always cheats you.’

She adjusted her shawl and slid her feet into worn sandals. “You know the law,” she reminded.

He grumbled, not because he was ruled by law, but because a man could not go out unnoticed in times such as these. She shouldered her bag. As the door closed behind her, she felt her spine straighten, her shoulders grow light. It was always like this now, on days such as these.

—

137 words

This has been an edition of What Pegman Saw. To read more stories inspired by the prompt, click here. Inspired by this little news story out of Panama:
In Panama, coronavirus lockdown means separating men and women.

Their unique approach to dealing with the coronavirus outbreak was to allow women out on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and have men-only days on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.

Frenchman’s Cap, Tasmania | Mungo Jones, Google Map

Here on this hill, we stayed back. We watched the other survivors pluck their way down the mountainside, past the burned shell of the fuselage, until the half-dozen figures were lost among the rocks and landscape; wondering, hoping, waiting.

We turned our eyes skyward and watched for rescue planes that never came and comforted the girl who grew tired as the hours turned to days, shivering even as we bundled our parkas around her, and gave her the last of the thin crackers wrapped in foil which we found amidst the wreckage of holiday baggage and broken bodies which were strewn upon the slope. And as waited, we told rescue stories which started out with big headlines and TV interviews, but then were more about meat pies and brown trout cooked on a fire, and finally just about living long enough to say goodbye to the ones who mattered most.

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150 words

This has been an edition of What Pegman Saw. To read more stories inspired by the prompt, click here.

Sorry so late! I never could get my first take completed to my satisfaction, so I abandoned it and wrote a new one! This is actually a photo of a climbing expedition and plane crash survivors, but there was something kind of forlorn in there which inspired this story.

S Railway Ave Drinkwater, Saskatchewan | Google Maps

“But Papa, he wants to marry me.” Her cheeks were bright. Whether it was from chill or passion he couldn’t say. He rested a hand on his shovel and studied her. Loosed from its braid, a strand of her hair waved in the wind.

He had plans when they pulled up stakes in Iowa and came to this featureless flat—plans that did not include marrying his sixteen-year old daughter to a handyman fifteen years her senior. “You’ll do no such thing,” he said.

“You don’t understand. We’re in love.” At that, her hand went to the curve of her belly.

It was a gesture he knew all too well, having seen it from his wife eight times these past twenty years. He understood all right. He understood there was no such thing as a fresh start.

—

137 words

This has been an edition of What Pegman Saw. To read more stories inspired by the prompt, click here.

I have a personal connection to Saskatchewan so I took this opportunity to fictionalize a page from my family tree. My grandmother was born in Saskatchewan. My great-grandfather is the handyman of this tale, and the headstrong girl is my great-grandmother.

Port Kaituma, Guyana | Martin Samaroo, Google Maps

There are moments that unfold like hours, and then there are those that hold a lifetime.

“Get in the jungle,” her father screamed from the stairs of the plane.

She looked down. Her mother’s body lay lifeless on the tarmac, a pool of blood where her trademark dandelion puff of blond hair should be. Her mother; a deck of images flashed through Tracy’s mind: the church in Charleston, the lemon cake Mom made for birthdays, her singing hush, little baby; her mother, gone. The men and their guns out of sight for now.

“Run.” His face was frantic. She turned. Her sister was running into the thick of it—the jungle that had seemed so frightening when they got there—the jungle full of centipedes and snakes and jaguars. The jungle as thick with danger as it was with darkness—even during the day.

It was the safest place to be.

—

151 words

This has been an edition of What Pegman Saw. To read more stories inspired by the prompt, click here.

Inspired by Childhood Jonestown Survivor Recounts Desperate Escape into the Jungle as Cult’s Mass Suicide Killed Over 900