Elizabeth Seckman is celebrating the release of her newest book: Bella's Point! To celebrate, she's hosting a blog challenge.
Bella's Point
A historical romance.
Bella has the spirit of Scarlet O'Hara and the heart of Melanie Wilkes. A former debutante surviving in the fallen South....
Isabella Troy Stanley is a divorced, slave freeing pariah surviving
in the shattered post Civil War south the only way she knows how. She
heads to a Yankee prison and buys herself a husband.
Jack Byron is the former Troy plantation stable boy and object of
young Bella’s affection. He rejected her then, and he’s still not sold
on the idea of marrying her now. Sure, she’s pretty, but he remembers
too well how even a glance in her direction got a man of his low
standing ridden out of town. No, Jack’s more sensible now, not to
mention he might still be betrothed to another woman.
It’s complicated.
Here's my entry into the blog challenge. Flash fiction featuring a super family:
It was the year 1865 when someone last mopped that floor.
Well, that might be an exaggeration, but the house was a
wreck—not an actual super-villain-smack-down wreck—but two kids and one husband
sure made a mess.
I’d say it’s because they’re all supers, but my neighbor has
two kids, too. She says her favorite cleaning method is to whip out a hose and
spray down the kids and the family dog. And her kids never accidentally bring
home genetically modified bugs—cast offs from an actual
super-villain-smack-down.
“Honey, have you seen the PALEO transponder?”
“Have you seen the dishes, dear?” I called back.
He leaned around the corner. “The what?”
I turned away from him and flipped the transponder to
silent, but it never failed. If I tried to talk distribution of domestic
chores, there’d be an All Call. Life was predictable, if occasionally cruel. I
slid the beeper into my pocket and picked up the magazine like I’d been reading
it. I hadn’t read one in years. Emergency in North Carolina. Super plot in
Argentina. Emergency in the bathroom—it was all the same. Divert disaster and
clean up. I did as much crime busting as my husband, and he still managed to go
play golf and poker with the guys. Why was I the one stuck cooking dinner and
vacuuming? Was there something in super powers that prevented the male of the
species from noticing things like full diapers and dirty dishes.
“Dishes, you know, flat, porcelain utilized by most people
to holding food prior to consumption. When left unwatched for mere seconds,
they bread into mountains covered in partially eaten food. Often the only
evidence of teenaged inhabitants—ring a bell?”
His solemn face grew longer as he tried to fathom what would
come next. “Are you suggesting that my work is somehow less important than
doing the dishes?”
“Are you suggesting that you don’t remember how you were
going to ‘step up more’ and ‘take on more of the housework’?” I crossed my arms
and cocked my head at him.
He swallowed. “Well, I just meant that—uh, I would—um. You know,
I think I hear the locator beeping. Maybe I should take it to Bob to have him
see what’s wrong.”
He turned to walk away, but I teleported in front of him.
“Oh no you don’t. ‘You cook, I’ll do dishes,’ were those not your exact words?”
“Sweetie, that was years ago—before the meltdown in
California.”
“Oh, so Super Villains plotting against humanity is some
sort of excuse to get out of doing the dishes?”
He swallowed. “Do you hear yourself?”
“I asked for a maid, and you said—“
“Not the maid again. Honey, we can’t have a maid. She might
figure out our secret identities.”
I tossed him my phone. He caught it with one hand, perplexed.
I ground my fists into my hips. “You tell PALEO, they’re one hero down until
the dishes are done. They have enough pencil pushers, I just want someone to do
dishes and vacuum once a week. We save the world. I want a maid.”
I checked the transponder, and sure enough, it was already
beeping. His eyes lit up. “Honey, we have to—“
“Get PALEO on the line.” I pointed at the stack of dishes. “I’m
lifting off, and if those aren’t done before I get home, I’m going to burn the
house to the ground.”
I stalked towards the door, but I heard Jessica slink into
the kitchen. “Does she mean it?”
My husband’s voice held the proper amount of fear. “I’m
afraid she does. You’d better clean up your room just to be sure, sweetie.”
Jessica gasped then whispered, “Poor villain, he’s never
seen Mom mad like that.”
I stepped onto the front stoop and took to the sky. To
emphasize my point, I hit the area with a super sonic boom.
