The Fog City – by REBECCA HARRISON

The Fog City

By Rebecca Harrison

The fields were wind-wide and empty. As Martha walked across them, fog swelled over her, smelling of damp cobwebs. She couldn’t see. She heard only distant tree drips. Deep in the fog, her hands grazed a wall which shouldn’t have been there. She took off her gloves; the stone was glass cold. Tracing its shapes with her fingers, she followed the wall curve. She heard winds unfold. The fog faded. The wall was gone.

The fields stretched sky-full and she stared for miles. One day, the fog came back. She waded into the white gloom, breathing its chill. She found the wall, followed it and felt archways and carvings. She leaned against stone she couldn’t see and tried to guess its height. But when the air brightened, the fields were bare.

Each time she searched the fog, she felt corners and pillars. She pressed her ear to the sides of the unseen city but heard only stone quiet. Back in her home, she tried to draw the city shapes. The seasons shifted and she left to hunt fog in colder countries. When it clamped forests, she found smooth walls. On a dim beach, she felt a door. She opened it and stepped inside. The winds came and blew the fog away.

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Rebecca Harrison sneezes like Donald Duck and can be summoned by a cake signal in the sky. Her best friend is a dog who can count. Through the WoMentoring Project, she was chosen by Kirsty Logan as her mentee. Rebecca’s been nominated for Best of the Net, and was a finalist in the first Wyvern Lit flash fiction contest. Her stories can also be read at Rose Red Review, Maudlin House, Luna Station Quarterly, and elsewhere.

*Photo courtesy of Brian Michael Barbeito.*