Member-only story
Kingfisher Blues: An Apocalyptic Love Story
Speculative Short Fiction
Using her small ration of gas in the old station wagon, Thea came to the river, sat on the cottonwood log leaning over the water, and tried to find some peace. Kush ran in wide circles, sniffing the bushes for recent visitors. But eventually, he found his own peace, paws crossed on the pebbly beach, listening for small creatures rustling in the blue-leaved willows. A kingfisher flew boldly out across the pond, where the silvery cottonwood logs formed an “X” with their watery reflection.
In this quiet place, Thea could escape the feeling that time was running out. She could feel the coming darkness, even here, in the Western States’ wide-open spaces. Racism, bigotry and xenophobia were rampant. Just as women had begun to rise from millennia of oppression, just when some semblance of balance began to appear, misogyny rose up, ugly and threatening — the speed of its rise, horrific — as if all the hopeful gains had been only a smokescreen. It turned out that the most wicked of men had never intended to give up their power.
Every woman needed a protector now and it was foolish to go anywhere alone. Thea had Kush, at least for a few more years. The scruffy old wolf-dog’s eyesight was failing, but random strangers weren’t aware of this deficiency. And there was nothing wrong with his…
