{"id":21875,"date":"2023-01-12T19:40:17","date_gmt":"2023-01-13T00:40:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/?p=21875"},"modified":"2023-01-12T19:42:13","modified_gmt":"2023-01-13T00:42:13","slug":"sagas-among-the-arcana-a-four-of-swords-flash-fiction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/2023\/01\/12\/sagas-among-the-arcana-a-four-of-swords-flash-fiction\/","title":{"rendered":"Sagas Among the Arcana: Four of Swords Flash Fiction"},"content":{"rendered":"

The four of swords is drawn \u2014 recuperation\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Every night passes and there is still the man on the bench. His jeans are worn not yet torn. His face is always covered by a fedora hat. No one knows from where he came, just that one night he appeared there on the bench, and when comes daylight, he is gone.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Once someone tried to give him money, but he simply tilted up his fedora and propped up a knee. \u201cNo thank you, sir. I\u2019m just resting here you see.\u201d After that, no one tried to approach him again. They simply mill about their evenings, occasionally glancing at that notorious lump on the bench.<\/span><\/p>\n

During daytime, when he\u2019s not there. They get anxious. They wonder where he is, where has gone that fedora of his? They spend sunlight hours lost in their curiosities about him, then when he reappears by nightfall, so too do their worries fall. They spend the late nights in peace, happy that the man on the bench still comes there for his nights to spend.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Finally, again, someone decides to address him. \u201cWhy are you on this bench?\u201d asks the girl. Once again, the man tilts his fedora hat. \u201cWhy simply whiling away my time at ease and at rest.\u201d Then he points to another bench just further down. \u201cHey, why don\u2019t you try?\u201d And so she does.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

By the next night, there are two benches occupied. At first, the second resident is nervous. <\/span>Everyone is looking at me!<\/span><\/i> She thinks as people pretend not to stare. But soon the humming of car engines passing by and taps of heels on the sidewalk nearby all join together to lull her body to relax. <\/span>Oh . . . this bench isn\u2019t quite so bad . . .\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

By dawn, she awakes. Never once through the night did she think of her household up the lake and how they aggravated her with much debate. She observed the fedora man rising as well, so she thanks him with a yell.<\/span><\/p>\n

He tips his hat and wanders back . . . to wherever he comes from.<\/span><\/p>\n

She wonders if he too has a home with noisy conundrums.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

end<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The four of swords is drawn \u2014 recuperation\u00a0   Every night passes and there is still the man on the bench. His jeans are worn not yet torn. His face is always covered by a fedora hat. No one knows from where he came, just that one night he appeared there on the bench, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2257,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21875"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2257"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21875"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21882,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21875\/revisions\/21882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}