She watched with delight as he scraped the last of the oatmeal into his waiting mouth, and considered herself fortunate that his insatiable hunger wasn’t confined to the breakfast table.

Jim’s old bathrobe hung from his strong shoulders, his muscled chest shining like gold in the morning sunlight.  He looked much different in the robe than Jim ever did.  He was taller than Jim, had more hair than Jim, and fucked her better than Jim ever could.  Or certainly better than he ever did.

While preparing his oatmeal, she’d apologized profusely for the lack of eggs and bacon, but he didn’t mind.  Now she observed him drinking the last sip of burned coffee from his cup before enthusiastically asking for more. 

As she poured the coffee with her left hand, he took her right hand in his own and kissed it.  She saw her future, and he was in it. (150)

-Jack

I wrote this story in record time.  For a variety of reasons I didn’t even begin writing until around midnight, when my Flash Fiction Friday stories normally auto-post.  However, I’d looked at the prompt photo beforehand and tried to come up with something good prior to writing.  My ideas were shaky at best, although when I actually sat down to work I found that they flowed easily.

The beaming woman in the prompt photo resembles a friend of ours, who happens to be celibate.  I imagined that this woman was also celibate (not by choice) and decided to depict the morning after a very satisfying sexual encounter.  Though the unnamed woman has nothing to feed her guest for breakfast other than Quaker Oats and wheat toast, he is grateful.  And although she has burned the coffee, her pouring him a refill prompts a romantic kiss on the back of her hand.

The title, “Observation”, refers directly to the woman in the prompt photo.  She is constantly looking at her guest, watching him eat in the first paragraph, observing him drink his coffee in the third, and finally seeing her future with him in the fourth.  However, as this episode is not self-contained but rather an apparent part of a much greater story, it occurred to me that “Observation” may also refer to the reader viewing this brief moment in time.

The word range was quite broad, 60-160 words.  I initially considered making this story much shorter than any I’ve written before, ideally around 75-80 words.  As usual, however, the story got away from me and I ended up writing ten words shy of the limit.  The required phrase was “…burned coffee…”  Per Jill’s suggestion, I considered ending the story with the woman’s observation being interrupted by the smell of burned coffee and a smoke alarm, but as the story took shape it became clear that this would feel forced.

Deleted Scenes:  

This week there weren’t many details that I was forced to omit due to lack of space.  In addition to the abandoned smoke alarm and burned coffee ending, I briefly considered throwing in a sinister twist (i.e. a revelation that she killed Jim), but disregarded this as unnecessarily bleak, and for that matter too close to the last-minute twist in my earlier story The Luchador and the Lady.  It occurred to me that not every detail needs to be explained, and eventually I decided that including a surprise twist or a visceral shock at the end of the story was redundant.  Perhaps the twist is that there is no twist.  

The scene depicted in the prompt photo suggested something quiet and slow playing on AM radio in the background.  “Sailing”, by Christopher Cross, comes to mind.

If you’d like to take part in the fun, or see who else participated this week, check out Erotic Flash Fiction Friday.