A Bucket of Ambivalence

For Miranda Kate's Flash Fiction Challenge: Week 58 After      “It's not much, is it?” All that stood in front of me was a vast expanse of white.      The man who seemed to be waiting for me at the top said nothing.      “So do you look this way for everybody, or just me?”      He glanced at his black suit, the withered, red carnation pinned to its lapel, the thin outlines of ribs pressing against the fabric of his shirt, anchored by the breeze. His expression was quizzical, like he didn't see what I saw.      “I neither know nor care, sir.”      I glanced down. The ladder still dangled below, perfectly still even as the stratospheric winds whipped against it.      “Lucky I was a jumper, huh?”      The man said nothing. His hands remained firmly clasped behind his back.      “So that, you know, the height...wouldn't...”      He just stared.      “Everyone has to climb.”      “So everyone ascends, huh?”      “

For Miranda Kate's Mid-Week Flash Fiction Challenge: Week 51 For My Two Favorite Idiots      I know you guys won't be able to read this, but maybe, somehow, some way, you'll get the gist of it. Feel the intent behind what's either gonna get clawed or chewed to pieces depending on which one of you gets to it first. I mean, probably not. But I'm writing a letter to a dog and a cat; “rational” isn't really me right now.      The long and short of it is that I realized that being happy, well, it's kind of like owning you guys. Except it's a version of owning the two of you that involves nobody bothering to tell me that you both have late stage terminal cancer and I'm gonna have to watch you both die a hell of a lot sooner than I'm ready for, like probably right when I'm starting to get used to the idea of you being a part of my life, and that feeling will hit its peak right when those tumors I didn't know were growing insi