The First Day of Fall

Flash Fiction

The putrid mizzle dripped down the trees and along the heated asphalt, as a distant hurricane’s break-up led the news.

But still, the twos and threes with rifles, over on 17 St. NW, defied any of the civilians to protest. Under the banner of “It’s all natural, ya hear?” They stomped about.

And if the slogan did not deter, the shotguns and uzis gave it teeth. “To Trump forever, the President For Life and Death!” shouted the men in orange hunting suits on the bonfire with such few sticks of wood to roar their angry souls. The faces were brilliant red with stubble.

No one doubted that the militia would hold their ground.

Young drudges came crumple up in a lollygagging stutter helter-skelter march: to Lincoln’s Memorial to the US Department of Fragricuture and back. With the oil and gatorade-ice-sweat gleamed down poured on the skinhead skulls, from barrels grimy and gloomy white.

It was Football Season and every day the boys of concussion played. There were very few civilians on the wide boulevards and the ‘Boys would make sure any were broken up tout suit. Every letter pronounced.

Just the stoplights: red, green, and yellow, for the cycle. Silent as a grave.

The air was quiet, for the Elections were once again canceled on a vote of the Supreme Court. The news was read from Fox every hour, just to make sure that every hooded adult and suited child heard it. With closing screeching blue in the background, the newsmen chanted the words “We, the five, have voted…”

It echoed in every doorway and every grand arch. With no talking under the arboretum, save for the gangs slurring the national anthem:

“I wish I was in the land of cotton…”