IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

POLYTECHNIC
Sta. Maria, Bulacan, Philippines Inc.
Marian Road, Poblacion, Sta. Maria, Bulacan
Chapter 5
Flash Fiction
It refers to largely fictional work of relative brevity. In terms of length,
some say that it should have not more than 50 words while others say that it
can have as many as a thousand words. It is also known as “Short Short
Story,” “Micro-Fiction,” “Micro-Narrative,” and “Sudden Fiction.”

According to Bob Batchelor (2011), it is also known as the “Smoking-

Long” story in China because one is likely to finish reading it before he/she
finishes smoking a stick of cigarette. It traces its origins to older genres such
as the fable and the parable. Notable writers such as American Ernest
Hemingway and Italian Italo Calvino wrote short works that exemplify the
genre.

Flash Fiction has its equivalent in the Philippines -- the Dagli. Some say
that Dagli had already been around for decades even before the term flash
fiction became popular. Examples of Dagli appeared on a regular basis in
newspapers and magazines as early as the first few years of American
occupation of the Philippines. Among the popular writers of the genre were
Jose Corazon De Jesus, Lope K. Santos, and Teodoro Agoncillo.

Another writer who is crafting her skills in writing flash fictions is the author
of A Jeepney Tapestry and Morsels of Memory. Charlotte Sharon Aninion-
De Guzman is a true blue Scholastican. She was an English teacher at De La
Salle College of St. Benilde, and became the Chairperson of the English Area.
Nowadays, she writes at the comfort of her home while enjoying the company
of her husband, daughter, and dog.

Reading Text 1. Read the text below and answer the tasks that follow:

A Jeepney Tapestry
by Charlotte Aninion-De Guzman

And so it began with a scream. Queenie rolled over from the front of
the jeepney to its entire length all the way back. She was going to make a
run for it, picturing herself like Katniss or some kick-ass action heroine from
a movie. She placed her bag between her and the gun being wildly pointed
at her face. All her life, she struggled with minimum wage as a waitress in a
posh Makati restaurant. An only child supporting her mother who was
fighting against lung cancer, she was steeped in debt already, until her new
employer took a “liking” to her. She can’t die now. Not with her mother
waiting for her. Not with hope shining down oh her. But, the shot rang out.

Aling Nora screamed. She was having one heck of a day already and
her first thought upon seeing the gunman was--where will they get the
money for my funeral? At 50 years old, a lifetime of cleaning other people’s
houses while supporting a drunkard of a husband and 8 children who never
got to finish high school, but instead decided that getting pregnant or
getting someone pregnant was more fun, had left her bone-dead tired and
spent. Now, not only did she have to support her husband and children, but
 her ever-growing number of grandchildren as well. Maybe, she
thought, before fainting, this was for the best and she’ll finally get her much
deserved rest.

The gunman was momentarily distracted by the old woman who

fainted. The young policeman, still fresh and untainted by the system he
was serving, decided that it was his sworn duty to protect the passengers.
And so he seized that moment of confusion, and bravely pulled his gun out
of his jacket’s inner pocket, and with all of his training coming into focus, he
pulled the trigger.

Edrex, saw the flash of light and suddenly felt the warm gush of blood
soaking through his favorite Zara shirt and dripping on his limited edition
neon green Nike shoes. He dropped his gun, before turning to the
policeman to say, “What the freak man? I wasn’t really going to shoot you
know.” Then his eyeballs rolled up, and the world blurred before his eyes,
before he fell on the jeepney floor. Poor middle class boy Edrex, who came
home every day from school with only the maids to keep him company. He
felt forgotten and sad, because his parents were rarely home even during
the weekends. He did not understand that they were moving heaven and
earth so they could buy a house for him to inherit someday, and so that he
could study in the private school that charges at least P100,000.00 per
semester, and so that he could, as well, have the latest fads and go to
Boracay whenever he wants. Unfortunately, all he could see was how they
were too busy for him and how they seem to take him for granted. You see,
anger tends to breed, fester and consume. Until one day, today to be
exact, he decided that he would make them listen and pay attention to him.
Poor poor Edrex, if only he saw his parents crawling home from work
because they were so tired, if only he heard them cry after they were
humiliated by their bosses when they failed to deliver the work that was
expected from them, and if only, he felt joy each time they know that all
their hard work was for the future security of their only son. No, he didn’t
see, hear or felt any of those. You see, Edrex was always too busy staying
“connected” via FB, Twitter, Instagram and Tumbler, but he didn’t have
enough time to look up, observe, see and hear things with his heart. But
that’s too late now. His heart, it seemed, had stopped beating.

And all this time, Mang Ando, the jeepney driver who didn’t have his
lunch yet, kept on thinking-- was his wife able line up for the Mayor’s free 2
kilos of rice before heading to her usual tongits spot? And how the heck
was he gonna get rid of the bloodstains on the seats?
 Reading Text 2. Read the text below and answer the questions that
follow:
Morsels of Memory
by Charlotte Aninion-De Guzman

They came, almost every day, at different times of the day, pilgrims of my
mother’s cooking. They did not knock, because everyone knew that our
door was never locked. And she welcomed them with a smile, a warm
coffee and with the delicious smell of food that was always slowly cooking
on our stove.

There was Aling Nita who seemed to be always fretting about one thing
or another, that her once straight hair suddenly turned curly and white
overnight. Then the group of glorious gay men working at a nearby beauty
parlor who can shake our house with their laughter. And poor little lost Ada
who was always playing hide-and-seek with love, while her sister Maya
dreamed of flying to distant lands and seas where she said her life waits for
her, and I could not help but wonder how she can walk and talk without the
breath of life in her languid sinewy body. But they were not the only ones,
there were countless others who sat in our small round kitchen table while
my mother fed their hunger. Perhaps that was my mother’s tragedy, like the
stew that was always cooking on her stove, her nose was too soft and her
heart too open.