FLASH FICTION
Silver Pennies
Illustrated by Hallye Webb
The only company he kept was his own, and it wasn’t very good company at all. Even if he had friends and there wasn’t a worldwide pandemic going on, the old man doubted anyone would visit him. So he talked to himself.
He found comfort in verbally attacking the only person within earshot — himself. When he tripped over the carpet, when he lost his train of thought, when the newspaper trembled in his weak hands, the old man berated himself, slinging curses around the room like stones. The hateful words started to collect in the dark corners of the small room, letching color from the drapes and hanging heavy in the air. The old man leaned against the weight of his own loneliness and in this way, they held each other up.
While the world ground to a halt, the seasons continued to turn. Days, weeks, and months folded over on themselves. Time became meaningless. As did everything else for the old man.
Until one cold day in January.
That morning, he jolted awake while dozing in his armchair. Most mornings he woke up disoriented, but this morning he was sharp, feeling the sting of whatever electric charge pulled him back to reality. His knees cracked painfully as he rose and shuffled to the window. Muttering to himself, he pulled back the curtain to reveal a small bear peering back at him.
At first, all he saw were two enormous faux fur pom-poms. Slowly his eyes adjusted to the light and saw that the bear ears were attached to a winter hat and that hat was pulled over the actual ears of a small girl. She had long inky plaits cascading down each shoulder. A mandatory yet cheerfully polka-dotted mask stretched from ear to ear, eclipsing her face except for a pair of enormous dark eyes.
For a moment, nothing happened. The odd pair simply stared at each other, unblinking. Suddenly, the girl looked to the left, listening. When she turned back to the window, she raised a hand to the glass. Reflexively, the old man mirrored her gesture and watched her eyes squint into a smile that stretched beyond her mask. And then she was gone, leaving behind an old man reaching out to his own bemused reflection.
The masked smile was the first gift.
When she returned a week later, the girl brought another. One at a time, she held drawings against the window. So as to not upset the stars in her eyes, the old man dutifully inspected each work of art. With a thoughtful crease in his brow and a hand on his chin, he nodded his approval for each one. After the parade of artwork, she took a moment to consider the old man and rifled through each of the pages, searching for something. When she found it, she gently tucked the page in the crack between the window and the frame. A gold sun. He could almost feel the warmth of the rays. Hand over his heart, he bowed to the little artist.
Every visit brought another gift. One week she presented him with a pebble that reflected the clouds. Another time the old man puffed out his cheeks and pulled his ears like a monkey and the girl suffered a fit of giggles so contagious that he found himself chuckling too. He couldn’t remember the last time he laughed.
Loose pieces of his soul started to float to the surface and his conversations with himself became lighter. Instead of spewing hate, he whispered phrases strung with amusement that sparkled between his lungs.
It was around then that he started to notice silver pennies.
The first penny was under his coffee mug. The portrait of an elegant woman with flowers in her hair stared up at him from one side and the other revealed nothing but hidden secrets in strange symbols. He put the penny on the windowsill to share with the girl.
And the pennies kept appearing. Everywhere.
He found them in the sink, tucked into a folded sweater, in books that hadn’t been opened in years. He even found one riding the rise and fall of his chest when he opened his eyes one morning. The old man was baffled and, for lack of any other rational explanation, accepted his dementia gracefully. He simply added each new discovery to the collection on the windowsill.
The silver pennies glinted in the spring sun, casting geometric rainbows across his walls. The shadows retreated as the days lengthened and the snow melted.
And he waited for her to return.
At first, he stubbornly hoped that the next day would bring back those bear ears. But as the weeks passed, the old man slipped back into the shadows of loneliness. The pennies began to lose their luster. Then one night, he scooped them off the sill and threw them out the window. Without looking back, he switched off the light.
The next morning, he went to drag the chair away from the window and froze midstep. A twisted curtain of flora emitting an unearthly glow flourished outside his window. Flowers of all shapes and colors burst from the lush green. The low-frequency hum from the bumblebees and hummingbirds dancing among the petals vibrated in the old man’s bones. He closed his eyes, feeling warmth in the dappled sunlight. If this was going insane, he was going to welcome it with arms stretched wide.
When he opened his eyes, he saw people between the stems of thick wildflowers and birds of paradise. They were pointing in his direction. While maintaining the required six-foot distance, others came too. A few came closer, leaning their masked faces toward the open window to listen to his tale. Someone brought folding chairs so they could stay longer. Then, with a few taps on a screen, the flowers spread across the country, across the world.
And with them came hope.
