High Marks by Frank Vatel
from Dystopia: a PUNK NOIR Magazine series
“Did mom get good grades, too?”
Wyatt contemplated the boy’s face before answering his question. Not for the first time, Manny’s dark, inquisitive eyes reminded him of Marisol.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “But she was smart, like you.”
His attention shifted back to his son’s social-studies quiz. When he read question six, his breath hitched.
6. What was the purpose of the 2034 Expurgation?
Wyatt couldn’t believe they were brainwashing fourthgraders. No, check that. He could believe it. He just couldn’taccept it. And he didn’t know what made him sicker, the question or his son’s answer: “Getting rid of all the bad people.”
“They’re teaching you about the raids?”
Manny nodded between licks of ice cream—a reward for earning high marks. “Mrs. Gaffney said those people were infecting our blood.”
Infecting our nation’s blood. For eight years, Wyatt had blocked the Leader’s pet phrase from his mind. Now it fizzed in his ears, summoning violent images from the most tragic day of his life.
“She also said—”
“Manny.”
“Yeah?”
Wyatt rubbed his face, trying to mask his grief. “Let’s change the subject, alright? What were we discussing before?”
“We were talking about mom.”
This story appears as part of Dystopia, a PUNK NOIR Magazine series.
Bio
Frank Vatel is a writer and freelance illustrator whose work has appeared in Bristol Noir and Reckon Review. He spends far too much time discussing crime fiction and old movies on social media and is currently penning a noir novel set during the Depression. He lives with his wife in Chicago.
PUNK NOIR, the online literary and arts magazine that looks at the world at its most askew, casting a bloodshot eye over the written word, film, music, television and more.
Subscribe for a regular dose of hard-boiled flash fiction, straight to your inbox.
That hit home. Great writing
A story for the times... I do love flash fiction.