Michelle leans towards me across the table. “I obsess about death,” she confides.

I sigh. I’m familiar with the problem.

“How about you?” she says.

“I think I’m past it now, I’m getting better. I was scared out of my wits an entire year. I hated going to bed, hated that space before sleep, lying in the dark, picturing... nothing.”

Michelle nods. She breaks off a piece of croissant and plays with it. “I’m terrified.”

“Aren’t we all,” I say, “and furious, too.” I turn towards the other tables, glowering at everyone and no one.

“So what do we do?”

“Nothing,” I admit. “We go on. We thank the powers that be for pleasant days.” I lift my coffee cup and toast the sky.

Just as I put the cup down and drop my eyes, a small black and white bird hurries past. Delicate. Perfect. An unfamiliar species.

“What kind of bird is that?” I ask Michelle.

She looks around quickly. “What bird?” she says.

“It’s beautiful,” I whisper.

But it’s gone.

Eva Eliav

received an honours BA in English Language and Literature from The University of Toronto. Her poetry and short fiction have appeared in numerous literary journals, including Room, The St. Ann’s Review, Emrys Journal, Ilanot Review, Flashquake, The Apple Valley Review, Horizon Review, The Enchanted Conversation, Stand, Constellations, Minyan, One Art, Gyroscope, and Fictive Dream. She is the author of two poetry chapbooks: Eve (Red Bird Chapbooks, 2019) and One Summer Day (Kelsay Books, 2021).

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ The War Zone, microfiction by Eva Eliav in Reflex Fiction (19 April 2018)

⚡ Chocolates, microfiction in The Ilanot Review (Volume 3, Number 2, Autumn 2011)