Mike McHone, author of 880 Feet Per Second, has previously published short fiction in Ellery Queen, Guilty, Mystery Magazine, Shotgun Honey, Playboy, the AV Club, and Mystery Tribune.
*****
All you hear is the pop. You don’t have time to turn and see the look in his eyes, but you can imagine it, that greed, that selfishness. You’ve seen it in the bathroom mirror. You’re wondering how your own brother could do this, but your anger doesn’t hold now that the bullet is half-way through your brain. Besides, you were going to do it to him, weren’t you? Rob the bank, come to your place, lure him into the basement, and then…
Jesus.
Little bastard beat you to it. Probably knew what you had planned all along. Clever. Always was, wasn’t he? Brave too. Had to be brave to do it right here in the driveway of your place on a Friday afternoon. In broad goddamn daylight.
Unreal.
You smell steaks on a grill coming from somewhere in the neighborhood. They smell so good, don’t they? You can almost taste them.
Andiamo’s Steak House. That’s where you were supposed to meet Francine tonight. Yeah. You’d planned to…
No.
Forget about the ring in your pocket. It’ll only make you sad.
Try to think of something good, something to lift your spirit.
As the bullet tears its way through the front of your skull, just before everything goes black and whatever isn’t attached to this meat and these bones and all this blood slips into whatever comes after the ever-after…
Ha!
Good one, kid. Enjoy the haul. Hope to see you soon.
I’ll say hi to ma for you.
*****
If you’ve enjoyed “880 Feet Per Second”, you can visit our free digital archive of flash fiction here. Additionally, premium short fiction published by Mystery Tribune on a quarterly basis is available digitally here.
For online archive of short fiction (longer pieces) on Mystery Tribune website, you can visit here.
