Moments Between Years

This new year, let’s remember that life’s in the little things.

☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕

Morning had just broken, but Elsie found her thoughts tracing the kitchen floor.

The first hour of the year was calm, quiet – giving room for pause. Singapore was still, but her apartment was buzzing with the noise of leftover wrappers, party poppers and half-finished cans of beer from the New Year’s Eve party the night before.

A cuckoo bird and its mate did a series of hops on the railing, as if filling the small gaps between the noise. A park lamp flickered, looking bent, as if conforming to the weight of the prior year’s unseen moments.

She strolled to the corner coffeeshop, giving silent nods to people she knew only briefly. Each step she took was a checklist of micro-decisions – taking the scenic route past the river, choosing which text message to reply to, skipping her usual cafe stop because it was too crowded. The new year was a mirror of the year before. The choices she made then rippled quietly into today.

She found herself seated on a park bench at lunch, the flavour of new year leftovers absent on her tongue. Her mind wandered as clouds drifted idly; children laughed, their chuckles filling the void in her soul.

She knew that void. The emptiness of life’s unnoticed textures -children’s laughter, an elderly woman’s chuckle-trumped the resolutions she made a year earlier. The pause before laughter was a reminder that the thought put into laughter – the little details – mattered as much as the laughter itself. Awareness in life’s small acts is what made a difference.

She returned to her apartment, opened a few letters she’d ignored over the new year and sipped her now rancid tea.

But for the first time in a long while, she felt as if she mattered. The clock on the TV console ticked steadily, indifferent to her presence. But she felt -there. Unrushed, with no need to know what happened next. She had already arrived.

She dialled her mother’s number, ready to finally speak to her.

Ready to address the spat they’d had a few weeks earlier.

Ready to meet the year ahead.

Because she was in the moment.

☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕☕

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Imparting Differences

Today is the International Day of Human Solidarity – one when a jigsaw becomes completely fitted.

When walls part, and partitions close.

When differences meet, magic happens.

🌟

The city of Parting was – parted. There were many parts, true to its name.

Every district spoke a different language. And within each language, a separate dialect.

Rules veered like cars as they steered from street to street. Neighbours saw each other – only with their eyes. Glances fleeted, lasting shorter than seconds.

🐾

Kevin frowned at George’s odd dances. Harry squirmed at Sheila’s crooked smile – one fixed on her face due to facial paralysis from an accident.

They laughed at Juno – he wrote, but climbing Everest was easier than reading.

But the little child smiled like an angel.

Then, the Mayor threw them a ball into a curve that was already curvy.

The Day of Differences. A town holiday.

To mark the day and make it as COMFORTABLE for the edgy as he could, he PAIRED the townsfolk.

Two worlds collided in a day.

Leila, the quiet librarian, frowned at George’s heady dance moves. Tom, the straightlaced mathematician, baulked at Ben’s cheeky eyebrow raising.

The differences sounded louder than cymbals.

Hearts listened, though minds ignored.

✨

The diversity blanketed Parting – now Imparting – and beyond.

Leila held Dance Appreciation Days at the town library – with George’s help. Ben spun records at the radio station with the help of a metronome that Tom assembled – after a mouthful of quirky complaints.

And containers were no longer separate – the differences melted hard plastic partitions.

Into nothingness.

🌟

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Whispers of Evergreen

Today is Small Town Election Day – when small communities vote on what matters.

Small voices matter – when sounded together.

🌳

🌿Evergreen was a town at almost perpetual rest – one where activity crawled. Shops opened late; restaurants shut right after dinner.

And its people seemed to tread with the help of walking canes.

A dense forest fringed the edge of the town, its thick shrubbery rustling like gentle whispers. The weight of generations-old trees, leaves brown with age – pressed on one’s shoulders.

Its reputation? For taking what it shouldn’t have.

38-year-old Clara Moon, school teacher and avid history buff, wanted to give these tangled murmurs a more audible voice. She sensed the gravity of stories etched on every tree bark.

She was wilful about it. And notorious for that.

🌳

🌿It was time for Evergreen to make a decision; election fever hit. Townsfolk assembled in droves at the polling station, their voices tinged with raspy excitement. The station’s hall resounded with their whispers.

To preserve – or not.

Developers gathered at the gates, plans in hand. Then, quiet, materialistic murmurs about profit.

Clara’s eye fell on Little Elliot. The child had wandered into the forest, his teletubby legs wobbling after a rabbit. Before long, bramble bushes grasped his ankles.

A hush fell over Evergreen. The forest had opened its mouth for –

Its prey.

Clara bit her lip. This was more than a child losing himself in the forest-it was the forest’s refusal to release him.🌿

🌳🌳

🌿 Clara rushed into the forest, hoping to grab the child before the forest swallowed him completely.

She did discover – not a child, but a sapling grove no one thought existed.

Baby trees shaped like infant animals.

At the periphery of her vision – chainsaws and axes.

Developers and dismissive grimaces.

The trunks of the saplings twisted towards them, like sentinels marching to an errant beat.

Clara’s eyes darted from one sapling to another. They stared back at her, leaves parted, almost pleading.

She wanted to help them. But that meant exposing Evergreen to their truth –

One the backwater town was not ready for.🌿

🌳🌳🌳

🌿Clara was torn.

To preserve? To tell the truth?

Her solution – a new approach.

The savvy schoolteacher arranged tours for a few of the town’s more open-minded residents.

Some backed away when they saw the saplings, their mouths open.

Others reached out to the leaves – and fingered them gently.

Clara faced those who dared touch – and cajoled.

“Such green magic is rare – your children need it in their meals daily, to grow.”

She turned to the others, their mouths still agape.

“They frighten you. But they also protect you – your peace.”

A few days later, the vote passed. Thinner than a blade of grass.

Plight mattered more than a fight. 🌿

🌳🌳🌳🌳

🌿Clara showed the way with soft hands – and won the vote.

The forest had parted its leaves quietly, revealing a clear path.

Not just one leaf or tree – piles of them.

It wasn’t just one sapling that marched – they all did.

To a single beat that played in perfect rhythm -for the greater good. 🌿🌿

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Glow in the Silence

It takes one to burn…and the flame spreads.

🕯

In a silent corner of a snow-caked street was a lone candle -sentient, it seemed to have a watchful eye.

Laura first observed it from her apartment window. It never burned out. But glowed brighter when someone walked alone. A crying child covered in frost. A young lady walking alone. An old man hobbling with a cane, trekking the pavement without help.

Curiosity poked its head from the recesses of her mind.

🕯🕯

She left a warm loaf of sourdough she had just baked outside her door. The candle sparked -swaying in an almost-dance of approval.

It was one of encouragement; Laura did a jig herself.

She thanked the shopkeeper who kept his store open over Christmas. She gave a knitted sweater to the little boy who wore too-thin layers.

And the mailman? She put the dog away so that it wouldn’t jump.

And the candle almost did the Macarena.

🕯🕯🕯

The candle’s glow wrapped the sidewalk on Christmas Eve; the whole street was bathed in its light. Neighbours came out of the shadows, beckoned by its warmth.

🕯🕯🕯🕯

Frost remained until the next morning, holding blades of grass with icy, white fingers. Then a knock on Laura’s door.

The store owner, with a cut of Christmas ham that reminded her of a mini Everest.

Another knock.

It was the child she gave the sweater to. He approached her, a cheeky grin framing his eyes. He had a scarf in his hands.

Another knock.

The mailman – with a packet of kibble endorsed by a bow.

Laura grinned. She kept a candle burning by the window.

Someone would bask in its glow.

🕯🕯🕯🕯🕯
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The Saint of Straight-Lacedness

Today, 9 December is International Corruption Day – a day we celebrate the rules and keep in check any bending.

But there are times good intentions bend the rules.

🗝️🕯️📜

9th December. The day her grandma passed. Not a day May would forget – for reasons she’d rather erase from memory.

May was a lawyer – and a law degree was the last thing she wanted on her list of accomplishments. The Toh family – hers – had assigned her the unwanted task of settling her grandma’s estate.

🪞🏚️💨

One she accepted – and regretted.

Grandma Toh.

Bukit Boon’s most upstanding council member had taken bribes.

A newspaper article written with words that shamed.

Bribes. Accusations.

Her grandmother – the woman she held in the highest esteem

May sifted hurriedly through the cluttered basement, flicking the dust off each album with hurried precision.

The dust mites parted to reveal her grandmother’s life – one she never knew.

But each album she uncovered wanted her to know.

The ledger glared at her, the yellowed pages aggressively promoting their secrets.

The pages parted with a silent call.

May’s fingers hovered over them, waiting.

📝💰⚖️

They couldn’t wait for very long.

Inside it were documents filled with names and numbers.

Ones that kept increasing.

Her grandmother’s offshore account had accumulated more money than May had ever thought possible.

A hidden account. Belonging to the Saint of Straight-Lacedness.

May’s eyes hovered over that page of revelation, stunned for a few moments.

The Saint of Straight-Lacedness was also the Devil of Crookery.

📜💌🖐️

May fingered the note – and it stayed in place.

It wouldn’t move.

Frozen by surprise – and understanding.

“Aunty Chong,” it read, “Thanks for paying our rent these past months. We would have been evicted otherwise.”

So the money had gone into a dense, grey corridor.

One where mistakes were as striking as good deeds.

Her grandma’s heart had bent where ethics wouldn’t – and saved.

Whether rightly or wrongly was anyone’s guess.

🏡💛🌗

May left the ledger in the basement – she never showed it to anyone.

The bribes – an offbeat act of integrity.

Out-of-sync, but not hurtful.

Her grandmother was but human.

A mix of dark and light.

Able to compromise.

Doing wrong to protect.

🕯️🗝️💭

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The Attic Between

Family ties aren’t always binding.

📜

When Mark entered the colonial three-storey he’d inherited from his grandmother on December 7th, the air carried the rustic scent of things not meant to be shared. Etched on the wooden hatch leading up to the attic was a hasty scrawl borne of fury — “Do not open.”

His curiosity knocked out his sense of caution. He lifted the hatch and stepped onto the ladder. The hatch groaned awake, a mouth dropping open, waiting to speak.

Words he wasn’t quite ready for.

It held what every attic did – dust motes dancing over albums and letters left unopened for years. Mark thumbed a diary open. His grandmother’s impatient cursive gave his eyes a sharp poke – a feeling that he’d never known.

The yellowed pages detailed decades of tension between his grandmother and mother – arguments over her “poor” choices, her parental role, and the crossing of social boundaries that made her who she was.

And something else. A letter addressed to his mother. Helen Song.

Its yellowed edge crooking its little finger.

And Mark succumbed.

“Helen –

“I want you to know,” it began, assuring yet breathless, “that I meant the best for you. Never to harm you.”

Mark’s eyes widened. Decades of resentment, intergenerational conflict, and tension made the hairs on his arm bristle – and he was too young to have been part of them. He had unlatched the trap door, expecting dust, mites – perhaps furniture too worn for the ultra-modern living room.

But he found a new road to walk.

At the bottom of a pile of diaries was a photo of his grandmother in the hospital ward where he was born, carrying him over a crib.

On its rails was a placeholder and a card – “Mark Lee.”

Lee was the surname of the Song family’s chauffeur.

He found a photo of his mother laughing with a young man, dressed in nothing but khakis and a singlet.

Mark’s eye fell on his Rolex, its dials suddenly spinning backwards.

The diary in Mark Song’s hand dropped to the floor.

📜

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Whispers Between Desks

Today marks Nelson Mandela’s passing in 2013.

We may not leave echoes in history the way he did, but we CAN resonate.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏

Prologue

A normal school morning, sunlight warming an already too-warm classroom – but it had the quiet promise that even small moments are reasons.

For those who ask, “Why do this?”

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

“Bye, Miss Kwek…no, bye Mummy.” The little 7-year-old girl offered a little hand swap as she bade goodbye and traversed the corridor.

The classroom’s silence wrapped around me as she left. Nothing but scattered papers and desk chairs.

I sighed. I’d have to spend an hour pushing them in and sweeping–the kids had to rush home for lunch.

Miss Kwek the SuperMum.

Or SuperTeach.

And honestly…I didn’t know if the little girls realised that anymore.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

My first teaching assignment. This music and English teacher offered little ditties.

I taught them occupations with Ernie’s “Who Are The People in the Neighbourhood.”

But…their attention waned, as it often did for seven-year-olds after the first half-hour of breathing.

Unmarked worksheets stared at me from a basket, berating me for neglect.

The empty classroom smelled of faded whiteboard markers. Ernie’s face stared at me from a chart on an easel.

Blank.

Wondering if the constant effort to plan lessons was worth the “Mummy”- or if they’d even remembered him after the song.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

As I put marked exercise books on a bookshelf, my hand met a box with a bump.

I hadn’t noticed it before.

An envelope reared an edge from its corner.

Beckoning.

I drew a breath, my fingers lingering over the edge —

And dropped it again.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

I picked the box, letting the exercise books cascade onto the floor with a thump.

A printed letter, the pristine white paper waiting patiently. Its edges were starting to curl, but a few minutes wouldn’t make a difference.

After those minutes were finally over, I pried the envelope open.

Addressed to me.

“Dear Teacher,

“I like Ernie, and Who Are the People In Your Neighbourhood. But I like the way you sing it. You sound like my Grandma. She had a great voice. She died last year. She used to bring me to school.”

A watermark.

I was about to create a few – but not the factory sort.

“Thanks for the song. I watch Sesame Street every afternoon now. My English has improved. Marilyn.”

So it had.

For all time.

I sat at the desk, a quiet smile starting to stretch across my face.

One that needed Face Yoga.

In case of premature sagging.

There was a reason for Mummy after all.

Despite how dog-tired she was.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

“Mummy” dropped the letter back into the box cautiously –

Its pulse was quickening.

The classroom still had a distinct marker odour – but it teased my nostrils.

It didn’t punch.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

I swept the floor, erased the whiteboard –

And lifted the easel.

Ernie.

And his neighbourhood.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

Mummy had a place in it.

Though her legs were a little tired from walking around.

📚✏️📚✏️📚✏️

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Seen At Last

Today marks the International Day of Disabilities – and by extension, the Celebration of Differences.

One sees the differences. And it’s all that matters.

🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿

Oppora was a city of contrasts -neighbourhoods of opportunity coexisted with those of strife.

Opporan society was —

Competitive.

To be extraordinary wasn’t an edge – it marked one as different.

Like seventeen-year-old Michael Long.

The pint-sized, scrawny teen often received discounts.

But these weren’t supermarket vouchers-

They were off-the-cuff remarks about height.

And they made him attuned to others who were discounted.

🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿

He saw the sidelines -and who sat painfully on them.

The smallest-sized child in class.

The transparent man who stuttered.

The restaurant that only let in patrons who fit its refined ‘establishment.”

Amusing – yet crushing.

Because the ones who should have noticed didn’t.

The boy’s sandwiches were snatched.

He shook his head.

He strode up to the cashier who had ignored the stuttering man.

“Is he invisible?”

The cashier attended to the next customer.

With a Rolex sitting proudly on his wrist.

🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿

It was a busy weekend at the town’s festival market- everything from wicker baskets to the glitziest wedding dress was on offer.

A well-dressed couple fingered the lilac linen.

With the salesperson chatting in exuberant tones.

Another pair clad in tee-shirts and jeans did the same- much to the salesgirl’s undisguised annoyance.

“Please look, don’t touch,” she directed, her voice two tones too sharp.

Michael let out a wry laugh – and shook his head.

He turned to approach – then hung back.

His father gripped his shoulder, nodding his head.

That tone would still sting the next jeans-clad couple.

🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿

Michael broke free of his father’s grip and strode up to the cashier.

Lipstick even.

Hair perfectly set.

“I think they’d like to try that. They can pay for it.”

The cashier gave him a swift nod- then turned to receive a cheque from the better-dressed pair.

The casually-dressed couple exchanged glances with the youth – and nodded.

Michael’s father beamed.

He couldn’t get the jeans-clad couple their dress.

But his trying got them notice.

🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿

Michael and his family continued their festival tour

The events played on – raucous, indifferent noise.

But he knew that someone had finally been seen – even if he was the only one who saw them.

🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿

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Echoes of Kedukan Bukit

Long before rivers were charted and kingdoms recorded on maps, Sumatra’s waters carried more than trade — they carried whispers of ambition, power, and memory. In the mud and currents of a forgotten riverbank, history waits for those who dare to listen.

Some stones do more than survive centuries. Some remember.

History speaks. Listen well.

🪨

The river swelled, covering Aria’s knees. The avid scholar had risked life for art, braving the torrents of the Sumatran river in the midst of the July-August monsoon.

A relic of the Srivijayan empire — the first maritime kingdom of Sumatra — was the goal. With torch in hand, she ploughed through the mud, the river’s plaintive cries rising to a near crescendo.

🪨

Her hands mired in mud, Aria’s fingers felt their way along rocks and their crevices — until they touched a half-buried stone slab.

The Kedukan Bukit inscription covered its surface.

Then, strangeness.

A feeling of being surveilled washed over Aria — almost as if the Sumatran river itself was keeping close tabs on her.

Then —

“Aria. Seek no more.”

A lost voice.

Aria’s fingers wrapped tighter around the base of her torch.

🪨

Her foot hit the base of a sharp stone.

On it, an inscription —

In ancient Javanese.

She shone her torch on the faded outlines of the script, trying to wrestle with a language she only knew through sessions with the lecturers at her university.

But she knew enough to pause.

In shock.

The rock was transcribing on its own.

Scripting her mind.

Mapping her ambitions.

Echoing her doubts.

Mirroring her obsessions.

The rock seemed alive — and knew too well who sought it.

And then she knew — echoes of the past weren’t just echoes — they lived with those who sought them.

🪨

Aria slipped her torch into her knapsack and grabbed the stone.

It refused —

To —

Budge.

She tried again —

It refused —

To —

Budge.

She stepped back —

The stone was history, and it commanded.

Demanded humility.

Solace.

Not ownership.

She left the river, and the slab, standing.

Glancing at her — waiting.

🪨

A week later, Aria returned — no slab.

But a stone.

With a new carving.

Glowing —

Changing.

Speaking.

Her initials, etched faintly.

History still called — because she

respected.

Heard.

Was still hearing.

🪨

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And The Shadow Steps Back

We all have our moments – young or old – when that dark green shadow threatens to overwhelm. And we choose if it wins.
🌙✨🌙✨🌙
Liora could bring everything on her canvas to life—the deer on the lawn, the dogs breaking into a run by the lake, or the oranges in a food bowl.
Her brushstrokes made everything too real.
But her skill meant nothing.
Not to everyone who treated her sister, Selene, as if she were God’s gift to the art world.
Liora was nondescript—plain, always underdressed and preferred jeans to the floral dresses Selene always wore.
She seemed to grow dim in her sister’s light, no matter the certainty of her talent.
Whispers and glances—all about the trendiness of Selene’s latest dress.
All eyes were always on the eye-catching colour of her hair or the portraits that put Rembrandt to shame.
The list was endless, and she was never on it.
📦🕸️📦🕸️📦
Liora was decluttering the attic one afternoon—one of the many tasks her mother assigned, since she hardly received party invitations.
Selene was far too busy organising her party schedule.
While heaving boxes up a rickety ladder, Liora’s head bumped the ceiling.
And there were too many bumps along its surface to be just plasterboard.
Intrigued, she forgot the pain and groped the plasterboard with her fingers.
It lifted—too easily.
Her usually inactive limbs took her up the ladder and into a room—one she’d never seen before.
Dust-caked windows greeted her as she stepped into what was an undiscovered attic, along with a heavily musty odor.
Cobwebs, along with their residents, danced at every corner.
But she wasn’t alone.
Something followed.
A shadow.
Over time, Liora realised that its quest was selective.
It came when Liora came to the attic to cry.
When she felt that Selene got more attention.
It lurked, waiting for acknowledgement—like her.
🎉🎈🎉🎈🎉
The shadow stepped into the attic, large.
Almost tangible.
Over the next days, windows banged, furniture flew across the floor—in tandem with Liora’s sadness or jealousy.
Liora’s heart—fully alive.
Selene’s birthday party was the next day—as usual, a party marked her elevated teen social status.
Liora stayed in her room—she and Selene’s iffy clique didn’t move at the same pace.
The Shadow decided to attend on Liora’s behalf.
It moved with Liora’s emotions, tossing decorations, turning the volume knob of the stereo, and flipping objects.
It crept into the party, responding to the green colour of Liora’s T-shirt.
And the guests knew.
Lights flickered, and the boombox boomed—really boomed—much to the chagrin of the guests.
Then, it hit Liora.
She had to control it—before it controlled everything else.
Her sister’s attention.
Her own reputation.
“Get out.”
Her voice sudden.
Loud.
🖤👁️🖤👁️🖤
The shadow froze at Liora’s outburst, taken aback.
It shrunk.
Liora caught her breath.
It only moved – when she faltered.
Grew-when she shrank.
She centred herself and eyed it firmly.
The room reverted—the lights steadied. Objects returned to their places.
And it didn’t escape her sister’s notice.
She put her hand on Liora’s shoulder.
Liora merely nodded, but didn’t look at her.
With her eyes on the Shadow, she spoke.
“It’s my turn.”
It stepped back. And without a word, returned to the attic.
Calm.
No longer forbidding.
Selene stood next to her and nodded.
Liora had faced her mirror.
And thwarted it.
🌙✨🌙✨🌙
An awkward stillness filled the room—then faded.
An exchange of glances confused murmurs among the guests.
But all was in place.
Liora breathed deeply, coming into her own strength.
Her shadow—gone.
Only present if Liora refused to be.
Selene patted her shoulder and turned to her guests.
She walked into the hall, strides purposeful.
The shadow waited in the attic.
Answering—only if she failed to remember.
🌙✨🌙✨🌙

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Please find a book of my horror microfiction, Echoes in the Dark, free for download here.