Flash Fic Day 3: A pottery painter, a barn, a strange message.

Prompt: A pottery painter, a barn, a strange message.

Photo by Stéphane Juban on Unsplash

The carpenter had remodelled the barn a few years ago to make good use of it as a workspace. In the winter, the barn would house critters living in the area. Food and warmth were readily available- just your average bed and breakfast for animals. The carpenter would occasionally take her hobby of pottery painting to the barn to protect the carpeted floors in her home. Her neighbour and friend worked with clay to produce simple, yet elegant household items that would be sold at town fairs each year. Pottery painting brought joy and quietude to the carpenter, and while she tried doing it for free, her friend insisted on giving her a small share of the already meagre profits she made from sales. At the moment, the carpenter headed towards the barn in the chilly night air, supplies in hand and bundled up to ward off the cold. She had started the fire earlier and the warmth welcomed her as she stepped inside. A gush of wind howled as she shut the door behind her. She heard skittering in the beams in the ceiling and noticed a few shadows in the corners. The carpenter enjoyed making little spaces for the squirrels and birds living in the trees by her house; some birdfeeders and tiny houses hung in the trees, and some boxes acted as hiding spots in the barn. She settled down at the workstation by the fire to paint a couple of jugs she had received earlier this week. As she started taking the supplies out of her satchel, some rustling behind her alerted her to someone- or something- moving by her chair. She didn’t think much of it, being used to the critters running around the barn, but when she turned around and looked down, all she saw was a piece of parchment under a chair leg. She picked it up gingerly and peered at the smudged childlike handwriting. She could barely make out what was written, but it looked something like, “Bring pine nut.” She frowned at the odd message, then tossed it back onto the floor, thinking perhaps the wind had blown the note inside somehow. She turned back around, and in a flurry of movement, a squirrel jumped onto her lap and then on the table, holding the piece of paper in its teeth. Dazed, the carpenter held out a hand, into which the squirrel deposited the note before scampering into a dark corner of the barn. She mentally added pine nuts to her grocery list.