I thought he was a reporter or an evangelist when I saw him through the front door glass. He was holding a book; clinging to it as if it was the thing that kept him from running away.

I put the chain on. ‘Hello?’ I said.

He was about my age, twenty-two, familiar yet unknown. ‘Is my father in?’ he said.

I was confused. ‘I’m sorry, you must have the wrong house,’ I said. He held the book up, my husband’s book, the one that made him famous.

‘Gil Coleman,’ the man said and he tapped the cover with a forefinger. ‘My father.’

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This 103-word piece of flash fiction is inspired by the picture above. It’s rather a leap this week, but the idea that we don’t know what’s on that stick, led me to thinking about other things that are unknown, which led me to my story. Friday Fictioneers is an online writing group where we all write 100 words or so from a picture supplied to us weekly by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields (and this week provided by Kent Bonham). You can join in here, or read other people’s stories here.

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In other news, I’ve written a blog post about how I got an agent, which you might be interested to read. And my novel, Our Endless Numbered Days, is now available to pre-order from Amazon in the UK and US, and of course from your local independent bookshop (hopefully).