“For the thousandth time, I promise, it wasn’t me,” her sixteen-year-old daughter said exasperated.“Fine,” she spat out the word. “Fine. So who else could have shattered the vase while the only one in the house was you?”
“I don’t know, mum! Anyone could’ve! Why does it always have to be me?”
“I wasn’t here!” her mother thundered at her, not even caring that the windows were open and their neighbours had already aligned themselves along the fence, as they always did when she started shouting in her rage.
“I didn’t do it though! I was in my room, listening to music – how do I know that you didn’t just creep in the house without me realising and breaking the vase?”
She was shaking with rage and barely stopped herself from slapping her daughter. Furiously, she turned back to face the vase that had travelled through generations already, now shattered to tiny shards on the living room floor. It had been standing on the counter as it had for years now, somehow her daughter must have knocked it down. She was furious that it was broken, but it was even worse that she was denying that it had been her.
Taking a step towards the vase, she nearly tripped over their dog. He was sitting at her feet, his tail lightly thudding against the floor. Slowly, she raised her eyes from the dog back to the vase, then to the counter, then back to the dog again. He was tall enough to reach the counter, and also now watching her intently with large pleading eyes.
© 2016
Flash Fiction for the Purposeful Practitioner, Week #7 – 2016
Photo prompt provided by http://publicdomainarchive.com/public-domain-images-black-lab-puppy-on-rustic-wood-background/
FELICIA HEILGENDORFF 
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