Dangerous things, windows – for their transparency and fragility – so tempting from the outside in. I should know, I spend my life looking through them.
I’m doing it now, as I write this blog, staring into secret cyberspaces, into brave new bedrooms. There’s no harm. It’s only looking. Anyone can do it. It’s easy as breathing, getting permission for Remote Administration Tools. I sneak my requests in on free downloads – movies or short stories. People never check the links they click. Have you any idea what you agreed to, when you started reading this? For all you know, my RAT just ran up your digital drainpipe, and is taking control of your webcam and microphone at this very nanosecond.
It’s a great hobby, especially when you work from home, or live alone. I’ve five windows open tonight. My favourite, let’s call her, ‘Window-one,’ has been tap-tap-tapping at her homework for hours, dull-faced, like faces are when they think no-one’s looking. I love that lack of expression, it speaks of intimacy.
She’s stopped tapping now, leaning deep into her screen, revealing downy skin on her upper lip, the silky curl of her pinkish fringe. I move closer in, my face millimetres from her delicious pixels. We exchange an ecstasy of eye contact made all the sweeter because she’s unaware. It’s so intense I’m almost glad when she pulls back, coquettes her head to take a selfie, then smiles as the responses bing, tweet and snapchat in.
Just looking was never going to be enough though.
Dangerous things windows. You never know what might try to crawl in, through the tiniest crack. I’m biding my time, waiting for one to widen. I only need her name. My her-tailored avatar is waiting, two clicks away from transitioning into her actual world.
If you’ve got the nerve after reading that, just follow the links to read some more of my flashes (don’t worry Breaking Windows is all fiction!) It won the Zero Flash comp in July 2017.
The story below won the Flash 500 comp at the start of 2020 and was published online in January 2020
The story here, Ten Green Bottles, came second in Molotov Cocktail’s Wild Flash Competition in August 2019 https://themolotovcocktail.com/vol-10/wild-flash/ten-green-bottles/
The story here was published in October 31st 2019 as part of the Monster Competition at Molotov Cocktail https://themolotovcocktail.com/vol-10/flash-monster-2019/climate-change/
The Arnolfini Funeral Flashback Fiction 1st July 2019
How to Sacrifice Your Life in the Line of Duty and Still Go Uncommemorated on War Memorials, Flash Flood June 15th, 2019 https://flashfloodjournal.blogspot.com/2019/06/how-to-sacrifice-your-life-in-line-of.html
My socially phobic inner voices as evoked by the prompt ‘doors’, Micro Madness June 7th 2019, https://nationalflash.org/micro-madness/
Unpunctuated Osmium, Reflex Fiction, June 26th 2019
How To Keep the Hunger at Bay, Writers HQ May 2019 Comp Short List
Six Things I’ll Have Done by the Time you Wake Up, Ellipsis August 2018 and finalist in the National Flash Fiction Day Drabble Competition 2018 https://www.ellipsiszine.com/six-things-ill-have-done-by-the-time-you-wake-up-by-jan-kaneen/
This story was longlisted for Reflex Fiction’s summer competition in June 2018
How to Stay Warm in the Winter from Flash Flood 2017
http://flashfloodjournal.blogspot.co.uk/2017/06/how-to-keep-warm-in-winter-by-jan-kaneen.html
Winner Christmas 2017 Horror Scribes competition
https://horrorscribes.com/2018/01/05/the-twelfth-day-of-christmas-and-overall-winner/#more-1157
https://cabinetofheed.wordpress.com/2018/02/13/exorcisms-jan-kaneen/
Ad Foc Fiction Winner Full Stop https://t.co/kTs7Mwgk74
Molotov Cocktail Flash Felon Winner The London Umbrella Company https://t.co/5GxZDVroYq
Runner Up Retreat West We’re Going to Pick up Daddy https://t.co/URQwntNRtA Runner up Retreat West
Winner Retreat West Flakes
http://www.retreatwest.co.uk/flakes-by-jan-kaneen/
A scary story for Halloween https://occulum.net/2017/09/05/spin-by-jan-kaneen/
This came fifth in the Flash Phenomenon Comp at Molotov Cocktail
https://themolotovcocktail.com/about/archive-vols-1-3/vol-6/flash-phenom/waiting/
