“What are you doing out here?” he asked in a whisper.

“Something told the wild geese to fly,” she answered.

He looked at her, trying to hide the worry from his eyes.

“They do that every year -”

“But not at this time. Not now. Something’s different.”

He watched her. She stood there looking up at the dusk lit sky. Her head tilted, eyes intent, seeing things only she could.

He loved his daughter but he worried too. She was not like other children. It was a source of pride and consternation. It was also a source of guilt. He knew why she was different.

“They’ll be back in the winter,” he said.

“Will we?” she asked and looked up at him.

He put his arm around her and looked up at the setting sun. Shades of orange and reds painted the horizon.

“We might.”

---

Prosery prompt from dVerse

Prosery, the very short piece of prose or flash fiction that tells a story with a beginning, middle and end. It can be in any genre of your choice, but it does have a limit of 144 words; an additional challenge is to hit 144 exactly. The special thing about Prosery is that we give you a complete line or two from a poem, which must be included somewhere in your story, within the 144-word limit. The lines were chosen from a poem called ‘Something told the wild geese’, which is about the moment, the turning point of the year, when wild geese sense that they must fly south and migrate to warmer lands for the winter.  The lines:
“Something told the wild geese
It was time to fly.”