This story by Amy Hample was a bit confusing at first and had to be read a couple times to appreciate the beginning once understanding what was going on (which doubles the word count and sort of defeats the purpose of flash fiction).
The basics: First person POV. Exposition of conflict metaphored in artist’s presentation. Conflict foreshadowed by questioning of details, interrupted with reality of visit to a doctor in setting time and place.
Very poignant piece. The motif of white crockery in the artist’s show, on the x-rays, as the narrator ties them together to put a concrete image onto a unassailable diagnosis. The theme of all that’s visible in a picture (and in reality) that fails to hide and indeed may magnify the one little thing that stands out–thus the question of "What is the white thing?" The one thing wrong with the perfect picture.
There is also a relationship to the narrator that evokes sympathy not only for her (assumption here) plight, but for the common and natural inclination to both seek truth and yet deny it, and find ways to accept and fit something into our world that we don’t necessarily want. Making the abstract (diagnosis/white spot) concrete (white crockery).
The storyworld is set mainly in the church where the narrator has stopped in to see the artist’s lecture. Drawn in by the sign "Finding the Mystery in Clarity" which she notes appears to be contradictory to human nature and yet it is the answer and meaning behind the black/white images that she seeks. In stopping in to view this lecture, she is avoiding an appointment with the doctor who will likely give her the clarity of her condition.
She does end up going to the doctor’s and insists, regardless of the explanation, to not see the white things for what they are–evidence of cancer. Just as she has forgotten what pieces of her childhood represented by her mother’s things as she gave them away she actually wanted–knowing only that they were white. The artist at the showing will not answer the question put to him by an audience member either.
Very nicely done and very powerful in its relevance to inner turmoil and our ability to compensate. There is the balance between what is expected and what is known. The metaphor of the white crockery becomes just that, a metaphor for something that is meaningful and distinct from the material item–i.e., she cannot remember what she wanted from her mother’s things. Story arc builds nicely with the slow infusion of the reality of the narrator’s condition. Even the flashback of her mother’s own giving away of things reinforces both the concrete image of black/white thing and the fragility of life facing death. Well done.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology