Worthing Flash

New Life, New Problems Andrea Tillmanns In his first life, Leo had been rather timid. That didn’t stop him from dying in a car accident that wasn’t his fault. When he awoke in the soil, he felt as though he could uproot trees. In his new life, he was stronger than ever before. Nothing and no one would stop him now. Unfortunately, he hadn’t considered that dung beetles, while very strong, were also very small. In any case, smaller than the crow next to which he had crawled out of the ground and which was very hungry. His second life therefore lasted only a few seconds. Andrea Tillmanns lives in Germany and works full-time as a university lecturer. She has been writing poetry, short stories and novels in various genres for many years. Her poems and stories have been published in The World of Myth, Hawthorn & Ash, SciFanSat, and other journals and anthologies. She has also published more than twenty books in German. More information about the author and her texts can be found on...

“ Highway to hell” boomed from a passing car as Lenny slowly let his heavy machine roll out. The song matched his mood. He refrained from revving the engine again before turning off the Harley. Maybe he had a few more seconds if nobody heard him coming. Lenny took off his helmet with the skull print and his sunglasses, ran his fingers through his long hair and opened his heavy leather jacket. Then he took a deep breath and walked slowly towards the lion’s den. After a few seconds, the door was pulled open. Lenny gulped as he thought of the fights that awaited him here every year. But now it was too late to turn back. Now he had to finish the journey. Lenny sighed devotedly, then strode energetically towards the house. “Merry Christmas, mom,” he said and took her in his arms. Andrea Tillmanns

It was particularly bad in summer. When she sat at her window and looked down at the beach, which was only a few meters and too many steps away from her apartment, she thought back to the time when she had also gone windsurfing on the beach with the others. And sometimes the images of the accident came back, she remembered the boat that had appeared next to her so suddenly that she had been unable to react, the slow awakening in the hospital, the doctors’ hesitant explanations. Then she hastily drew the curtains and rolled away from the window. by Andrea Tillmanns,