Background Check

I am pleased to announce that your contest entry “Background Check” will be published in our next PDF issue, debuting October 31, 2005! Readers will vote on their favorite contest entry for the quarter. The winner will be announced in the January issue and will be awarded a $10 gift certificate at Amazon.com!

To see your entry, as well as your competition, subscribe to our PDF version. And spread the word! Only subscribers can vote on the winning contest entry, so have your friends and family subscribe and cast their votes, too. The issue is only $2! See our subscription page for more details.

If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to email me.

Thank you,
Jennifer Michaels
Senior Editor, Flash Me Magazine
http://www.authorrealm.com
flashmemag@yahoo.com

Background Check

By Toriano L. Porter

I knew, subconsciously perhaps, that my ladies' man reputation may have preceded me when Tracie didn't return the last of my five phone calls. I mean, just two nights earlier we’d had our first date. It was great. We met promptly, ate well and drank mercifully at O’Charley’s Restaurant, all the while conversing about life situations.

After dinner, we went back to her non-descript one bedroom apartment. Over a post-dinner celebratory funny cigar, we discussed our professional lives, eventually leading to our talk about college life. She mentioned she had attended my alma mater for two years before transferring, which coincided with my last year there.

“Are you serious?” I asked her when she informed me of her two year stint at Central Missouri State University in Warrensburg, Missouri. “You went to CMSU?”

“Yes,” she replied, “but I had to leave. I was tired of the people up there always in my business.”

We couldn’t remember each other from campus, but we both knew some of the same people. After awhile, it became apparent that we may have known each other but were unaware of each other’s core existence.

After going out dancing together for a few hours that night, Tracie mentioned she would try to get the inside scoop on me from some of her old CMSU friends before our next date. I didn’t think much of her sleuth work until the second date never materialized.

She must have gotten a bad word.