“Capsule” by Adele Gallogly is a vividly depicted microfiction about mothers and daughters: their coded conversations, their unspoken understandings. Set at a local carnival, Gallogly activates the senses with “pink popcorn,” “sunset clouds,” and “seawater upset by boats.” Above it all hovers the “refused” Ferris wheel, and one significant secret. —Court Harler
You refused the Ferris wheel twice that day with teenage politeness, almost poise. I first asked while sucking on pink popcorn, a snack you’d devour for weeks afterwards. I’m good, Mom, thanks. After we conquered another ladies’ room wait, I offered to pay for the express ride line. Still good, thank you though.
I didn’t get it. While young, I loved those rising seat pods in the sky, that gift of flight without free fall, those views huge and safe. Your dad and I didn’t always kiss up there; sometimes I was content to watch sunset clouds the colours of our tongues. He didn’t tease me with unwanted rocking, like most boys did (yours, too?).
We split a sauceless corn dog. I worried about my own possible nausea, a souring gut complaining only to me. You didn’t admit you’d grown blisters in one carnival hour of wrong shoes. Near the boardwalk, I laughed at painted spaniels in red lace bonnets. You strode ahead, towards seawater upset by boats. The familiar rims of your shoulders seemed steady and strong as you moved across the stained wood. Already you were lifting your secret news into the future, my freighted daughter.
I caught up enough to see your expression, indescribable then. Now I know. You looked dutiful and worn, like the host of a suddenly sparse party, like some mother up late with a sinkful of plates, brushing off crumbled food with no good memory of making or desiring it.
“Capsule” was highly commended in the 2025 Bridport Prize Flash Fiction Award and first appeared in their winners’ print anthology.
ADELE GALLOGLY is a nonprofit writer/editor and an emerging flash fiction writer living in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Her stories have appeared in the Bridport Prize 2025 Anthology, FlashFlood, Six Sentences, 50-Word Stories, Paragraph Planet, and elsewhere. Find her on Bluesky and Instagram @AdeleGallogly.
Featured image by Devon Rogers, courtesy of Unsplash.
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