Elias Blackford
9 stories published
Stories by Elias Blackford
Silence Subscription
An app offers silence delivered in monthly installments. For a fee, it mutes inner monologues for an hour a day. At first, the quiet feels luxurious. Decisions arrive clean. But the invoices creep up....
Rent-a-Memory
An online service rents memories for those who feel empty. You can borrow a childhood beach day or a graduation walk. The rentals come with vivid sensations and a ticking timer. One user rents a memor...
Time-Share Body
An ad offers a time-share body: mornings are yours, nights belong to someone else. The arrangement is affordable and oddly freeing. You wake to find dishes washed, laundry folded. In return, you leave...
The Rehearsal Mirror
A mirror in a thrift shop promises rehearsals for tomorrow. Stand before it, and it shows your mistakes before you make them. People queue with job interviews, first dates, apologies. The mirror revea...
Reverse Archaeology
Instead of digging up the past, the Reverse Archaeology team buries it. Funded by a foundation obsessed with legacy, they create layers for future historians to discover. Maria, team lead, selects mundane artifacts: a grocery list, a child's drawing,...
The Orchard of Lost Hours
On the edge of town, an orchard grows fruit from hours people lost scrolling feeds and waiting in lines. Trees bear luminous apples, skins shimmering with paused seconds. Farmers tend carefully, pruning regret. Visitors harvest lost time for a price....
The Apartment Between Floors
Between floors seven and eight of a downtown high-rise is an apartment not on any blueprint. The elevator stops there only if you press 7 and 8 simultaneously while humming. Tenants who discover it find a cozy space with mismatched furniture, a kettl...
The Clockmakerâs Rebellion
In the town of Bellmare, clocks never disagreed. Church bells, wristwatches, oven timersâthey all ticked in harmonious consensus, thanks to the Precision Guild. The Guild traced its roots to a clockmaker named Ansel who, centuries ago, built a master clock that whispered the correct time to every ot...
The Librarian of First Sentences
The Library of Beginnings occupied a single, long room lined with narrow drawers. Each drawer contained cards, each card bearing a first sentence from a story, novel, speech, or diary that had never been finished or had gone missing. The librarian, Ana, guarded them. People visited when they were st...