Miracles.(Kevin Hughes) Author's Note: This is a Flash Fiction story. Do you believe in miracles? Would you pay a quarter for one?

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“Step right up. Come on people. I am offering you a miracle. All it costs you is a measly twenty five cents. Wouldn’t you pay that for a genuine honest to goodness miracle? Step right up!”

I laughed out loud. It didn’t phase the Carny Huckster one bit.

“Why you laughing young man? Don’t you believe in miracles?”

“Yes, maybe. But not for a quarter!”

People around me laughed too.

The Carny wasn’t phased at all, he looped his thumbs under his suspenders (and who wears suspenders anymore?).

“Miracles come way cheaper than a quarter.”

Now everyone laughed. Not the Carny.

“Name one!”

I thought I was being clever, cute, condescending. Later... I would not think so.

“What’s your name, young fella?”

“Mark.”

“Okay, Mark- you asked me to name a miracle cheaper than a quarter. So I will. (Unlooping one hand from his suspenders to point directly at me)

You!”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. You are a miracle. Your Mom and Dad had to meet each other, two strangers out of seven billion people. They had to be attracted enough to get intimate. She had half a million eggs and only one egg drops a month. He had several million sperm and only one of those gets the egg. Calculate the odds on any one of those parameters and you defy the odds. After ten months, a miracle was born. You. Mark.

What’s the chances of that egg, out of fifty thousand, meeting that sperm, out of millions, and those two people meeting out of seven billion…face it Mark. That fact that you are standing in front of me, now, here, at this moment…is a miracle!”

I didn’t know what to say. I had never thought about it before. Not like that.

I paid my twenty five cents.

He winked as I went inside to get my miracle. He touched my shoulder with a very light, but friendly, pat.

“That first miracle was free. The Twenty five cent one is a doozy.”

I went inside the tent. There was a fish bowl with hundreds of little folded pieces of paper in it. The sign said:

“Pick one. It is your miracle.”

I reached inside the bowl. I took out a piece of paper. It said:

“Look out for the Wind.”

I laughed. I got suckered in by a practiced routine. It was worth the quarter to learn that I was a sucker. Heck, the guy in suspenders deserved a quarter for the “Miracle Mark” spiel. It worked.

I was still laughing when I went outside the tent.

A gust of wind blew a hat towards me. I heard a girl’s voice:

“My hat. Please catch my hat. It was a gift from my grandmother. Please catch it!”

I leaped over some of the tent pegs and ropes. Just barely catching the hat before it blew into the river.

I turned back and the girl slid to a stop a few feet from me.

“Oh, thanks so much. I love that hat and my grandmother isn’t around to give me another.”

She took the hat, our hands touched. Neither of us let go. She smiled up at me.

“Want to buy some cotton candy and ride the roller coaster with me?”

“Sure.”

“Lovely. Watch out for the wind…it might take my hat again.”

I squeezed her hand. My other hand I put in my pocket to check if that slip of paper was still there.

It was.

“Watch out for the wind.”

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