In Varsity Lifestyle's second feature in collaboration with Cambridge Creatives, Phoebe Chen discusses flash fiction, creative inspiration and cake in Cambridge. Check out 'Darkroom', one of Phoebe's pieces, at the end of the article. 

Why flash fiction?

The way I see it, flash fiction is like Vine videos, or at least its literary equivalent. It’s literature for people who (1) have no time, or (2) have no patience. And because less is more, more or less.

How personal is your writing? 

I get more retrospective than introspective if that makes any sense. It’s more about lifting a person or a feeling out of my memory and letting it – whatever it may be – grow, take shape, and mutate, because by then it already has a mind of its own.

How do you go about finding the untranslatable words featured in your column? 

This is going to sound boring but practical: google.

Why do you think some languages have words which others feel are unnecessary?  

So yesterday when I was telling my friends about ‘fernweh’ (German = feeling homesick for a place you’ve never been), one of them said it sounded like the Germans didn’t like living in Germany very much, if they had a word to describe longing for another place as their home. Somehow I didn’t know what to say, and it kind of clicked. I don’t know why the Germans have ‘fernweh’ in their dictionary while we don’t. Maybe it says something about the German culture or maybe it shows the impoverished state of the English language. Either way it doesn’t cancel out the fact that the German language appears more nuanced and whimsical than before.

Does it ever bother you that people might misinterpret what you've written? Can they? 

It’s totally possible for people to misinterpret what the story means, which I don’t mind. I’d like to think it’s amusing when that happens, but maybe the reader doesn’t find it so. 

Favourite flash fiction piece or writer? 

Um. I don’t have one. But I like the ‘Flash Friday’ series on Tin House. The one attributed to Ernest Hemingway isn’t really a favourite but it’s probably the most memorable: “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”

Best place to write in Cambridge, in your opinion? Why? 

Afternoon Tease. It has a good vibe, and if you’ve been there then you know what I’m talking about. And the cakes. They’re amazing. So really I go for the cakes and end up writing. Somehow it just works out that way.

Take a look at Phoebe's gorgeous piece below, and her weekly column on Cambridge Creatives: Phoebe Chen for more. 

'Darkroom' -  Phoebe Chen

It was a soul bottled up that she held in her hand.
A little hard to see.
A little unrelenting.
A little fragile.

It took a special kind of cruelty to wrap her fingers around it.
The way her nails were barely touching was hard on the soul.

She filled the ivory tub with liquid that glistened silver on the surface.
Tugging back a strand of hair that had fallen out while she reached for the vials, the soul hummed in anticipation, not knowing if it would hurt since it did not even know whether it was capable of having pain anymore.

Three grams of this, and a dash of that. And the water rolled with a touch of impatience.

Finally she submerged the soul, swirled it around and let it settle.
All the while, she was counting to the sound of his heartbeat.

With tongs and leather gloves, she took out the soul and dried it and polished it with a black velvet cloth. She parted the curtains with a quick wave of her hand. The acrid smell of chemicals followed her like hungry stray cat as she left the dark room.

A lady in a cream blazer stood alone, waiting. She had the air of someone who was used to waiting as she was being waited on.

“Here is your photo-glass. The fee altogether will be seventeen Cronos.”
The lady reached for the glass with moving pictures inside and dropped it into a wooden box lined with satin of a blue that reminded her of the colour of fortune.

“Nice job, as always. Come to my place tomorrow at twenty o’clock on the dot. I have a few more for you to develop.”
“Yes, of course. I’ll send my apprentice with the necessary equipment for safe conveyance. Might I ask, how many souls?”
“Just two.”
“Of course.”