#FlashFiction Friday #bravewriting

It's time once again for my weekly writing exercise. Here was today's challenge.

First line: He had enjoyed ten years of being totally irresponsible. (randomly generated line)

Last line: “Yes,” I said. “Isn’t it pretty to think so?” (~Ernest Hemingway)

Exercise: Construct a character who is not present.

He had enjoyed ten years of being totally irresponsible. His visits were scattered whirlwinds of excitement and promise that always fell just short of expectations. In the decade since my dad left, I changed, my mom changed, and the world changed, but he stayed the same. Always a boyish grin and quick joke to distract from any semblance of real conversation—Heaven forbid we get too deep.

At first I believed he would come back and stay. Why wouldn’t he? He was my dad. So his first visit was hardest. It had been over six months then without warning one day there he was outside of school leaning against an old rusted brown car with sunglasses and a smile I had begun to think I imagined.

“Hey, kiddo,” he said. “Did ya miss me?”

I dropped my backpack and flung myself into his waiting arms. He was home. I was right and everyone else had been wrong. He came back. The rest of the day was a blur of sugar, games, and brightly colored lights, which ended in a stomach ache and my mom furious. I fell asleep to the sound of their muffled argument, but still I smiled because my dad was home.  It was two years before I saw him again.

The next time I was a much wiser eight year old. When he breezed back into my life, I hesitated.

“Don’t you recognize your old dad?” he asked.

I stared at him. Nothing had changed except the car he drove, now it was a faded VW bug. But I was different. Hurt does that to a person, it changes them unpredictable ways, but it definitely robs them of their child eyes. I had a new dad now and was cured of my delusions about my real dad staying. But still the trickle of excitement seeped into me and I went with him once again for our day in Never-Never Land.

And so it went on as the years passed. He would always come without warning and be gone hours later. I don’t know what he did or how he survived when he wasn’t here. I didn’t even know where he lived. It could have been a mile or a thousand miles away. Every time he drove a different old car, but he was always happy and made me feel like the center of the universe even if it was just for a few hours.

Mom never said anything after the first time about his visits. She would just accept me home late with a relieved sigh and dry the inevitable teas that came later when he left again. But now she was gone and so was my stepfather. One terrible accident and now the stranger I had worshipped as a kid and tolerated as a teenager was my legal guardian.

“It will be different now,” my friend Emily said.

I gave her a weak smile. “Yes,” I said. “Isn’t it pretty to think so?”

#FlashFiction Friday #BraveWriting

Who's ready for a story/challenge? Just in time for Valentine's Day something romantic....ahahaha I kid. 

Here it is:

Today's flash fiction:Write a 500 word scene where the character experiences a visceral (instinctive and out of their control) reaction to something that is happening.

A hard lump formed in my throat at the base of my neck just above the collar bones. My fingers skimmed the spot expecting to find physical proof of its existence, but all I felt was soft skin. From there my ribs seemed to pull in with sheer and utter panic and my mouth was completely dry, but all I could do was stare out of the window. 

“What a shame the poor bride’s groom is a whore,” repeated over and over in my head as I watched him with her below. They couldn’t even give me one day. No. That wasn’t the right response. 

She tried to leave and he took her hand. I braced myself against the window frame as my knees threatened to give out and the tops of my cheeks burned. He pulled her back to him. The dull ache in my heart throbbed out through the rest of my body. His lips possessed hers as his hand crushed the delicate silk of her dress. I forgot to breathe. She pulled back, shaking her head as I drew in a gasping breath and copious amounts of cool anger that made my hands shake, but strengthened the rest of me. This was my day. Nothing was taking it from me. 

Stepping back from the window, I stood in front of the mirror staring into my own eyes. It would all be okay. Better a tragic widow than a fool of a wife. The color in my cheeks slowly drained with breath. 

There. I was perfect again.



-Liz

#FlashFiction Friday #bravewriting

Hello all,

Here is this's week's piece of flash fiction. I hope you guys are enjoying these as much as I am. Here was the challenge:

Write a story backwards. Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Chronicle of a Death Foretold works this way, more or less. Murder mysteries are told backwards, in a sense. Most stories we tell orally we tell from the middle forward until someone tells us we’ve left out important details, then we double back. You might try taking one of your own short pieces—or someone else’s—and simply reversing the sentences. What then? Unless you’re very lucky, you’ll have to do a good deal to make this reversed piece of prose make sense. Make sure this does not become simply a device. The structure should be inherently useful to the material, which is good advice for any fiction. 500 words.

The path to my future was beat down before me. Impractical shoes wore blisters on my feet. I paused long enough to take them off before starting back forward, not seeing anything before me. The tall dry grass brushed my skirt and tickled my legs, but heart lay bleeding and broken back on that porch with the only man I had ever loved.
Jack had been sitting on the top step of my porch, elbows against his knees and a beer dangling from his fingertips when I got home from my trip.  I left to find myself—God that sounded cliché. The whole cab ride home I debated if I had found what I was looking for at all. Seeing Jack’s unshaven square jaw and serious eyes hungry as they grazed over me, I doubted everything I thought I figured out.
He waited until I was within a few feet of him to look up with a wry, entirely too handsome smile. “You’re home.” His rich baritone was soft and pensive.
I dropped my suitcase on the sidewalk and schlepped up the four steps before I plopped down next to him. “How long have you been here?”
His lips pursed as he shook his head ever so slightly, taking a swig of his beer. “Not long.”
Three more bottles of beer sat behind the post. I reached around him, bumping him with my shoulder as I grasped one bottle and knocked over another. Empty. Raising my eyebrows I straightened. “As I suspected.” I took the bottle out of his hands and took a drink before handing it back.
We sat in comfortable silence for several minutes. Exhaustion plucked at my consciousness make each blink longer and slower. After traveling all day, the only thing I wanted to do was shower and go to bed. “What are you doing here, Jack?”
He took a deep breath and offered me his beer again. I took it as he watched out of the corner of his eye, never once turning toward me. He was obviously in a mood today.
“Do you know what the best part of my day is?” his voice startled me.
My mouth fell open. I pressed my lips together and shook my head.
“It’s sitting on the balcony with you.”
My cheeks were warm and my breath thin. This was it. It was finally going to happen. I glanced at the ceiling of the porch as if I would be able to see the balcony that sat above it. Every evening I sat out on that balcony and waited for him to come home. That moment when he’d look up at me from his driveway next door and smiled just for me had been the best part of my day since the day I moved in. I looked back at his profile, his mouth still thoughtful and his cheekbones sharp. “Is that right?” I handed his beer back to him.
His shoulders drew up with breath and his legs shifted, pressed his knee against mine. Suddenly I was very much awake. The warmth from his leg soaked into mine. His finger laid over mine, but he still didn’t look at me.  “It would appear so.” The vibration of his deep voice ran down my spine.
I wasn’t going to misunderstand this time.  If it killed me, he was going to spell it out. I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. I dropped my head against his shoulder and let this rare moment of vulnerability wash over me. I didn’t have to control everything, but I did need to know he wasn’t going to change his mind again. I couldn’t go through that a second time.  If my trip had taught me anything, it was that I couldn’t keep waiting around for him. I had to live my life. The degree to which Jack would be in it was up to him. It had to be.
“What does that mean?” I finally forced out, terrified he wouldn’t answer—or worse that it changed nothing. He’d still go home like he did every night and leave me in limbo.
Those wonderful, terrible fingers rough to the touch, moved back and forth over mine so gently, so soft. The seedling of hope grew. I couldn’t help it or stop it. This was what I wanted and I was finally getting it. He was finally choosing me.
“I don’t know,” he said.
All heat drained from my body. Piece by piece I broke contact. First, I removed my head from his shoulder, next I slid over enough that our legs were no longer touched, and finally I took my hand from his, feeling each finger tear away a piece of me as they left. It was my turn to breathe deeply. Tears didn’t come, only shocking pain that hardened my insides—a tragic aftermath of hop. I stood up and went back down the stairs. With trembling legs, I pushed each foot forward. I couldn’t go into my house and I didn’t look back.
I’d never look back again.
The worn down path stretched out endless in front of me. It didn’t matter where I was going. All that mattered was that it wasn’t here.

Flash Fiction Friday #BraveWriting

Okay, so this week's flash fiction challenge was this.

"Write a story in present tense about the girl in the picture below. What is she listening to on the radio? Show how it reflects her mood about where she is going without stating the mood. (this challenges us to write in present tense as well as to work on as well as using elements of the setting to tell us about the character)

So here goes!

Song: Sick Muse – Metric

I can see the city still miles away, but closer than it has ever been. My car slows to a stop on the empty highway as Metric blares from my speakers too loud for sitting still, but just loud enough for driving fast. Fast is the only way I want to drive. Each mile my tires gobble up is another one away from Harvey.

Pssh. Harvey. What kind of stupid name is that? It’s a hipster name that’s what it is—probably not even his real name. His entire persona is an affectation down to his fake glasses, teal shorts, and $90 t-shirt that looks like it comes from Goodwill—but doesn’t. Add a blond straggly beard, shitty music playing in the background on a record player, and a $6 cup of coffee made by a giant corporation he claims to hate but still frequents daily, and that is exactly how he looked when I left.

My head bobs up and down to the music and I sing with the singer about living my life instead of being tied down by Cupid’s plans and those nasty little arrows. He says I’m a sellout because I want to make money doing my art instead of letting my parents support me. How does that even make sense?

Well one thing is for certain, I’m not with stupid anymore. So yeah, Cupid, take your arrows back or I will pluck them out myself. Perhaps money is a sick muse, but this sellout is ready to play the lead.

Flash Fiction

I wrote a little flash fiction piece this afternoon as a writing exercise to get the creative juices flowing. This one took a bit of a dark turn, but it was a lot of fun to write. Basically flash fiction is something where you have a picture and/or a challenge for you to write about.

Here is my picture

And here is the challenge: Defying Stereotypes: Take two typically stereotypical characters and make them your own in 500 words or less.

And here is my story (entirely unedited or read by me so don't get judgy)

The technician walked into the room. A young woman with pale hair and skin sat with her chin down on her chest that lifted and sank softly with calm even breaths. You wouldn’t know it by looking at her—the destruction she caused. One had to be removed, but which would the doctor choose?

Two minds waged a war for domination inside of the petite frame. Two voices struggled to be heard without making a sound. One dress, one body, and one chance to choose the correct personality before both were lost forever. The Hyde to the other’s Jekyll lurked beneath the passive exterior. There could be only one though two choices remained.

The woman’s head snapped up when the doctor entered the room as if she had known not to bother with the technician. Her hooded, dull eyes looked straight through him to something beyond before her head jerked to the right.

“Help me. I can’t fight her any longer.”

Her head whipped to the left. “I was here first. She is the abomination.”

“Please,” she begged to the right. “Please help.”

“Don’t listen.” The woman snapped back to the left. “She speaks only lies.”

The woman looked right through the young technician with bright, glossy eyes. “Why is she doing this to me? Please you must help me.”

The technician took a step toward the patient.

“Do not approach the subject,” the doctor said his voice flat and impersonal.

The technician stayed his feet.

The woman’s head rolled to the left. “Destroy her.”

“Please, please help.” She looked down and to the left her lower lip quivering.

“I have seen enough,” the doctor stated, nodding to the technician.

The young man approached her cautiously, though she was restrained, with his cart. She had murdered six people, tore their bodies apart like a wild beast. The leather straps at her thin, pale arms didn’t give him comfort. One by one he place the cold, gooey electrodes on her. She didn’t struggle or speak though her eyes stoically followed his movements. He oh so carefully placed the bite guard in her mouth. When he finished he backed away as far as the cords would allow. The doctor stepped closer.

“I know which one of you are,” he said squatting down in front of her.

Those dark eyes rose to meet his. She blinked and head tilted to the right then it tipped to the left. He gave the signal to the technician and electricity coursed through her body, making her muscles strain and snap and her teeth clench against the guard. His fingers hovered over the button waiting for the single to stop, but the doctor didn’t give it. He shifted and chewed on his lip. His fingers twitched over the button. They’d kill her if they didn’t stop soon.

“Now,” the doctor said.

He flipped the machine off and the woman went limp in the chair. The doctor waited a couple beats before he moved closer and undid the leather straps at her arms, she slumped in the chair. One by one her removed the electrodes then retrieved the mouth guard as well.

Her eyes snapped open and her teeth sank deep before she tore them away and spit out a hunk of flesh. The doctor’s scream gurgled in his throat as his useless hand pawed at the spraying wound.

The woman stood, knocking the doctor out of the way, turning toward the technician. Her white dress and deathly pale skin spatter with blood as her black eyes found him. The doctor had chosen the wrong.

A slow crimson smile spread on her face. “I want to tell you a secret.”

The technician blinked.

“There is no Dr. Jekyll.”

His screams echoed down the empty hallways.  

-Liz