Follow 1

/ Liz H

The challenge? Write a story in 6 sentences, no more & no less, and if you’d like, share your creation or just visit and comment on others’ ideas, with GirlieOnTheEdge, Denise. The prompt is “LEAD”, and here’s where you join the party: Six Sentence Stories  

***

“C’mon then,” he said, his hand held out, fingers beckoning impatiently.

“I’m not sure,” she replied, and tipping her head back to gaze up the tall tower’s stairway curling up out of sight and seemingly disappearing into night, long before twilight had even begun on their current ground level, she added “I heard this place was haunted, and that those who go up never come back down.”

“Nonsense…I’ll bet you never actually heard from anyone who didn’t return,” he barked, mounting the stairs and dragging her up after him.

“My point exactly,” she mumbled, and shrugging, followed his lead anyway because he was kind of cute for such a weirdo.

They climbed up and around for what seemed like forever until finally, they reached the point beyond which they could go no further, and he prized open the heavy wooden shutters to let in the light of a full moon that shone through an exquisite stained glass leaded window, comprised of rolling green fields, crisp blue skies, brown and blond-striped rabbits nibbling purple clover, their snowy white cottontails tilted toward a friendly sun, and a far distant castle that glinted red and gold; it was more portal than window, and it called them to step through.

How would you answer, given the world we’re faced with at present?

© Liz Husebye Hartmann (2023)

26 thoughts on “Follow 1”

  2. Ah, do I spy a subtle Princess Bride reference? “We’ll never survive the fire swamp!” “Nonsense, you’re only saying that because no one ever has” / “Nonsense…I’ll bet you never actually heard from anyone who didn’t return,”

    A very intriguing start!

    Liked by 1 person

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    • Oh my! I didn’t even think of that, and Princess Bride is one of my favorite movies and books.
      Yeah, we’ll see where this one wants to go. Just writing/pantsing on the fly!

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  3. So if he’s on the evil, weirdo side, does he get women to step, hypnotized, through the window and fall to their death and then bury all the bodies…?

    Liked by 1 person

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  4. Pingback: Follow 2 | Valley of the Trolls

  6. I liked his attempt at an argument: “I’ll bet you never actually heard from anyone who didn’t return” It is probably best not to follow his lead. What is on the other side of that portal looks too good to be true.

    Liked by 1 person

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  11. “All houses wherein men have lived and died
    Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
    The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
    With feet that make no sound upon the floors…

    …The spirit-world around this world of sense
    Floats like an atmosphere, and everywhere
    Wafts through these earthly mists and vapoursdense
    A vital breath of more ethereal air…

    …Our little lives are kept in equipoise
    By opposite attractions and desires;
    The struggle of the instinct that enjoys,
    And the more noble instinct that aspires…

    …And as the moon from some dark gate of cloud
    Throws o’er the sea a floating bridge of light,
    Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd
    Into the realm of mystery and night…”
    Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    So Liz…into the realm of mystery is my answer.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

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