“Dammit!” She slammed through another stack, and slid the entire mess of books aside. Some toppled from the pile, featureless cloth covers catching up dust and disappearing under the wooden bench. Continue reading
Stories
Night Shift Parts 1 and 2
©Ayr/Gray
From Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr’s photo prompt. The Unicorn Challenge (05/26/23). No more than 250 words in length. Otherwise, let your creative flag fly!
This two-parter is a snippet of a longer story that needed editing. Hope it pleases!
Night Shift Part 1
Sophie gazed out the kitchen window. The small harbor town below was glazed in apricot and rose, as the sun climbed the sky. She sipped her second cup of coffee.
Taking a sip of my own, I turned to Sophie. “What happened?”
“There was a collision: a single engine plane that shouldn’t have been flying at night. You know those people who can afford to fly to the remote lake properties often have more money than good judgment.” She spat those final words. Continue reading
Strategy: Punt and Run
The challenge? Write a story in 6 sentences, no more & no less, and if you’d like, share your own creation or just visit and comment on others’ ideas, with GirlieOnTheEdge, Denise. The prompt is “CAROUSEL”, and here’s where you join the party: Six Sentence Stories
She’d retreated to the kitchen to escape the cacophony of what had become weekly shouts and belches that took over the living room, to get herself together and decide the next big thing she needed to do.
She would start with something easy: bake a sourdough loaf, with its usual white-whole wheat mix, and add dried fruit and nuts, with a scattering of spices of indeterminate mixture; nothing calmed her like creating something with her hands that no one had ever tasted before (not that these over-enthused sports nuts her husband had gathered would be able to appreciate the craft that brought her calm). Continue reading
Drinking Game o’ a Saturday Night
The challenge? Write a story in 6 sentences, no more & no less, and if you’d like, share your own creation or just visit and comment on others’ ideas, with GirlieOnTheEdge, Denise. The prompt is “FLUSH”, and here’s where you join the party: Six Sentence Stories
(Yes, playing fast and loose with punctuation, conjunctions, and sentence-length with this one, but the scene begs for a full snapshot. So let’s all…just…chill. Bwahahahaha!)
Three friends sat around the tree trunk that served as a table for a Saturday night card game, a squat three-spouted pitcher of Hazelnut Dark Brew centered between them that was low enough that they might peer with varying success of no-tell, over the cards held fanned out in front of their pendulous noses. Continue reading
For Satan’s Angel
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 “FORGE”, and here’s where you join the party: Six Sentence Stories
Bonus Challenge: From Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr’s photo prompt: The Unicorn Challenge (04/28/23). No more than 250 words in length. Otherwise, let your creative flag fly!
The journey through the dark wood had been long, icy and lightless, even where the steep granite hills broke through like knotty spine and muscular back.
Steady as she goes, they crested the mountain top to find the mine’s entrance, a spiraling drop down a pathway only just wide enough for one wheelbarrow, one man at a time. Continue reading
The Color of Hope
Angus Swanson loved Maribel McIntyre
From near and afar
Since the beginning of time and every moment since
He was a yearbook photographer
She student editor on The Plains Weekly News.
Angus was cool and quiet
Mary the center of every broil Continue reading
Morning Song
From Jenne Gray and C.E. Ayr’s photo prompt: The Unicorn Challenge (04/21/23). No more than 250 words in length. Otherwise, let your creative flag fly!
Moon sets as sun rises, soon disappearing behind a tiny fist of palm. Palm no longer whips, panicked in the worst thunderstorm since forever. The marina is still, taking no damage from wave and wind; the marina is well-protected. That’s why she brought him here.
She looks down at him lying half-out of the water, still handsome despite the battering and near-drowning. He breathes, begins to rouse. There’s a decision to make.
These humans are so fragile! Continue reading
Valley 