A brother and sister show up at your house claiming they grew up there in the '60s. You agree to let them look around. Big mistake.
At first I thought I’ll hide in the kitchen and pretend not to be home. But my curiosity changed that plan. The pitch and timber of their voices on the porch, a woman and a man, clearly, and something out of sorts.
I cracked the door and she, pretty and rail thin, was inside before speaking a word, and heading for the stairs. When I turned to say something, he came in and said in a condescending way I’d painted the front hall one out of a million off-whites.
I’m not keen on this carpet, Ken. What was it when we were here?
Blue.
No it wasn’t, it was green.
Excuse me?
Oh sorry, this used to be our house.
Yeah we grew up here.
Oh really, I grew up here too.
Until….
We’ve both done well since then, moved up the ladder as they say, ha ha. Pretty far up.
Ken here lives in eighty five hundred square feet, actually. I’ve got over six, but in two different places.
Interesting.
It’s plainer than I remember.
And smaller.
When you’re small you remember things big.
Then you see them later and they’re small.
That’s where the theory of relativity comes from.
Ken is in real estate.
Well la de da, I said. This house has been in my family since the nineteen fifties.
That couldn’t be.
Right. We were here then. In the fifties.
Wait.
Yeah, wait a minute. Ken . . .
Silvie.
I’m Daniel, by the way, and you’re in my house.
There are times when the theory of relativity is useful.
Indeed, Daniel, said Silvie, looking between me, and her brother Ken, in such a way she looked to be shaking her head, no, no.
Susana had sad eyes and she drove slowly, always, taking long sucking drags on her skinny cigarettes and flicking the ashes out the open window.
Susana had sad eyes, whites dull and heavy as marshmallows, and she smoked such skinny cigarettes.
Sad-eyed Susana dreamed of marshmallows more often than she dreamed of anything else, even her late mother, but she ate no sugar, preferring to devote all her vice bandwidth to those long and skinny cigarettes.
Marsha was overweight for most of her childhood and she received so many unfortunate and predictable schoolyard names, but on that very first gas station stop of her first drive out of state, the actual moment of leaving home, she bought her first pack of smokes and gave the leering brown-toothed man behind the counter a fake number, and said her name was Susana. She didn’t realize she would keep both the name and the habit.
Susana had sad eyes, someone might say who had caught only the hound-dog languor of her beauty. She was not actually sad most of the time, just highly uncertain what to do with herself. Usually, when she felt the uncertainty hit its highest, vertiginous pitch, she would raid the shoe-box of emergency cash in the closet, and get a full carton of smokes from the bodega. That and one large bag of X-tra-Fluff marshmallows with the puffed-up lettering in blue, orange and green. Susana would go up on the roof and alternate pleasures until she felt ill, leaving a wide cupful of ash to be emptied, slowly, by the wind.
Susana didn’t expect the diagnosis, as nobody, not even hypochondriacs, really expect it when it comes, but the tall, large-handed doctor mistook her large, sad eyes for a kind of wise-beyond-her-years equanimity, and for the first time in his career he asked a patient out to dinner.
After crab legs and prosecco and spirited fucking, Susana reflected that this man, though a doctor, would not really be able to care for her, at least not in the ways she had expected, while he too partook of a long cigarette beside her. But, he was like her a Midwesterner, and they spoke of ambrosia salad studded with tiny, stiff marshmallows, and of their late mothers, and she reflected that she might just one day grow fat again, with him, and maybe even happy.
This is just beautiful! I love all the repetition, the rich details, the soul, the heart of this piece, and the last line is absolute gold! It reads like poetry to me.
Thanks! And ooh yes such an interesting point - I always wonder about this kind of question, as to which bits should be specified and which left open. Too far in either direction and it breaks..
[A brother and sister show up at your house claiming they grew up there in the '60s. You agree to let them look around. Big mistake.]
"Oh, we're sure it's the one," the woman called Miranda said. "To tell you the truth, we fed the number into Google Street View and looked at it carefully. You've built on an extension to include the garage, but...
"Not I," I said. I'd been settling down to write when the doorbell had rung, and I was not in the best of moods. "All that was done when we bought the place."
"When was that?" the brother -- Jake, he said he was -- asked.
"It was in... '93."
He had a little notebook in his hand, and he was scribbling in it with a little pencil like they give away at IKEA.
"What we noticed," Miranda said, "was the sundial up there on that sort of turret thing. We remembered it immediately!"
"Oh, that," I said. "Yes, it was there when we moved in. It's broken. Doesn't tell the time any more."
"It was there when we lived here," she said. "It gave us quite a thrill to see it!"
"Could we take a look inside?" Jake asked.
"If we're not disturbing you," the sister added.
I heaved an inward sigh and opened the front door. For a while I counted minutes as I escorted them round from room to room, Miranda exclaiming and Jake scribbling. Then they stopped.
"Do you remember this, Jake?" Miranda asked, pointing to a plastered white wall.
Jake shook his head and tapped the wall with one knuckle. "Hollow," he said.
"It wasn't here back in our time," Miranda said, looking at me.
I shrugged. "No idea when it was done."
"Up there above, it's the turret, right?" the brother said. "There could be stairs going up there."
"The turret's all sealed off," I told him. "Anyway, if there were stairs, you'd be remembering them. Wouldn't you?"
He pointed at me with a straight index. "Right."
"Now, if you don't mind, I said, "I have work to do."
"Oh, don't let us disturb you any more," Miranda said hurriedly. "You've been very kind."
When they'd gone, I settled down to work again. Could not. Nerves hopping. The cheek of some people!
The doorbell rang. "Miranda" with a search warrant. "Jake" with a squad of workers with tools.
"We're taking that wall down," he said. "See what you've got hidden in there."
I was never sure, not fully, if I was attending the weekly support group for people who thought they had died but hadn’t, or people who had died but couldn’t accept the fact. How would you even know? Whichever group you were at, everyone would be someway between the two positions but they’d be there exactly because they were mistaken one way or the other.
I was there because I was ashamed.
I was ashamed for choking to death at 21 years old, alone at a bus shelter under a cloudless sky in the afternoon. On a marshmallow. Like I said, I wasn’t a hundred percent certain, but, whether or not I had lost consciousness and woken deluded into thinking I was dead and through some oxygen-starved haze had come to believe I was in the afterlife, or whether I really had died and the afterlife happened to offer support groups in community halls for those that couldn’t accept the facts of their death, it didn’t matter. I was in the wrong place.
Whichever way round it was, I needed the group for people who were ashamed of how they had died, irrespective of whether they’d died or not and whether or not they knew which way round it was. It was the feeling I wanted to shake, not the delusion.
Brian, he was in the right place. I liked Brian, I was glad he was getting the help he needed. He always sat on the chair to my right, always saved me a seat and never judged me for being late, and always whispered to me while the leader was introducing the session’s goals.
‘How’s your week been?’
‘Shit show,’ I’d say.
He always chuckled at this, and would take out a bag of mints from his coat pocket and offer me one. He wasn’t being insensitive. I’d never shared how I got where I was, and anyway, I wasn’t going to make that mistake again, so I always took one, and would quietly shift it around in my mouth while we listened to the week’s newcomers introduced themselves.
I liked listening to their stories. Their world seemed so simple. They accepted the circumstances of their own deaths entirely, just didn’t agree with the outcome. I guess that’s why I kept coming back. It was soothing to be around people who weren’t humiliated. And anyway, I like a mint.
Good story. When I was a teenager I used to collect facts of embarrassing deaths. For some reason I thought dying from having a pig fall on you would’ve been embarrassing but apparently it’s not uncommon :)
Just tried to be strict with myself and write into the dark on this (having read SC about intention and realised I probably write that poem about dogs more often than not)
Writing just as far as your headlights can see is both scary and very fun. I always love seeing what I come up with that didn't exist only moments before.
Love the premise and the opening line -- and love where you went with it, or where it went with you. Into-the-dark worked! And in particular, "He wasn't being insensitive" - ha!
We’ve had the same Thanksgiving dinner with the same ingredients prepared in the same way every Thanksgiving since 1950. There will be no changes. We’re looking at you, Sarah. You may have spent 1968 in Florence, but you’re home now, and we don’t want your risotto on our Thanksgiving table.
2. No martinis before the guests arrive.
For reasons clear to all who were with us last year, there will be no martinis before the dinner guests arrive. This ban applies to both the members of the household and our houseguests.
3. No passive-aggressive contests.
The no-preparty martini rule should eliminate this problem, but to be clear, no contests. As we all recall, last year my brother prepared a pitcher of martinis at 11:00 am. My sister-in-law, brother, and husband all imbibed. I refrained as I still had a turkey to stuff and pies to make. At 2:00 pm, my sister-in-law, two martinis in, produced a frozen pie crust she had secreted into the house along with a jar of premade mincemeat. (I had prepared my homemade mincemeat Wednesday afternoon, the same afternoon I ironed the table linens, shined the silver, and put fresh sheets on the guest bed.) She put her jarred mincemeat in the frozen crust, threw it into my oven, and announced that we would have a blind taste test during dessert to see which was better, her pie or mine. She said I would thank her when she won because it would save me work next year. I will not ever thank her for that.
4. No Running Off for a Round of Golf When the Going Gets Rough
The no-preparty martini rule should take care of this also. However, my husband and brother are forbidden from leaving to play golf when they realize, as my husband so ineptly puts it, that “the fur is about to fly.”
5. No Surprises
No surprises. None of us can endure another announcement like Mike’s last year. Empty pie plates and full stomachs are not the setting for telling your wife, closest friends, and relatives that you’ve been having an affair for the past two months and will be moving into your lover’s apartment on Black Friday. Enough said.
I remain optimistic that if we adhere to these simple rules, we will have much to be thankful for this November.
I liked it ok until everyone stopped serving turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce and moved into enlightened new agey dishes with a hundred ingredients you never heard of before.
Especially as the hostess was so uptight from not drinking martinis OR woozy from not respecting her own rule about not drinking martinis, that she made her piecrust hard as nails.
1. Carve out a large block of free time. Take all your accumulated leave, add in a few sick days, and plan to spend up to two weeks of uncompensated time, if you can afford it. Don’t worry about any deliverables that will fall due during this period. Drop the kids off at your ex-husband’s. Tell your boyfriend you’ll see him in a couple of months. (Now might even be a good time to break up with him, if that’s something you’ve been considering.)
2. Find a suitable space. If you stay home, you’ll feel tempted to clean the oven or paint the kids’ room. Ask your friend Amy if you can borrow her lakeside cottage, since it isn’t the season when she goes there. When she asks whether you’re bringing a plus-one, laugh and say, “I’m sworn to secrecy.”
3. Equip yourself with the right tools. Think seriously about whether you want to use word processing or some more specialized software, like Scrivener. End up buying every piece of software anyone has ever recommended. Stock up on pencils and notepads, just in case.
4. Buy some good books to bring with you. Great literature, or even novels that sold well, could be inspiring while you’re writing your novel; on the other hand, they could make you feel that everything worth saying has already been said. Or that your chances of producing anything as good are approximately nil. Serious nonfiction would be a good choice, unless it makes you so anxious about the state of the world that you wonder what the point of literature even is anymore.
5. Come up with a title for your novel. Make a list of twenty titles. Cross off the ones that sound too corny. Check out the others on Amazon to see whether anyone else has used those titles before. List twenty more titles.
6. When you get to the cottage, unpack your suitcase, set up your laptop on the kitchen table, and write an opening sentence. Try to make it memorable.
7. Look out the kitchen window at the lake. Open the window and listen to the birds singing. Make a note to buy binoculars and bird feeders.
P.S. Mary - No, you haven't been writing too much in your prompts! I get so much out of those. I mean, if you need to step back and do less, you should, but don't do it on our account!
We cannot buy candy at the neighborhood grocery anymore. Cozy Corner, they sell penny candies and bubble gum. Mother forbids us to walk inside. They installed a pinball machine. She is convinced it is a gambling device and that reminds her of Uncle Fred, her brother-in-law who runs a gambling joint across the street from the City Hall. That place is full of prostitutes, and men from City Hall who throw dice and play cards. Smoky, it is full of smoke.
So Cozy Corner is off limits. We watch our buddies enter this sinful haven and buy our candy for us. Standing on the sidewalk we hear the jingle-thump-clang of the bells on the machine as the Hanson brothers feed it quarters. We can only imagine what is going on because we have never seen the device they stand before with bells clanging, and red lights flashing in their eyes. A Hanson brother pushing his entire body against the device. It is a body thrust with his hands perched on the sides of the machine, guiding the metal ball we are told.
Left in the downpour, soaked through, fireproofing leached away, a shoe waits beside the kitchen door.
The shoe, the last evidence of the family that had lived there.
The boy — it was his shoe — hadn’t wanted to leave. He thought there’d be a chance to save everything. He thought the rain would stop but the sun wouldn’t come this time. But his parents had seen this before, and before that, and told him to get in the vehicle. Now. Don’t even finish getting dressed. Pick up your fireproofs and get in the vehicle. Now. So he got in but left his shoe by the kitchen door. We have to go back for my shoe he said after five minutes. Too late, father says. I have extra shoes. But its my favorite shoe, boy says. Too late, mother says. They drive on and the boy looks out the window.
He can’t see anything through the torrential rain. He feels the vehicle handle the rough road, then the streambed, then the unpaved pass over their mountain.
On the other side of the mountain, the rain has stopped. The heat suffocates. The vehicle shelters from the sun but doesn’t comfort. The boy looks out the window. Small fires start spontaneously, all the way across the plain. Where there aren’t new fires there are dying fires. Houses and churches and stores smolder and collapse. Flames point at the vehicle; they drive faster, toward the next mountain pass.
Behind them, on the other side of their mountain, the rain stops. The sun rises over the peak, scorching the unpaved road, vaporizing the water in the streambed, melting drowned leaves on the driveway. The house goes in a breath of annihilation. The shoe, the last evidence, bursts into flame.
Mary's "apocalyptic" is right. What happens when when this family, and all the others forced to flee, fast, ahead of the scourging faces of exponential environmental change don't just get away over the mountains only to find they've run smack bang into the impenetrable wall of a securely closed border or impossible to navigate turbulent waters?
You're just following in the footsteps of Cormac McCarthy and Steinbeck, though. Both of them Pulitzer Prize winners for putting their fictional families in impossible situations. Good stuff here.
Why be sorry... oh yes, I sorry because the misfortune and jeopardy that's befallen this fictional family raises our empathy with so many in the real world whose unfolding lives are having to cope with not just one-off but recurrent catastrophes. Used to be kagoules were the thing to have to hand and wear in the face of cope with adverse weather: fire-suits up the ante very considerably!
When three distinct knocks sounded on the door that afternoon, Millicent was folding laundry. A sharp rap, followed by a hollow echoing knock, and an open-handed thud. Before Millicent could answer the front door, the sequence began again. As that final thud sounded, she opened the door to her neighbor, Dave, standing on her front porch.
“Hey, young lady!” he greeted her, smiling.
She hated his “young lady” crap. Was he mocking her?
“Hello, Dave.”
“Hey, if you ever want to use our new can crusher, just come on over.”
“Well thanks, but–” she paused and asked him, “Do you hear ukulele music?”
“Um…no.”
She heard it again. An off key rendition of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and someone who had lost track of the lyrics.
“Where is that coming from?”
“Dunno…but we wondered if we can play pinball. My grandkids love it!”
“Pinball? Why are you asking me–?” But then she heard it: pinging, clanging, chiming, and flashing its lights–a fully operational Willy Wonka pinball machine. On her driveway. As she stepped through the screendoor, the machine gave a resounding knock that made her jump, and announced a Replay.
“I…” She looked around. “I guess…”
“Great!” Dave called across the street and his 5 grandkids joined him on the driveway.
Elliot arrived home from work an hour later, jumped out of the car, and ran over to join them.
“This is great!” He called to Millicent.
“Oh wait! I stopped at the store. We were out of marshmallows!” He reached into the backseat and pulled out a giant-sized bag of Sta-Puft marshmallows.
“Hey, did you know the first people to eat marshmallows were the ancient Egyptians?” called Dave. “They were medicinal.”
The crowd around the pinball machine now included the ukulele player, and everyone was singing “Pinball Wizard” while he played.
“At least they know the words,” Millicent thought.
Just then a car drove up and two people got out.
“Hey, can we look around?” A dark-haired man wearing a flat cap and a green bomber jacket asked her.
His companion, a willowy woman with long brown hair and a flowing skirt offered her hand to Millicent.
“We grew up in this house. In the 1960’s! I’m Elena, and this is Todd.”
“I think you are mistaken,” Millicent responded. “This house was built in 1970.”
“No, no…I remember the pinball machine. So glad you kept that!”
I loved the guy, he was my dad it's what you do. But there were times; it wasn't always plain sailing. There was the job for a start. Pa was a musician, they called him 'King Clarinet', maybe a little ragging going on there. So money was 'hit and miss'. When there was a run of gigs, maybe a recording session with one of the kingpins, it would be steak and frites. When the bookings dried, more like sausage and beans, sometimes sans sausage.
But that wasn't really the issue, the issue that would overheat, smoulder, then burst into flames. OK, it wasn't just his fault. Ma was a terrific lady but she had a temperament, the kind of temperament betrayed by the auburn locks that cascaded down to her shoulders in curves and swirls and meanders that mesmerised you if you happened to glance in that direction. In the ordinary way she was sweet and kind and even-minded and we never doubted for even a splinter of a micro-second that King C was at the centre of her world. But in return she wanted the same unconditional.
She wanted it but she knew that could never happen. And for the most part she ran with it. Till this one time. She opened the case, looked inside, glowered at the rival. It was just bad luck that right on cue King C strolled in to witness the full-on bad-eyeing. He took off, struck the rafters, descended back onto his loafers, rocked forwarded, gathered the gleaming Buffet-Crampon into tender hands. And swooned.
Swooned and spoke, 'Benny Goodman gave me this. Said never let it leave your side. Benny was right, look what's goin on.'
Ma saw the tender hands. We saw the ire bubble, rise, steam and then volcano. She erupted. Not just with words but with hands and nails. Words we didn't know but would learn later, hands that slapped, nails that scratched.
And then screamed the oath, 'It's me or her. I'll never spend another night with that serpent in my bedroom.'
Dad left that night. He'd come and pick us up on Saturdays. We'd go for a drive. Me and Sis would sit up front, the back seats reserved for the case.
Four chairs are around a coffee table. David is emptying the last of the potato chips into bowls. He looks around.
This room is Party Ready.
He stares at a chair
POP
A girl is sitting in the chair
Hi I’m Binny- is the party through there?
No it’s here- Hi Binny-I’m David
I have strawberry cider in my bag
I have a Riesling that slaps you round the head or a better one that takes you behind the library for a good talking to
She smiles at him blankly
POP
A blonde boy sits on chair next to Binny
Hi- Tim Freckle- Got some Green ginger wine
We could mix them- David grabs glasses- returns to the two talking and giggling
What would be incredible Binny?
Tim’s friend went to a party The Excitement was at
Whoa
Hell yeah. Did you invite him?
No
Why do people have parties and not even try?
Use that energy to focus on the Excitement
They focus
POP
An old lady is seated, rubbing her calves
I’m Dorothy
Hi Dorothy- we’re focussing on inviting The Excitement
No point we’ve used all the chairs
Silence
I’d like to meet the Excitement
Bring a chair next time said Tim Freckle
I will leave gracefully, not being here will make me happier
Are you sure Dorothy? You might not be able to get back in
Definitely wont
I have a husband who loves me- he just won’t shut up
You can Say Home three times anytime you want out
I dont even go to parties without the Exhilaration. HOME HOME
Wait Dorothy says Binny
HOME
( Dorothy disappears )
She got more interesting at the end
What kind of people are we?
People at a party- everyone focus on the Excitement now
POP
A little man chewing on something long pink and stretchy appears
and freezes on the chair, mid chew
Are you the Excitement ?
Maybe
I knew it
Party just exploded like my head
Thanks for coming
I’m not the Excitement. Used to be- got banned- My Grandson’s friend is the Excitement
Oooohhh
Don’t get your hopes up- Greg’s hard to find, won’t carry a phone. He says he cant hear the call if he’s on the phone
Who does that?
Totally anti social
How do we get him?
You could ask Emmet. He loves any attention the bastard
Emmet!
Get off my chair!
The Little man disappears- annoyed- as a young man tries to deliberately squash him on his way in
Waddup Pigeons- Gugs- Excitement Here
Really?
I thought you just knew the Excitement?
I’m the Excitement Idiot
Ok…are you sure…?
Are you sure you’re not the worst guest ever? At the lamest party on Earth?
Who believes him?
Three of them shake their heads
Emmet reddens- then purples- about to burst with anger- he picks up a bowl of peanuts- rubs it into his armpit- puts it back- then starts to suck for air, then starts to cry.
HOOOOOOOOMMMMMME!
The chair is empty
SILENCE
That guy was a new Party low
Toxic
SILENCE
Please stay everyone- pleads David
I have an early thing- mumbles Tim, home home home
Binny please stay
You know I would- but the Dorothy biz is legit giving me anxiety which gives me indigestion- home home home
Awww- alone again on Tuesday night
He pours himself a riesling that slaps him round the head
David turns off the music. He starts covering chips and throwing out peanuts- goes to blow out a candle
POP
( Music starts to play. Music David has never heard )
Hi- I’m Greg. this place is hard to find
He is a golden masterpiece of sculpted flesh bone and muscle. In a suit
WOW- you look like a K pop star who become a movie star because they’re too handsome for just one thing and probably a genius
I wish it was the first time I’d heard that…but it IS…THANK YOU!
POP
Binny!
Thought it might be your first party- share the anxiety
Meet the Excitement
NO! You’re Not! Of course you ARE!
I love your name Binny- something is starting for you tonight
Binny grips her chair with excitement
Oh my Goodness when the real thing happens you Know
Feels completely different
POP
Emmet pops back.
Helloooo,
he looks at the floor
Emmet…says The Excitement…we’ve discussed this
Greg please let me stay for once, I promise, I’ll be Positive-Emmet
Haven’t seen him in years…What do we think?…Shall we start out with an unselfish act, knowing we can boot him at any moment?
Emmet looks at Binny to speak
I’m only going to say positive things in the presence of the Excitement so I’ll leave that to someone else
Emmet mouths Filthy Bitch. No one sees him
David speaks
You can stay Emmet but one bad move and you’ll be thrown out the window
Nicely done David, says the Excitement, you are becoming a force to be reckoned with- I have a gift for you. He blows up an inflatable chair
Binny looks at David- impressed
POP
Dorothy is back. Sitting on the blow up chair
He didn’t know I was gone- Hadn’t stopped talking
Welcome Dorothy
We missed you
The Excitement speaks calmly- the music has quietened out of respect
David’s hand has clenched Binny’s without either of them realizing it
There’s a little bit of extra room in your heart, up the top, it’s an extra fifth of heart, untouched, it’s about to take in new Excitement. All of you are going to be simultaneously calmed, energized and filled with a joy you thought Baptists made up singing at Church, except darker and sexier, with great lighting- ( the lighting adjusts-the music is incredible, new- yet filled with some nostalgic heart-squeezing importance )
Lil Binny you’re going to fall in love this year
Really? Whispered Binny
The Excitement’s eyes are tender pools of truth
What is your dream…David?
(David shrugs happily)
Maybe this was my dream
Humble. No one’s ever said that. How about a party a month for a year?
Oh heck yeah
Emmet?
I’d like heaps of cash money and a lot of crypto
What else?
…A better personality?
Up to you. What are your dreams?
A cat?
You will have a cat
Dorothy speaks
I’d like to write a book someday, but really right now or I’ll go mad
The Excitement speaks-
It’ll be a lot of work, but people will love your book
Dorothy cant stop smiling
There’s a bubble tea kiosk- your used cups get made into Bowling pins for elderly people who want the dignity of Bowling at home
Dorothy we could bowl with you- said Binny
No. Maybe a walk in the morning before I write
The place looks huge, the bar is cozy- the cerise glowing dancing room beyond is inviting
Binny gets up and nearly slips, on the Excitement’s softly raining dewy vapour- David catches her-
Will you come to all my parties?
I dont know- can you dance?
I don’t know
Let’s find out
They dance- Laughing and hugging and singing and whispering and Dancing Slower and Faster and Faster
I just love how this is so original and unique (a story can take any form!) and also I'm glad Dorothy will write her book. I'll pre-order it from my local bookstore.
Getting to this a day later Mary, but just wanted to say that I love your prompts!! I really appreciate all the work you put into them and all the wonderful examples you provide. These snippets are great too, but if I may be honest... your prompts are the best! :) I always look forward to what you cook up. The highlight of my Monday morning.
Thank you, Imola! I know you're busy over there in your delightful substack, adding yoga to the mix! Love watching you expand into new directions (and hopefully, you're having fun, too).
It was my fault. I’d been showing off. But wasn’t that to be expected, a young man out on the street with his mates?
I didn’t believe he was legit anyway. Who would? This guy stops you, says, ‘Look, I’m pretty much done here, you can have this last one on me, no catches, I just want out,’ and he looks tired, so tired, I mean spiritually tired. You notice the litter blowing by, you notice the urine stains in the doorways, you see your reflection in the shop windows. You don’t think beyond these things.
‘Whatever,’ I say.
No no no. He hangs his head, shakes his head, puts his hand on my shoulder, turns those tired old eyes on me.
‘I’m not messing kid. Don’t foul this up. I mean it, I’m done, got one more wish to give away and then I am out. No catches, I mean it, nothing coming back to bite you, no be careful what you wish for,’ he gripped a little harder, locked me in his eyes,’ you get a free hit here’.
He was offering me a wish. A wish! As if he was some kind of devil!
I want to shake his hand off my shoulder, I don’t want to be called kid, but he he really looks like he means it.
‘You go girl!’
‘You into him?’
‘He had you at hello!’
‘That a banana in your pocket?’
The boys snap me out of his glare.
‘No. No way. Just get-‘
‘I mean it,’ he says, ‘don’t pass this up.’
‘Whatever old man. I just want a banana,’ I step my shoulder away from him, gesture down at his crotch, ‘like yours.’ The boys laugh.
‘A banana?’ he sighs, looks away, and when he returns his glare the tiredness has passed, there’s something else there, some life.
‘A banana,’ he says ‘on your person?’
‘On your what, bro?’
‘On him, innit? On him,’ the boys were gesturing at their own crotches now. I was out of the woods.
‘Yeah. On my person.’
And that’s that. To be fair to the old devil, he tried. I really do think he tried to be kind. There’s always, always, a banana secreted somewhere about me, in a pocket, under my hat, down my sock, tucked between my, well, somewhere about me. It’s annoying, it’s uncomfortable, though you learn to live with it, especially once you’ve learned to wear pyjamas. I just wish, well, I just wish I’d wished for something else. But, what does a young man know?
He was a young officer, a little green, who presented me the remains.
‘Is that all that was left? A pair of smoking boots?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Thank God.’
‘No sir, it was just the one smoking boot.’
He offered the boot for my closer inspection.
‘And, how did… have we a… ‘
‘The coroner’s report has not yet been filed, sir.’
‘I see. Any-’
‘Could be lightning strike, sir, though we can’t rule out a case of spontaneous combustion.’
‘Another one?’
‘Yes, sir. It is rather unfortunate, but it seems the most likely at this stage of investigation. Eye-witness reports -‘
‘Good God, there were witnesses?’
‘No sir. Eye-witness accounts have as yet failed to present themselves.
He looked pained. I couldn’t blame him, of course. When I started out, I too thought the job was about solving things. It wasn’t until I’d been out there for a couple of years that I learned that the true job was to prevent people worrying about things, preferably by stopping them finding out in the first place. But,
‘Officer, are we in a position to account for the missing boot?’
His eyebrows knitted themselves even tighter.
‘I’m afraid not sir.’
Dammit. After all these years, all this experience, still the door handle of mystery would snag at my belt buckle. Neither lightning bolt nor spontaneous combustion would leave behind just one boot.
‘Any fool could see that!’
‘Sir?’
And now I was voicing half my thoughts. Dammit again, the oregano of mystery had sprinkled itself over the pizza base of my soul.
I love the oregano of mystery sprinkled on the pizza base of his soul! So good! And the door handle of mystery snagging at his belt. Love the combined elements in this one.
A brother and sister show up at your house claiming they grew up there in the '60s. You agree to let them look around. Big mistake.
At first I thought I’ll hide in the kitchen and pretend not to be home. But my curiosity changed that plan. The pitch and timber of their voices on the porch, a woman and a man, clearly, and something out of sorts.
I cracked the door and she, pretty and rail thin, was inside before speaking a word, and heading for the stairs. When I turned to say something, he came in and said in a condescending way I’d painted the front hall one out of a million off-whites.
I’m not keen on this carpet, Ken. What was it when we were here?
Blue.
No it wasn’t, it was green.
Excuse me?
Oh sorry, this used to be our house.
Yeah we grew up here.
Oh really, I grew up here too.
Until….
We’ve both done well since then, moved up the ladder as they say, ha ha. Pretty far up.
Ken here lives in eighty five hundred square feet, actually. I’ve got over six, but in two different places.
Interesting.
It’s plainer than I remember.
And smaller.
When you’re small you remember things big.
Then you see them later and they’re small.
That’s where the theory of relativity comes from.
Ken is in real estate.
Well la de da, I said. This house has been in my family since the nineteen fifties.
That couldn’t be.
Right. We were here then. In the fifties.
Wait.
Yeah, wait a minute. Ken . . .
Silvie.
I’m Daniel, by the way, and you’re in my house.
There are times when the theory of relativity is useful.
Indeed, Daniel, said Silvie, looking between me, and her brother Ken, in such a way she looked to be shaking her head, no, no.
My thoughts exactly.
"Ken is in real estate." Too funny.
Such good stuff! "It's plainer than I remember. And smaller" -- ha! Just the lightest touch here works so nicely.
I love your twisted humour Tod. And this is great dialogue! I'm waiting for something really sinister to happen
Such a low key ending - I love it !
Whoa. Alternate realities. Daniel’s house is one version of the Tardis!
"That’s where the theory of relativity comes from." "There are times when the theory of relativity is useful."
I'm shaking my head, yes, yes.
There's a lot of truth in this piece. Nice job.
Susana had sad eyes and she drove slowly, always, taking long sucking drags on her skinny cigarettes and flicking the ashes out the open window.
Susana had sad eyes, whites dull and heavy as marshmallows, and she smoked such skinny cigarettes.
Sad-eyed Susana dreamed of marshmallows more often than she dreamed of anything else, even her late mother, but she ate no sugar, preferring to devote all her vice bandwidth to those long and skinny cigarettes.
Marsha was overweight for most of her childhood and she received so many unfortunate and predictable schoolyard names, but on that very first gas station stop of her first drive out of state, the actual moment of leaving home, she bought her first pack of smokes and gave the leering brown-toothed man behind the counter a fake number, and said her name was Susana. She didn’t realize she would keep both the name and the habit.
Susana had sad eyes, someone might say who had caught only the hound-dog languor of her beauty. She was not actually sad most of the time, just highly uncertain what to do with herself. Usually, when she felt the uncertainty hit its highest, vertiginous pitch, she would raid the shoe-box of emergency cash in the closet, and get a full carton of smokes from the bodega. That and one large bag of X-tra-Fluff marshmallows with the puffed-up lettering in blue, orange and green. Susana would go up on the roof and alternate pleasures until she felt ill, leaving a wide cupful of ash to be emptied, slowly, by the wind.
Susana didn’t expect the diagnosis, as nobody, not even hypochondriacs, really expect it when it comes, but the tall, large-handed doctor mistook her large, sad eyes for a kind of wise-beyond-her-years equanimity, and for the first time in his career he asked a patient out to dinner.
After crab legs and prosecco and spirited fucking, Susana reflected that this man, though a doctor, would not really be able to care for her, at least not in the ways she had expected, while he too partook of a long cigarette beside her. But, he was like her a Midwesterner, and they spoke of ambrosia salad studded with tiny, stiff marshmallows, and of their late mothers, and she reflected that she might just one day grow fat again, with him, and maybe even happy.
This is fantastic
Thanks, Mary. Your reading and feedback week in and week out is such an extraordinary offering - and such an encouragement onward!
Thank you, Danielle.
This is just beautiful! I love all the repetition, the rich details, the soul, the heart of this piece, and the last line is absolute gold! It reads like poetry to me.
Such encouraging feedback! Thank you!
Wow! There are full chapters in this short piece, Danielle. Great fun to read this.
Thanks, Angela! Usually it's a tricky thing for me and I near 400 words thinking, "oops, something is supposed to happen!"
Yes. Time's passing is marked not just well but in a way which deepens the story.
Thanks so much!
Wow. You packed so much story in there!
Thanks, Mark with a K!
Wonderful Danielle !! Some great lines here. You never know when true love will find you.
Thanks, Tod! (:
I liked the turn it took from diagnosis to love… but.. I still want to know what the diagnosis was….
Thanks! And ooh yes such an interesting point - I always wonder about this kind of question, as to which bits should be specified and which left open. Too far in either direction and it breaks..
This is so full!
Thanks, Deborah! (:
What a story, Danielle! Love the ending.
Thanks so much, John!
[A brother and sister show up at your house claiming they grew up there in the '60s. You agree to let them look around. Big mistake.]
"Oh, we're sure it's the one," the woman called Miranda said. "To tell you the truth, we fed the number into Google Street View and looked at it carefully. You've built on an extension to include the garage, but...
"Not I," I said. I'd been settling down to write when the doorbell had rung, and I was not in the best of moods. "All that was done when we bought the place."
"When was that?" the brother -- Jake, he said he was -- asked.
"It was in... '93."
He had a little notebook in his hand, and he was scribbling in it with a little pencil like they give away at IKEA.
"What we noticed," Miranda said, "was the sundial up there on that sort of turret thing. We remembered it immediately!"
"Oh, that," I said. "Yes, it was there when we moved in. It's broken. Doesn't tell the time any more."
"It was there when we lived here," she said. "It gave us quite a thrill to see it!"
"Could we take a look inside?" Jake asked.
"If we're not disturbing you," the sister added.
I heaved an inward sigh and opened the front door. For a while I counted minutes as I escorted them round from room to room, Miranda exclaiming and Jake scribbling. Then they stopped.
"Do you remember this, Jake?" Miranda asked, pointing to a plastered white wall.
Jake shook his head and tapped the wall with one knuckle. "Hollow," he said.
"It wasn't here back in our time," Miranda said, looking at me.
I shrugged. "No idea when it was done."
"Up there above, it's the turret, right?" the brother said. "There could be stairs going up there."
"The turret's all sealed off," I told him. "Anyway, if there were stairs, you'd be remembering them. Wouldn't you?"
He pointed at me with a straight index. "Right."
"Now, if you don't mind, I said, "I have work to do."
"Oh, don't let us disturb you any more," Miranda said hurriedly. "You've been very kind."
When they'd gone, I settled down to work again. Could not. Nerves hopping. The cheek of some people!
The doorbell rang. "Miranda" with a search warrant. "Jake" with a squad of workers with tools.
"We're taking that wall down," he said. "See what you've got hidden in there."
oh wow. Such a fun ending!
Not for me. I should have run while I had time.
Bastinados!
What a twist !
Whoa! I love this twist. Great story.
I was never sure, not fully, if I was attending the weekly support group for people who thought they had died but hadn’t, or people who had died but couldn’t accept the fact. How would you even know? Whichever group you were at, everyone would be someway between the two positions but they’d be there exactly because they were mistaken one way or the other.
I was there because I was ashamed.
I was ashamed for choking to death at 21 years old, alone at a bus shelter under a cloudless sky in the afternoon. On a marshmallow. Like I said, I wasn’t a hundred percent certain, but, whether or not I had lost consciousness and woken deluded into thinking I was dead and through some oxygen-starved haze had come to believe I was in the afterlife, or whether I really had died and the afterlife happened to offer support groups in community halls for those that couldn’t accept the facts of their death, it didn’t matter. I was in the wrong place.
Whichever way round it was, I needed the group for people who were ashamed of how they had died, irrespective of whether they’d died or not and whether or not they knew which way round it was. It was the feeling I wanted to shake, not the delusion.
Brian, he was in the right place. I liked Brian, I was glad he was getting the help he needed. He always sat on the chair to my right, always saved me a seat and never judged me for being late, and always whispered to me while the leader was introducing the session’s goals.
‘How’s your week been?’
‘Shit show,’ I’d say.
He always chuckled at this, and would take out a bag of mints from his coat pocket and offer me one. He wasn’t being insensitive. I’d never shared how I got where I was, and anyway, I wasn’t going to make that mistake again, so I always took one, and would quietly shift it around in my mouth while we listened to the week’s newcomers introduced themselves.
I liked listening to their stories. Their world seemed so simple. They accepted the circumstances of their own deaths entirely, just didn’t agree with the outcome. I guess that’s why I kept coming back. It was soothing to be around people who weren’t humiliated. And anyway, I like a mint.
Love that ending. Like the ending of Annie Hall when he says he needs the eggs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NR3lAzC_Bc
Good story. When I was a teenager I used to collect facts of embarrassing deaths. For some reason I thought dying from having a pig fall on you would’ve been embarrassing but apparently it’s not uncommon :)
When pigs fly?
Just tried to be strict with myself and write into the dark on this (having read SC about intention and realised I probably write that poem about dogs more often than not)
Writing just as far as your headlights can see is both scary and very fun. I always love seeing what I come up with that didn't exist only moments before.
You succeeded. :-)
Love the premise and the opening line -- and love where you went with it, or where it went with you. Into-the-dark worked! And in particular, "He wasn't being insensitive" - ha!
You give me hope that there will be mints, support groups, and helpful souls like Brian when our Marshmallow Overlords invade the afterlife!
Rules for Thanksgiving circa 1971
1. No menu changes.
We’ve had the same Thanksgiving dinner with the same ingredients prepared in the same way every Thanksgiving since 1950. There will be no changes. We’re looking at you, Sarah. You may have spent 1968 in Florence, but you’re home now, and we don’t want your risotto on our Thanksgiving table.
2. No martinis before the guests arrive.
For reasons clear to all who were with us last year, there will be no martinis before the dinner guests arrive. This ban applies to both the members of the household and our houseguests.
3. No passive-aggressive contests.
The no-preparty martini rule should eliminate this problem, but to be clear, no contests. As we all recall, last year my brother prepared a pitcher of martinis at 11:00 am. My sister-in-law, brother, and husband all imbibed. I refrained as I still had a turkey to stuff and pies to make. At 2:00 pm, my sister-in-law, two martinis in, produced a frozen pie crust she had secreted into the house along with a jar of premade mincemeat. (I had prepared my homemade mincemeat Wednesday afternoon, the same afternoon I ironed the table linens, shined the silver, and put fresh sheets on the guest bed.) She put her jarred mincemeat in the frozen crust, threw it into my oven, and announced that we would have a blind taste test during dessert to see which was better, her pie or mine. She said I would thank her when she won because it would save me work next year. I will not ever thank her for that.
4. No Running Off for a Round of Golf When the Going Gets Rough
The no-preparty martini rule should take care of this also. However, my husband and brother are forbidden from leaving to play golf when they realize, as my husband so ineptly puts it, that “the fur is about to fly.”
5. No Surprises
No surprises. None of us can endure another announcement like Mike’s last year. Empty pie plates and full stomachs are not the setting for telling your wife, closest friends, and relatives that you’ve been having an affair for the past two months and will be moving into your lover’s apartment on Black Friday. Enough said.
I remain optimistic that if we adhere to these simple rules, we will have much to be thankful for this November.
Hilarious. And way too close to the truth.
Thanksgiving is a terrifying American ritual. But y'all can get over it by having a nice family Christmas just a few weeks later.
Confession: I have always hated Thanksgiving.
I liked it ok until everyone stopped serving turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce and moved into enlightened new agey dishes with a hundred ingredients you never heard of before.
Oh but cranberry sauce served straight from the can?
it's not cranberry sauce if it doesn't come out of the can and retain those visible lines
That is exactly what my hubby's mother believed.
Brilliant!
There is always a Mike. I recall a similar situation right after Christmas one year...
i think we can assume the frozencrust/jarred mincemeat was better....
Especially as the hostess was so uptight from not drinking martinis OR woozy from not respecting her own rule about not drinking martinis, that she made her piecrust hard as nails.
I like to think a couple of martinis could improve the piecrust.
A few Martinis would have turned the whole holiday into a non issue.
Even better!
Love this. Thanksgiving rules are made to be broken over and over again.
Rules for Writing a Novel
1. Carve out a large block of free time. Take all your accumulated leave, add in a few sick days, and plan to spend up to two weeks of uncompensated time, if you can afford it. Don’t worry about any deliverables that will fall due during this period. Drop the kids off at your ex-husband’s. Tell your boyfriend you’ll see him in a couple of months. (Now might even be a good time to break up with him, if that’s something you’ve been considering.)
2. Find a suitable space. If you stay home, you’ll feel tempted to clean the oven or paint the kids’ room. Ask your friend Amy if you can borrow her lakeside cottage, since it isn’t the season when she goes there. When she asks whether you’re bringing a plus-one, laugh and say, “I’m sworn to secrecy.”
3. Equip yourself with the right tools. Think seriously about whether you want to use word processing or some more specialized software, like Scrivener. End up buying every piece of software anyone has ever recommended. Stock up on pencils and notepads, just in case.
4. Buy some good books to bring with you. Great literature, or even novels that sold well, could be inspiring while you’re writing your novel; on the other hand, they could make you feel that everything worth saying has already been said. Or that your chances of producing anything as good are approximately nil. Serious nonfiction would be a good choice, unless it makes you so anxious about the state of the world that you wonder what the point of literature even is anymore.
5. Come up with a title for your novel. Make a list of twenty titles. Cross off the ones that sound too corny. Check out the others on Amazon to see whether anyone else has used those titles before. List twenty more titles.
6. When you get to the cottage, unpack your suitcase, set up your laptop on the kitchen table, and write an opening sentence. Try to make it memorable.
7. Look out the kitchen window at the lake. Open the window and listen to the birds singing. Make a note to buy binoculars and bird feeders.
This reminds me of the Writing Residency i once did when i did not write a single word....
what did you do instead?
GOOD QUESTION
P.S. Mary - No, you haven't been writing too much in your prompts! I get so much out of those. I mean, if you need to step back and do less, you should, but don't do it on our account!
I second that!!
Thank you, Masha!
This was such fun to read! Very relatable.
Now I know what I am doing wrong! I need to borrow Amy and her lakeside cabin.
Yes, Amy is essential!
Beware Paragraph 7, Angela!
Ah, but that is when the good stuff can fly in!
That could be a great story prompt right there!
Ha! :)
The Pinball
We cannot buy candy at the neighborhood grocery anymore. Cozy Corner, they sell penny candies and bubble gum. Mother forbids us to walk inside. They installed a pinball machine. She is convinced it is a gambling device and that reminds her of Uncle Fred, her brother-in-law who runs a gambling joint across the street from the City Hall. That place is full of prostitutes, and men from City Hall who throw dice and play cards. Smoky, it is full of smoke.
So Cozy Corner is off limits. We watch our buddies enter this sinful haven and buy our candy for us. Standing on the sidewalk we hear the jingle-thump-clang of the bells on the machine as the Hanson brothers feed it quarters. We can only imagine what is going on because we have never seen the device they stand before with bells clanging, and red lights flashing in their eyes. A Hanson brother pushing his entire body against the device. It is a body thrust with his hands perched on the sides of the machine, guiding the metal ball we are told.
Nice visual!
I love the idea of a place named Cozy Corner being seen as a "sinful haven."
Prostitutes, corrupt pols, gambling machines, dice, cards, cigarettes...
What else could it be?
politicians...
They're on the list, under "corrupt" ;)
Left in the downpour, soaked through, fireproofing leached away, a shoe waits beside the kitchen door.
The shoe, the last evidence of the family that had lived there.
The boy — it was his shoe — hadn’t wanted to leave. He thought there’d be a chance to save everything. He thought the rain would stop but the sun wouldn’t come this time. But his parents had seen this before, and before that, and told him to get in the vehicle. Now. Don’t even finish getting dressed. Pick up your fireproofs and get in the vehicle. Now. So he got in but left his shoe by the kitchen door. We have to go back for my shoe he said after five minutes. Too late, father says. I have extra shoes. But its my favorite shoe, boy says. Too late, mother says. They drive on and the boy looks out the window.
He can’t see anything through the torrential rain. He feels the vehicle handle the rough road, then the streambed, then the unpaved pass over their mountain.
On the other side of the mountain, the rain has stopped. The heat suffocates. The vehicle shelters from the sun but doesn’t comfort. The boy looks out the window. Small fires start spontaneously, all the way across the plain. Where there aren’t new fires there are dying fires. Houses and churches and stores smolder and collapse. Flames point at the vehicle; they drive faster, toward the next mountain pass.
Behind them, on the other side of their mountain, the rain stops. The sun rises over the peak, scorching the unpaved road, vaporizing the water in the streambed, melting drowned leaves on the driveway. The house goes in a breath of annihilation. The shoe, the last evidence, bursts into flame.
Scary and apocalyptic. Really nicely done.
Thanks. I've never tried anything like this. Interesting exercise, interesting to see where the prompt took me.
Mary's "apocalyptic" is right. What happens when when this family, and all the others forced to flee, fast, ahead of the scourging faces of exponential environmental change don't just get away over the mountains only to find they've run smack bang into the impenetrable wall of a securely closed border or impossible to navigate turbulent waters?
Grand story Kevin.
Thanks. I'm sorry I put this family in this spot!
You're just following in the footsteps of Cormac McCarthy and Steinbeck, though. Both of them Pulitzer Prize winners for putting their fictional families in impossible situations. Good stuff here.
i'm ready for my pulitzer. unless i have to inflict more trauma on the poor folks first.
Why be sorry... oh yes, I sorry because the misfortune and jeopardy that's befallen this fictional family raises our empathy with so many in the real world whose unfolding lives are having to cope with not just one-off but recurrent catastrophes. Used to be kagoules were the thing to have to hand and wear in the face of cope with adverse weather: fire-suits up the ante very considerably!
had to look up kagoules. they're so yesterday, what with today's threats.
With this shoe and my extra marshmallows we have the makings of one sizzling s’more or shoe’more. ;-)
fill the shoe with tiny marshmallows. yum!
Good work Kevin
Thanks!
Tense pace and great mood in this story.
Thanks!
So much possibility here. The "breath of annihilation" and the landscape you describe. Takes me back to The Road.
Thanks. Haven't read that yet.
Apocalyptic like your piece.
removed
What an ending!
Keep calm and eat a marshmallow. Well done.
A great twist at the end of this one as well! Nicely done!
When three distinct knocks sounded on the door that afternoon, Millicent was folding laundry. A sharp rap, followed by a hollow echoing knock, and an open-handed thud. Before Millicent could answer the front door, the sequence began again. As that final thud sounded, she opened the door to her neighbor, Dave, standing on her front porch.
“Hey, young lady!” he greeted her, smiling.
She hated his “young lady” crap. Was he mocking her?
“Hello, Dave.”
“Hey, if you ever want to use our new can crusher, just come on over.”
“Well thanks, but–” she paused and asked him, “Do you hear ukulele music?”
“Um…no.”
She heard it again. An off key rendition of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and someone who had lost track of the lyrics.
“Where is that coming from?”
“Dunno…but we wondered if we can play pinball. My grandkids love it!”
“Pinball? Why are you asking me–?” But then she heard it: pinging, clanging, chiming, and flashing its lights–a fully operational Willy Wonka pinball machine. On her driveway. As she stepped through the screendoor, the machine gave a resounding knock that made her jump, and announced a Replay.
“I…” She looked around. “I guess…”
“Great!” Dave called across the street and his 5 grandkids joined him on the driveway.
Elliot arrived home from work an hour later, jumped out of the car, and ran over to join them.
“This is great!” He called to Millicent.
“Oh wait! I stopped at the store. We were out of marshmallows!” He reached into the backseat and pulled out a giant-sized bag of Sta-Puft marshmallows.
“Hey, did you know the first people to eat marshmallows were the ancient Egyptians?” called Dave. “They were medicinal.”
The crowd around the pinball machine now included the ukulele player, and everyone was singing “Pinball Wizard” while he played.
“At least they know the words,” Millicent thought.
Just then a car drove up and two people got out.
“Hey, can we look around?” A dark-haired man wearing a flat cap and a green bomber jacket asked her.
His companion, a willowy woman with long brown hair and a flowing skirt offered her hand to Millicent.
“We grew up in this house. In the 1960’s! I’m Elena, and this is Todd.”
“I think you are mistaken,” Millicent responded. “This house was built in 1970.”
“No, no…I remember the pinball machine. So glad you kept that!”
Hysterical. Ukelele players are so needed in today's world.
I cannot resist doing a mash-up.
Hahhahaaha! And I'm so glad you cannot resist!
Ukuleles and Clarinets
I loved the guy, he was my dad it's what you do. But there were times; it wasn't always plain sailing. There was the job for a start. Pa was a musician, they called him 'King Clarinet', maybe a little ragging going on there. So money was 'hit and miss'. When there was a run of gigs, maybe a recording session with one of the kingpins, it would be steak and frites. When the bookings dried, more like sausage and beans, sometimes sans sausage.
But that wasn't really the issue, the issue that would overheat, smoulder, then burst into flames. OK, it wasn't just his fault. Ma was a terrific lady but she had a temperament, the kind of temperament betrayed by the auburn locks that cascaded down to her shoulders in curves and swirls and meanders that mesmerised you if you happened to glance in that direction. In the ordinary way she was sweet and kind and even-minded and we never doubted for even a splinter of a micro-second that King C was at the centre of her world. But in return she wanted the same unconditional.
She wanted it but she knew that could never happen. And for the most part she ran with it. Till this one time. She opened the case, looked inside, glowered at the rival. It was just bad luck that right on cue King C strolled in to witness the full-on bad-eyeing. He took off, struck the rafters, descended back onto his loafers, rocked forwarded, gathered the gleaming Buffet-Crampon into tender hands. And swooned.
Swooned and spoke, 'Benny Goodman gave me this. Said never let it leave your side. Benny was right, look what's goin on.'
Ma saw the tender hands. We saw the ire bubble, rise, steam and then volcano. She erupted. Not just with words but with hands and nails. Words we didn't know but would learn later, hands that slapped, nails that scratched.
And then screamed the oath, 'It's me or her. I'll never spend another night with that serpent in my bedroom.'
Dad left that night. He'd come and pick us up on Saturdays. We'd go for a drive. Me and Sis would sit up front, the back seats reserved for the case.
Poor Ma, in competition for affection with a clarinet. That's a losing proposition! Love all the detail in this one, and that lovely ending.
Thank you, Mary. The prompts are the thing 👏
Fantastic. The relationships are so well defined, human and otherwise. And real.
Thanks, Kevin. ‘Human and otherwise’ 👍
Vivid descriptions here. So well done.
Thanks, Angela
THE EXCITEMENT 1.
Four chairs are around a coffee table. David is emptying the last of the potato chips into bowls. He looks around.
This room is Party Ready.
He stares at a chair
POP
A girl is sitting in the chair
Hi I’m Binny- is the party through there?
No it’s here- Hi Binny-I’m David
I have strawberry cider in my bag
I have a Riesling that slaps you round the head or a better one that takes you behind the library for a good talking to
She smiles at him blankly
POP
A blonde boy sits on chair next to Binny
Hi- Tim Freckle- Got some Green ginger wine
We could mix them- David grabs glasses- returns to the two talking and giggling
What would be incredible Binny?
Tim’s friend went to a party The Excitement was at
Whoa
Hell yeah. Did you invite him?
No
Why do people have parties and not even try?
Use that energy to focus on the Excitement
They focus
POP
An old lady is seated, rubbing her calves
I’m Dorothy
Hi Dorothy- we’re focussing on inviting The Excitement
No point we’ve used all the chairs
Silence
I’d like to meet the Excitement
Bring a chair next time said Tim Freckle
I will leave gracefully, not being here will make me happier
Are you sure Dorothy? You might not be able to get back in
Definitely wont
I have a husband who loves me- he just won’t shut up
You can Say Home three times anytime you want out
I dont even go to parties without the Exhilaration. HOME HOME
Wait Dorothy says Binny
HOME
( Dorothy disappears )
She got more interesting at the end
What kind of people are we?
People at a party- everyone focus on the Excitement now
POP
A little man chewing on something long pink and stretchy appears
and freezes on the chair, mid chew
Are you the Excitement ?
Maybe
I knew it
Party just exploded like my head
Thanks for coming
I’m not the Excitement. Used to be- got banned- My Grandson’s friend is the Excitement
Oooohhh
Don’t get your hopes up- Greg’s hard to find, won’t carry a phone. He says he cant hear the call if he’s on the phone
Who does that?
Totally anti social
How do we get him?
You could ask Emmet. He loves any attention the bastard
Emmet!
Get off my chair!
The Little man disappears- annoyed- as a young man tries to deliberately squash him on his way in
Waddup Pigeons- Gugs- Excitement Here
Really?
I thought you just knew the Excitement?
I’m the Excitement Idiot
Ok…are you sure…?
Are you sure you’re not the worst guest ever? At the lamest party on Earth?
Who believes him?
Three of them shake their heads
Emmet reddens- then purples- about to burst with anger- he picks up a bowl of peanuts- rubs it into his armpit- puts it back- then starts to suck for air, then starts to cry.
HOOOOOOOOMMMMMME!
The chair is empty
SILENCE
That guy was a new Party low
Toxic
SILENCE
Please stay everyone- pleads David
I have an early thing- mumbles Tim, home home home
Binny please stay
You know I would- but the Dorothy biz is legit giving me anxiety which gives me indigestion- home home home
Awww- alone again on Tuesday night
He pours himself a riesling that slaps him round the head
I'm so glad that Dorothy came back!
Me too!
THE EXCITEMENT. 2. ARRIVAL.
David turns off the music. He starts covering chips and throwing out peanuts- goes to blow out a candle
POP
( Music starts to play. Music David has never heard )
Hi- I’m Greg. this place is hard to find
He is a golden masterpiece of sculpted flesh bone and muscle. In a suit
WOW- you look like a K pop star who become a movie star because they’re too handsome for just one thing and probably a genius
I wish it was the first time I’d heard that…but it IS…THANK YOU!
POP
Binny!
Thought it might be your first party- share the anxiety
Meet the Excitement
NO! You’re Not! Of course you ARE!
I love your name Binny- something is starting for you tonight
Binny grips her chair with excitement
Oh my Goodness when the real thing happens you Know
Feels completely different
POP
Emmet pops back.
Helloooo,
he looks at the floor
Emmet…says The Excitement…we’ve discussed this
Greg please let me stay for once, I promise, I’ll be Positive-Emmet
Haven’t seen him in years…What do we think?…Shall we start out with an unselfish act, knowing we can boot him at any moment?
Emmet looks at Binny to speak
I’m only going to say positive things in the presence of the Excitement so I’ll leave that to someone else
Emmet mouths Filthy Bitch. No one sees him
David speaks
You can stay Emmet but one bad move and you’ll be thrown out the window
Nicely done David, says the Excitement, you are becoming a force to be reckoned with- I have a gift for you. He blows up an inflatable chair
Binny looks at David- impressed
POP
Dorothy is back. Sitting on the blow up chair
He didn’t know I was gone- Hadn’t stopped talking
Welcome Dorothy
We missed you
The Excitement speaks calmly- the music has quietened out of respect
David’s hand has clenched Binny’s without either of them realizing it
There’s a little bit of extra room in your heart, up the top, it’s an extra fifth of heart, untouched, it’s about to take in new Excitement. All of you are going to be simultaneously calmed, energized and filled with a joy you thought Baptists made up singing at Church, except darker and sexier, with great lighting- ( the lighting adjusts-the music is incredible, new- yet filled with some nostalgic heart-squeezing importance )
Lil Binny you’re going to fall in love this year
Really? Whispered Binny
The Excitement’s eyes are tender pools of truth
What is your dream…David?
(David shrugs happily)
Maybe this was my dream
Humble. No one’s ever said that. How about a party a month for a year?
Oh heck yeah
Emmet?
I’d like heaps of cash money and a lot of crypto
What else?
…A better personality?
Up to you. What are your dreams?
A cat?
You will have a cat
Dorothy speaks
I’d like to write a book someday, but really right now or I’ll go mad
The Excitement speaks-
It’ll be a lot of work, but people will love your book
Dorothy cant stop smiling
There’s a bubble tea kiosk- your used cups get made into Bowling pins for elderly people who want the dignity of Bowling at home
Dorothy we could bowl with you- said Binny
No. Maybe a walk in the morning before I write
The place looks huge, the bar is cozy- the cerise glowing dancing room beyond is inviting
Binny gets up and nearly slips, on the Excitement’s softly raining dewy vapour- David catches her-
Will you come to all my parties?
I dont know- can you dance?
I don’t know
Let’s find out
They dance- Laughing and hugging and singing and whispering and Dancing Slower and Faster and Faster
I saw this whole thing playing out in my brain, just a hilarious little play. (But poor David, alone again.)
Me too. Although I am a bit worried about Emmet and his peanut fixation.
He’s not alone for long. Did u see the next one?
Dang they’ve posted in the wrong order
oh! I just saw the other one!
I just love how this is so original and unique (a story can take any form!) and also I'm glad Dorothy will write her book. I'll pre-order it from my local bookstore.
Thanks Kevin you’ve always said such supportive things
She’ll love that!
Getting to this a day later Mary, but just wanted to say that I love your prompts!! I really appreciate all the work you put into them and all the wonderful examples you provide. These snippets are great too, but if I may be honest... your prompts are the best! :) I always look forward to what you cook up. The highlight of my Monday morning.
Thank you, Imola! I know you're busy over there in your delightful substack, adding yoga to the mix! Love watching you expand into new directions (and hopefully, you're having fun, too).
Yes, you are so right! A lot of work to set it all up, but yes, a lot of fun. Always such a delight to connect with you.
It was my fault. I’d been showing off. But wasn’t that to be expected, a young man out on the street with his mates?
I didn’t believe he was legit anyway. Who would? This guy stops you, says, ‘Look, I’m pretty much done here, you can have this last one on me, no catches, I just want out,’ and he looks tired, so tired, I mean spiritually tired. You notice the litter blowing by, you notice the urine stains in the doorways, you see your reflection in the shop windows. You don’t think beyond these things.
‘Whatever,’ I say.
No no no. He hangs his head, shakes his head, puts his hand on my shoulder, turns those tired old eyes on me.
‘I’m not messing kid. Don’t foul this up. I mean it, I’m done, got one more wish to give away and then I am out. No catches, I mean it, nothing coming back to bite you, no be careful what you wish for,’ he gripped a little harder, locked me in his eyes,’ you get a free hit here’.
He was offering me a wish. A wish! As if he was some kind of devil!
I want to shake his hand off my shoulder, I don’t want to be called kid, but he he really looks like he means it.
‘You go girl!’
‘You into him?’
‘He had you at hello!’
‘That a banana in your pocket?’
The boys snap me out of his glare.
‘No. No way. Just get-‘
‘I mean it,’ he says, ‘don’t pass this up.’
‘Whatever old man. I just want a banana,’ I step my shoulder away from him, gesture down at his crotch, ‘like yours.’ The boys laugh.
‘A banana?’ he sighs, looks away, and when he returns his glare the tiredness has passed, there’s something else there, some life.
‘A banana,’ he says ‘on your person?’
‘On your what, bro?’
‘On him, innit? On him,’ the boys were gesturing at their own crotches now. I was out of the woods.
‘Yeah. On my person.’
And that’s that. To be fair to the old devil, he tried. I really do think he tried to be kind. There’s always, always, a banana secreted somewhere about me, in a pocket, under my hat, down my sock, tucked between my, well, somewhere about me. It’s annoying, it’s uncomfortable, though you learn to live with it, especially once you’ve learned to wear pyjamas. I just wish, well, I just wish I’d wished for something else. But, what does a young man know?
hahaha! Youth is wasted on the young.
He was a young officer, a little green, who presented me the remains.
‘Is that all that was left? A pair of smoking boots?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Thank God.’
‘No sir, it was just the one smoking boot.’
He offered the boot for my closer inspection.
‘And, how did… have we a… ‘
‘The coroner’s report has not yet been filed, sir.’
‘I see. Any-’
‘Could be lightning strike, sir, though we can’t rule out a case of spontaneous combustion.’
‘Another one?’
‘Yes, sir. It is rather unfortunate, but it seems the most likely at this stage of investigation. Eye-witness reports -‘
‘Good God, there were witnesses?’
‘No sir. Eye-witness accounts have as yet failed to present themselves.
He looked pained. I couldn’t blame him, of course. When I started out, I too thought the job was about solving things. It wasn’t until I’d been out there for a couple of years that I learned that the true job was to prevent people worrying about things, preferably by stopping them finding out in the first place. But,
‘Officer, are we in a position to account for the missing boot?’
His eyebrows knitted themselves even tighter.
‘I’m afraid not sir.’
Dammit. After all these years, all this experience, still the door handle of mystery would snag at my belt buckle. Neither lightning bolt nor spontaneous combustion would leave behind just one boot.
‘Any fool could see that!’
‘Sir?’
And now I was voicing half my thoughts. Dammit again, the oregano of mystery had sprinkled itself over the pizza base of my soul.
‘Buckle up, officer. Buckle up.’
His frown eased. He knew what was coming.
‘They’ve told you about me.’
‘Sir?’
love the tone, the humor and the plot!
I love the oregano of mystery sprinkled on the pizza base of his soul! So good! And the door handle of mystery snagging at his belt. Love the combined elements in this one.