So thank you Jim, for your participation – post and comments – and hope Antonia’s absence is down to no more than getting to grips with a new computer.
In the hope
others will find time to participate – always in short supply at this time of
year – I offer
Words for the coming week: educate ribbon squash
Entries by midnight Thursday December 1st, new words scheduled for Friday 2nd as I’ll be away,
Usual rules: 100 words maximum (excluding title) of
flash fiction or poetry using all three words above in the genres of horror,
fantasy, science fiction or noir. Serialised fiction is, as always, welcome.
All variants and uses of the words and stems are fine. Feel free to post links
to your stories on Twitter or Facebook or whichever.
Antonia - quick note, apologies to you all, especially Sandra,. I will be back! It's been migraines (getting worse rather than better) ex visiting, waiting on the new computer (still) frantic chasing from here to there and back again and somehow,. somehow,. getting three anthologies to the printers before the New Year deadline (if peiople want them as gifts in the New Year, they hae to be printed now) and I've lost all awareness of time and date - went to the surgery yesterday to be told I was 4 days too early for my bp check...
ReplyDeleteNeed to quieten down, get my car through its MOT and sell it, get the... Time I took my life back! It's been tougher than I thought, this Retirement buiness...
It's a well-known fact retirement brings the question 'How did I ever find time to work?' but you sound as if you've been more than normally bombarded. Hope things settle soon.
DeleteThis is David - I have been missing in action due to work commitments but in the words of Arnie - 'I'll be back'
ReplyDeleteSaturday Night at the Movies
ReplyDeleteEveryone was squashed up in stalls of the old the old cinema. As a last hoorah they were going to show John Ford’s classic cavalry movie - She Wore a Yellow Ribbon. The aged projectionist said he was determined to give us philistines an education before everything went to hell in handcart.
Outside the perniciously creeping vines had smothered the town in a vast emerald blanket of toxicity. I tossed popcorn into my mouth and wondered if we would make it to the final frame of the final reel before the cinema was crushed to its foundations.
As ever, David, your pieces visually vivid - but better than watching a film for the images your words set growing in my mind.
DeleteI can't think of a better time for popcorn. Very striking imagery with the vines at their back as they watch the large screen.
DeleteA fine movie, but I don't think it's worth waiting for the ending. I'd get outta town!
DeleteOh good stuff, David! here's some wild images in that offering!
ReplyDeleteMore rats... (I tried and all the others fell apart on the screen...
ReplyDeleteMore Rats!!
So there’s this smooth coated long whiskered rat-ess, oh my, find me some silky ribbon, people, Let me decorate this female so she – well, so she sees how much I would like to educate her into throwing herself into my arms, where we can stay squashed against each other for a good long time. I would be content with that but – there’s a problem. An idiotic rat is busy trying to film the resulting chaos which you could call The Stand if it weren’t already done. Thing is, this rat ain’t keen on the group thing, this one is my find…
Love that rats have relationship problems too!
DeleteCurious to see how it plays out and what the rat-ess thinks about our narrator. :)
DeleteWell, this opens the door to a number of interesting possibilities.
DeleteSorry for disappearing! It has been chaos at home and then I was quite sick last week. I'm going to try to write something this week.
ReplyDeleteI guessed at the chaos, but not the sickness - hope you recover soon.
DeleteThanks! Hopefully this is the last illness before the holidays, though that's a tall ask with little kids in school.
Delete[Threshold 415]
ReplyDeleteHaving readied himself for retribution, looking towards our audience, reading in their squashing closer their avidity for bloodshed – mine, at Raven’s hands – he paused. Murmured, ‘It would sit better with me to educate them rather than punish you –‘
‘Noble idea, but how?’
‘Show them the workings of the quad bikes. In simple enough terms for them to believe a woman capable of comprehension.’
I was tempted to smack him but judged that would further shred his (genuine) authority to ribbons. Warned, instead, superfluously, ‘Just don’t let them take the keys, else we’ll not see them for dust.’
Oof, I can feel their overwhelming presence with 'their squashing closer' and want to warn them all to take a step back! :) Definitely keep hold of the keys.
Deleteintriguing instalment, ending with a visiion few would want to see, a sudden leap to a ten year old... what next?
DeleteMay be a good idea to give him a good, hard smack!
DeleteChange of focus [493]
ReplyDeleteFamiliar enough with the mortuary to not need the corpse he was to identify ribbon-wrapped – although the lack of bulk normally provided by limbs incongruous enough he had to squash thoughts of butchery and beef – Pettinger asked for the shoulder blade to be unwrapped prior to his having to face the … face. Was able to further delay what he knew to be inevitable in educating the pathologist in the correct pronunciation of Petzincek, and a potted history of Khakbethian strife.
Unable to further delay he nodded, involuntarily closing his eyes. Opening, he found himself looking at a ten-years-older Aleks.
I can't imagine how hard it would be to identify a body of someone you know, especially when it's not entirely there.
DeleteWe're All Afraid of Something
ReplyDeleteWednesday’s got it right. A death stare’s so much better than a clenched-teeth smile. I’d rather be a stubborn stump dug deep than a willow bent and squashed beneath their feet. Bind my cares in ribbons, bury them deep. Put my education beneath glass and magnify the flaws. Quiet, smile, fit in; don’t upset anyone. Why? This sugar-coated nervousness helps no one who matters. Shed the mask, stare through until I see beneath. We’re all afraid of something.
Something different this week. Wednesday refers to Wednesday Addams from the Addams Family. :)
Different, yes, and thoroughly intriguing; enough to ake me wish it were the start of a novel.
DeleteGreat use of the prompts, Holly, and I loved the phrase "sugar-coated nervousness."
DeleteTHE IN-BETWEEN
ReplyDeleteI awoke groggily within a dimly glowing fog. “Where am I?” I asked, but I was alone.
A voice answered, “The In-Between.”
“The what?” was my response.
“Your subconscious. The realm between consciousness and death.”
“W… What?” I muttered. “But why?”
“You’re an educated man. Figure it out.”
“And you,” I muttered. “What do you want?”
“Ah, the blue-ribbon question,” said the voice, chuckling. “Not to squash our conversation, but you know the answer. Check your hand.”
Shockingly, I realized I held a gun.
Confused, I asked, “But why?”
The voice chuckled. “You know why, so get on with it.”
Horribly scary - and all too believable - conversation.
Deletethis is creepy in the extreme! How do you do it all the time, Jim?
DeleteVery creepy and so many questions!
Delete