A Lone Memory
Her face
an engraved
memory,
the cold winter night,
her aroma,
her taste,
her soft skin,
he felt
sixteen,
still in love,
again.
Look both ways, but today’s memories were conceived long ago.
Mind the gaps to be filled with feelings of love and pleasure.
Each Wednesday, the magnificent maven of mystery, Rochelle, sends us a notice with a photo prompt. Inspired by the prompt, we are challenged to write a complete story in fewer than 101 words. To go to her blog and join the fun, click on her photo below.
I usually avoid reading other Friday Fictioneer stories until I have written and posted mine. This week I read Rochelle’s first. Her story replaced her photo as the primary prompt in my mind. Eventually, I wrote this one which I felt was more influenced by the photo, maybe.
Genre: Fiction
Title: The Best Outcome
Word Count: 100
***
The Best Outcome
James and Cathy had a wonderful life together. Highschool sweethearts who’d recently celebrated their sixty-sixth wedding anniversary. They’d raised five children and lost count of the grand and great-grandchildren whose names were too often forgotten.
After their fiftieth year together, James and Cathy made some end-of-life medical decisions and a covenant. Neither would allow the other to suffer an unnecessarily prolonged, painful death after all better options had been exhausted and all hope was lost.
The time came. It fell upon James to end Cathy’s tormented life. He couldn’t. He ended his own, alone in the garage. “What is love?”
***
Look both ways and try to see other points of view.
Mind the gaps, we don’t need more damn bricks in the wall.
Haddaway sings while we shuffle happy dance.
Bygones
He didn’t marvel at that momentous moment.
After many years, she had become sanctimonious.
It wasn’t the stupendous vision he hoped for. It was horrendous, not tremendous,
seeing her now as portentous.
Look both ways but the past was then, this is now.
Find and mind the gaps for hidden reasons for change.
Kicking off the twelfth month of twenty-twenty-two, artist, businesswoman, swimmer, writer, mother, wife, sister, (I could go on), and our friend and fictioneer leader, Rochelle, has provided us with a peek out from Roger Bultot’s window with his inspiring photo as a bridge to creativity.
It goes like this. We look at the picture and write whatever story (beginning, middle, & end) we want. Easy, right? It’s doesn’t even have to be pure fiction. But we must prove our micro (or flash) – (non-)fiction bone fides by trimming our stories to any number of words under 101. Try it!
The directions are simple and available on Rochelle’s blog page, reachable with a simple tap, click, or press on Roger’s picture, like it was a detonator.
Genre: Espionage Fiction
Title: Truncated Bridge
Word Count: 100
***
Looking out the window, I felt stress. Ignorance fed by fear. After this job, I’d comfortably retire. To what? Sad.
The morning sunrise lacked hope. It was threatening. A foreboding bloody sky in a randomly meaningless universe. I didn’t care. It was time.
I lit what I promised myself was my last cigarette and sat by the window as I’d done hundreds of times before. When I saw the target on the bridge, I pressed the detonator button and watched the explosion. I always hated all the collateral damage. The news would blame the old bridge. Everyone lies. Everyone dies.
***
Look both ways to find happy endings.
Mind the gaps because that’s where the bridges collapse.
And for the music lovers among us, I present the Eagles singing “Seven Bridges Road.” If it works. I suppose I took the bridges thing a bit too far.
For Thanksgiving Eve this year, Boss Rochelle, our lovely, multi-talented, family oriented, and artistically gifted literary ladyship guide has gone redux to prompt us all with a pic from the awesome Brit, Sandra Crook. Sandra’s photo has many prompting options, but I was mused into a musical mood.
Click on Sandra’s photographic prompt to jump off into Rochelle’s blog page from where you may climb back up with your own story based upon whatever inspiration you received.
Genre: Parodic Musical Fiction
Title: Toy’s Lament
Word Count: 100
***
“Toy! Hey, Toy. What y’all doin’? Where’s that devil woman yer in lust with?”
Toy sang out, “She gone, Mick. Done left me in Spartanburg. Oh, Lawdy, Ima gunna buy a ticket till it run out of track.”
He pulled his guitar up and sang, “Gonna climb that highest mountain. Gonna jump right off. Ain’t nobody gunna know. That woman, Lawdy. What she done to me. Can’t ya see, Mick?”
I said, “Yer too stoned to climb up there. I’m sorry. We told ya she’s a black-hearted woman, man.”
Toy yelled, “Mean ol’ woman’s with Marshall. Never told me goodbye!”
***
Look both ways in love and lust.
Mind the gaps for tips, trips, and occasional slips.
My story is based on the early 70’s southern/country rock song lyrics, Can’t You See, by the Marshall Tucker Band, written by Toy Caldwell. Other allusions: Mick (Jones) from the band Foreigner (Cold as Ice) and Black-Hearted Woman by the Allman Brothers Band.
The original song by the original band.
Mark this Monday
Some calendars make Mondays first
for the week of seven days, listing Sundays as the last.
I could never adjust to such, not that it matters,
as Monday is always sandwiched between Sunday and Tuesday.
Taken on its own, we European-influenced folks agreed
by naming the day after Sunday for the moon (moon-day).
Our now traditional first of the five-day (forty-hour) workweek,
but sadly following two so-called rest days known as weekends,
When plumbing breaks, school’s out, and our kids get sick,
it’s when there are things to do other than what we get paid for.
This one is the week when Americans take a Thursday holiday
with a thankful glancing focus towards a black Friday,
Toward retail shopping and deals and rival’s football
and when food gluttony is more tradition than a seven deadly sin.
When the Yule time decoration dogs are unleashed,
and it is finally time for fa-la-la frills and different looking coffee cups.
But around the world, if not throughout the boundless Universe,
this is today no matter how we name it or whatever yesterday was.
Look both ways for many happy todays.
Mind the gaps for long-forgotten memories,
when feelings were for so long—so different.
Rochelle, our dear dancing diva with big black boots and broken toes, has punted a Friday Fictioneers photo from Starsinclayjars to us, twice actually. Her intent is for us to score goals by netting our 100-word (or fewer) stories for mid-November. We are to look and see the picture, big or small, and then write a story from our mused inspiration. Thence, to blog post said fibs for all the world to admire and love.
Be bold and click on the boot by the bush for a fast flash over to Mistress Rochelle’s rockin’ blog to kick up some fun with micro fiction. Post your story in one of the squares thingies and jump in on others to tell them what you think, even if you don’t know who they are.
Genre: Historical Fiction
Title: Canned English
Word Count: 100
***
The young Englishman intended to stand against the obstinate, award-winning poet, and sardonic senior citizen.
“You must wear the standard green uniform, Sir, or face the boot.”
Peter glared, “Unsatisfactory. I’ve done this vapid work well-enough for twenty-two years. I want the job. Not uniforms.”
“Sir, the National Agribusiness empowered me to inform you that you are suspended. Agree to our terms, the job is still yours.”
Peter watched a bird and sipped his wine, “You’re a callow, grotesquely inadequate twit. I’d rather live in Marfa bloody Texas than work for you jackasses.”
The young man was beet-red, “Where’s Marfan?”
***
Look both ways and be true to your conscience.
Mind the gaps, especially if your day job is on the proverbial line.
English poet Peter Reading and I were born an ocean apart on the same day, 27 July 1946. He was “one of Britan’s most original and controversial poets: angry, uncompromising, gruesomely ironic, hilarious, and heartbreaking. His scathing and grotesque accounts of lives blighted by greed, meanness, ignorance, and cultural impoverishment” captured this Bokowski-lover’s mind, heart, and imagination.
He was fired for refusing to wear a uniform, lived in Marfa, Texas, for a time, and titled the book about that experience Marfan. Peter died about 11 years ago, but his attitude and poetry live on.
More Time, Please
It was one of those warm and humid days.
When it’s like that in LA, it is
miserably smoggy, but here
it is just moody and gloomy—no rain—
in the mid-seventies, like me.
Drove and hour to Temple, Texas,
for tests (the answers to which I thought I knew)
and to see a new PA-doc
and then to get gas
and drive another hour back home.
It’s boring sitting and waiting,
but since this is a hospital, boring and routine are good.
No, “I’m sorry, Mister Bill, but … ‘oh, no’.”
I saw nicely dressed police or correctional officers escorting
a mildly overweight bald man in an orange jump suit
and fake shoes
with handcuffs in the front,
all making it hard for others to not stare and wonder.
It was not so boring thinking about that.
Got an obit email that morning.
Another high school classmate had died
(they say he passed to be euphemistic
as though he just kept driving).
Patrick Murphy (Murph)
was an artist and philosopher
of Irish descent, and a Vietnam War vet.
His obituary was more interesting than most.
Anyway, I shall not be
characteristically pointing out problems or deficiencies today
because Murph is dead, and I am not. It’s all good, thanks.
So, I’ll just sit here trying to remember him
from art class, I think,
and be happily bored on a gloomy day
in a hospital clinic waiting area
in Temple, fucking, Texas.
Looking both ways at the days of gloom and doom.
Mind the gaps in loose cuffs and I wonder who wipes his butt.
Click the photo of Robin Williams and Matt Damon to watch this scene from the movie, Good Will Hunting.
I found thalassic in Robin Devoe’s Dictionary of the Strange, Curious, & Lovely. I wrote an acrostic insult poem with more rare words from the same book. It’s Monday. I started this Saturday morning. I’m tardy.
***
Tin gods abound worldwide. Practiced prevaricators
Hemipygicly half-assed witlessness,
Adonized avatars in their own lost and low minds,
Lardaceous lickpennies of limicolous living with
Acherontic soulless evil demonic spirits, those
Snollygosters comfortable within any snobocracy,
Slubberdegullions of the lowest order or less,
Imbruted by nature without redemption.
Cacodemons with sycophants.
***
Look both ways when searching for right.
Mind the gaps for the tin gods because they disguise well.
Yesterday was Election Day, or ED day (snicker), depending on your POV. Tomorrow (Thursday, 10 November) is the USMC birthday, and Friday is Veterans Day.
Our lovely and world-class author, artist, and story-teller-mom, Rochelle, has, yet again, teamed up with the Magical Mistress of Montreal, the fabulous photographer, gifted story-maker in her own right, and social butterfly, Dale Rogerson, to delve deep into our creative minds for flashes of micro fiction miracles.
After seeing Dale’s pic, you only need a monochrome click to be transferred to the bright purple world of Her Nibs blog to clear the dark fog from your mind and create your own story with fewer than 100 words, beginning, middle, and end. If you’ve read this far, what are you waiting for? Click on Dale’s photo for the codes of color.
Genre: Gonzo Medical Journalism
Title: Thunderstruck
Word Count: 100
***
I wasn’t dreaming. I could see only faint monochrome outlines. Where was I? Was I dead? While conscious and lucid, I felt neither pain nor pleasure. I was weightless, but grounded.
She turned and smiled at me. I recognized her face. She said, “You’re back. I’ve missed you. Shall we dance?” We danced. When we kissed, I was thunderstruck.
I felt the jolt lift me. Then I heard her voice.
“Stop defib. No more shocking him. We have a heartbeat. He’s alive.”
A male voice said, “I thought he was gone for sure. Good job everyone. Welcome back, Mister Bill.”
***
Look both ways and decide your own reality.
Mind the gaps for shots and shocks.
We’ll be glad to see you again.
A twisted, and super-popular, little take on an AC/DC rocker covered by the hillbilly bluegrassers, Steve’n’Seagulls. (Turn the volume up loud and fasten your seatbelt.)
Our Literary Journey 