Micro Fiction March Day 5

 

After writing a sonnet about unconditional love yesterday, today's challenge gave me a chance to splash around in more familiar waters. I can't say I'm deliriously happy with what I've written today, but it's more important to write something than write something great (at least, that's what I'm telling myself right now!). Today's idea arrived reasonably fully formed and it was a challenge to whittle it down to 300 words but I managed - just. So, without further ado, here it is...

First Person Train Journey

I didn’t mean to kill him. 

Actually, that's not strictly true. I did mean to kill him, but I didn't mean to kill him tonight or leave behind so much evidence. But he always knew how to press my buttons, and I just snapped.

The kitchen knife slid in so much easier than I expected. His eyes wide. Hands clutching the handle.

I left him there on the floor. Packed a bag. Took money and passport. Booked a flight from Heathrow to Costa Rica after googling who doesn't have an extradition treaty with the UK. And now it's 5.59am, I'm 10 minutes into my train journey and we're stuck in a tunnel.

No one else in carriage and the lights go out. Fuck. And no signal on my phone. The phone's torch is working though, so I thumb it on and head to the next carriage. 

The door is locked.

There's a pained groan from behind me and the hairs go up on the back of my neck. It's impossible but I know it's him before I even turn around. The knife still lodged in his stomach. He drags himself down the aisle towards me, a trail of blood slick behind him. This can't be happening, my brain screams. But it is.

My back to the locked door, I watch as he inches closer. He's dead but he's coming for me all the same. Blood-soaked fingers outstretched to me.

I scream, finally, as I feel his hands close on my ankles like steel manacles.

And I know this is the end.

*    *    *

Police have named Amy Carruthers, 38, as the main suspect in the murder of Dominic Pierce. CCTV footage shows Carruthers stepping onto the platform at Tamworth Station but she never got on the earliest train at 6.03am.

Micro Fiction March Day 4

So, this was the toughest day so far and there were moments where I said to myself "A poem, Oliver/ Why on Earth would you set a poem as a challenge?", because this is one of the forms of writing I have the least experience and the least confidence in. A piece of science fiction, horror, fantasy or a thriller? No problem! A bit of comic fiction? I can do that. But a poem? That is an altogether different kettle of fish.

So, today, I pondered for quite some time on the theme and then, once I'd decided what I was going to write about, I ended up pondering considerably longer as I tried to think what I wanted to say and how I could say it.

The result was a sonnet on the topic of unconditional love. Word count was no problem (a measly 114 words) but this was the slowest words per minute I think I've ever managed in my life. In the end, I quite liked it. I hope you do to.

Unconditional Love

For love doth come in many shapes and forms,

And I do not pretend to know them all,

Though some may falter through quarrels and storms,

Unconditional love requires no fall,

No barbs and thorns could ever dissuade me,

No fault in you could I ever discern

They say true love is blind and yet I see,

Purest light in your every twist and turn,

A smile from you enough to warm my heart,

A tear from your eye and I am bereft,

For you I know I would give everything,

Until there was truly naught in me left,

See true that my love is adamantine,

I am yours, and forever, you are mine.

Micro Fiction March Day 3

Today's challenge was to write a children's story - which left things pretty open compared to the title-based challenges of the first two days. But, that openness was a challenge in itself as it took me ages to pick an idea and stick with it. Ideas that came close, but which didn't make it, included a story about someone who had a dinosaur under the bed, a version of the three pigs (in which the wolf was a council planner who simply tried to stop the pigs from considerable breaches of health and safety), and a story about a pirate who was an abject failure at pirate school. In the end, I went with something completely different; a story told in rhyme about an imaginary friend...

A Children's Story - Imaginary Friend

Billy’s my imaginary friend,

I play with him every day.

We play a million games,

And he’s fun in every way.

He’s waiting for me when I wake,

We go and eat breakfast together,

Then we both go get on our coats,

And go out, whatever the weather.

We go on the swings and the slide,

And we dig great big holes in the sand,

We spin the roundabout so very fast,

Having an imaginary friend is just grand.

When we’re home we play with the toys,

We do jigsaws and read lots of books,

Then as it gets late in the day,

We watch as mum or dad cooks.

We eat dinner and laugh out loud,

Mum and dad think I am silly,

I try to explain but they don’t understand,

It’s because mum and dad can’t see Billy.

Then it’s time to get ready for bed,

We splash and we play in the bath,

We put on pyjamas and clean our teeth,

And maybe have one final laugh.

Then we both climb up into bed

And I watch Billy as he falls asleep

I wish he could be forever my friend,

His company I always want to keep.

But Billy is growing much older,

And our time soon must end, I feel.

For once Billy completely grows up,

To me, he’ll no longer be real…

Micro Fiction March Day 2

 

Time was pressing even more today than yesterday and, thanks to needing an early start, it proved impossible to get up early and write (I couldn't face the thought of writing at 4.30am). So, I wasn't able to get started on this until 8pm tonight. Fortunately, I had the story in my head all day, so it proved relatively easy to excavate (Stephen King makes this wonderful analogy about story ideas being like fossils that authors discover and then have to try and excavate as precisely as possible to translate into what can be read - it's always resonated with me). 

The most difficult part was keeping this to 300 words. I started writing; wrote a short intro with some scene setting. Word count check. 262 words. Bugger. Complete edit required. Darlings were not just killed, they were lined up and dealt with executioner style. But, in the end, I managed to get it done in exactly 300 words. Hope you enjoy, at least a little...

The Last Stop

Friday nights have recently followed the same routine. Drinks down the pub to warm up. More drinks at the club so I believe I can dance. Embarrass myself chatting up girls way out of my league. Exit club and eat spicy kebab. Catch the night bus. Fall asleep. Get woken up by Ralph at the end of the route. Home. Sleep. Remember very few details of any of the above next morning.

Half a kebab still in hand, grease and sauce spilling down my wrist, I staggered up the steps of the bus and waved my bus pass at Ralph. He stared blankly back at me, not his usual cheerful self.

The bus lurched away from the stop with me still standing in the aisle, and I navigated my way to the back seat like a man on a ship in heavy seas before falling into place on the red plastic seat and sliding along it to sit by the window.

I went to eat the second half of my kebab and realised that it was on the floor, halfway back up the aisle. It was difficult not to get emotional. I’d become quite attached to it in the short time we’d had together. Oh well, sleep it was. I put my head against the window and I was gone.

I awoke. It was cold. The bus was static and silent and we seemed to be in a forest. My brain tried to work out what was going on. Ralph was standing in the aisle.

“This isn’t the last stop,” I said.

Ralph’s face rippled in a way that faces really shouldn’t ripple.

“Oh”, he said, his face splitting into an impossibly wide smile that revealed a mouth full of teeth like black needles. “I think you’ll find it is.”

Micro Fiction March Day 1

Today was, frankly, one of those days. The kind of day where you get swept up in stuff and have literally no time to yourself. So, I was thankful that I got up at 5.30am this morning to tackle Day 1 of my Micro Fiction March challenge because, otherwise, there's a good chance that I'd have ended up flunking on the very first day. As it is, it's still taken more than fifteen hours since writing before I've had a chance to sit down and actually post this.

Creating something vaguely complete in 300 words or less is tough. Today I came in at 298 words, but it definitely required I be at my most concise.

I originally planned to write something completely different but, when I sat down and looked at the blank page this morning, this is what came out. I hope you enjoy it...

The Tide

The sand was cold beneath my feet as I slipped my shoes and socks off and began a slow walk down the empty beach. Air thick with brine, the only sound was that of white tipped waves as they rolled in and then crashed themselves against the shore. The sky above a rich, dark purple as the barest hint of the morning sun began to creep across the horizon behind me; the moon hanging high and bright.

The tide was still rising, and I stared at the moon and wondered if it knew the effect that its presence had on us; that its gravitational pull raised and lowered the seas and oceans across our entire world as we rotated and our surface drew nearer, then further, from it. Did the moon know? Or was it entirely unaware of the power that it exerted?

Sharp fragments of shells prodded against my feet as I took five steps closer to the sea. A large wave washing a foamy sheen across the sand until the last tendrils of cold water seeped around my toes.

I wonder if you knew the effect your presence had on me. Like the moon, you exerted a power over me; your gravity serving to raise and lower my spirits, to tug at my heart. But I can never ask, because you’re no longer here to answer. The oceans within me now stilled and stagnant. 

The sea took you from me that day three months ago. And took so much of me in that same moment.

I feel the hotness of tears against my cheeks as the frigid water laps at my ankles. And I wonder if this will be the day I cannot bring myself to step back. To submit to the tide and join you.