Change in Posting Schedule
24 May 2019I will likely need to cut back on my posting schedule over the next few months to make time for some new creative projects I’m picking up. I still plan to post at least every other day.
I will likely need to cut back on my posting schedule over the next few months to make time for some new creative projects I’m picking up. I still plan to post at least every other day.
Today’s prompt: “Put two characters, each of whom wants something from the other, in a room together. Neither of them is allowed to ask for it straight out. Give them five minutes with only dialogue to get what they want.” [I don’t feel like writing a dialogue-heavy scene today, so I’m going to modify this just slightly.]
You’re sitting across the table from a person with a slight build, their blond hair in a short, boyish cut.
“I know what you want,” they say. They pull a set of keys from their pocket and set them on the table with a clank. You eye them and nod. One of them looks like it will fit the padlock on the door out of this room. Another would almost certainly operate a vehicle outside. You could drive far away from this treacherous place.
“And you know what I want,” they say. They pull a vicious-looking jackknife from their pocket, unfold the blade, and set it on the table with a solid clack.
You stiffen a bit and breathe deeply. You know what they want. They want to drive the knife deep into your neck. They want to watch the red stains pool on your shirt as blood blooms from your carotid artery. They want to hear your soft wet breaths escaping from a bloody hole in your trachea as you expire on the cold tile floor.
“I want it more,” they say, and smile, unmoving.
That’s not possible. It’s simply not possible that their desire to kill you could surpass your will to survive.
The next few seconds crawl by like eons.
They still haven’t moved. Their hands are sitting on the table, their fingers interlaced. Their eyes are boring holes into yours.
Are they daring you to move first? Do they think their reflexes are that much faster than yours?
Should you try to grab the keys, and then push them to the ground? Force your way to the door? Slam your fist into their hand as they reach for the knife when you grab the keys? Grab the knife yourself, and kill them first? Knock the knife to the far side of the room and grab the keys?
That last one. It’s not that you’re against killing them. It just seems like it has the greatest likelihood of success. They’ll scurry for the knife and you can run for the door, and have more of an edge with the timing.
You tell your arm to bat the knife away. Your hand moves, but instead of keeping the back of your hand to the handle of the knife so you can quickly swipe it to the far wall, your hand turns. Opens. Reaches for the handle of the knife.
Your eyes widen. You glance at the person sitting before you. Their eyes flicker up to meet yours, then narrow again, their gaze now leveled at your hand.
You try to move your hand away from the knife, to reach for the keys instead. But it’s like you’re in an invisible arm wrestling contest. And you’re losing.
Your hand grasps the knife. It raises the blade to your neck. It carves a thin red line across your throat. It punctures your windpipe. You gasp wet, fluttery gasps. Your blood soaks your shirt.
They breathe deeply and allow their muscles to relax. They wanted it more. And they got what they wanted.
Today’s prompt: “Write two prayers for your character: one to be said in private, one to be said in public.”
They pray, publicly: “Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah-nagl fhtagn.”
You pray, privately: “I hope you choke on my bones, you eldritch shitbag.”
Today’s prompt: “Find a section of your writing that has no energy to it and rewrite it as one long sentence. Be sure that the sentence keeps expanding outward, don’t worry about it being a run-on, and just let it flow.”
You wake up at 6 a.m., all smiles and eager to start your day, having gone to bed early last night after watching a few educational videos about personal hygiene, and after toweling off from your shower, you put on your favorite pants – those khakis with the front pleats – and your favorite light gray polo shirt, buttoned all the way up to the top, and then you make your lunch, slathering mayonnaise on two slices of Wonder Bread and topping them with two Kraft Singles – ahh, processed American cheese, the perfect sandwich – and you drop it into a brown bag with a Red Delicious, and now it’s on to breakfast, decaf coffee and a bowl of plain oatmeal, so you stir your oatmeal, scoop out a big spoonful, and suddenly pitch forward, face down, dead, into the bowl, and wouldn’t you know it, I was just too busy feigning excitement while stifling yawns to get your cause of death.
Today’s prompt: “Who people think you are, compared to who you know you are”
Most people think you’ve been dead for months. Your body was never recovered, but there’ve been so many mass graves of charred remains uncovered over the last year that they can be forgiven for jumping to conclusions. And you were very clever. You saw all the signs of the cultists gathering, growing in power and influence, and summoning the Great Old Ones to this plane. And what did you do? You stocked up on bottled water and canned goods. You built your bunker in secret. And when the Twin Blasphemies, Nug and Yeb, destroyed most of your city, you took the opportunity to disappear.
No one knows you’re alive except you, and the random cultist who happened to hear the sounds of your generator as he wandered through the woods, hoping against hope to find a new sacrifice, and who is now standing over your sleeping form, knife raised.
Today’s prompt: “What you’ve kept”
Your left eye. Nine of your fingernails. Seventeen uncrushed ribs. One leg.
Today’s prompt: “Honesty”
“Let’s start with your life line,” the fortune teller says. Her left hand cradles your hand, and her index finger traces the line next to your thumb. She stops. She frowns. She slowly draws her hands back from yours, then shoves the $20 bill you handed her earlier back across the table.
“What’s wrong?” you ask.
“Oh, nothing really,” she says. “Your future is … cloudy. I can’t get a good read on it.”
She can barely meet your gaze. It’s obvious she’s lying.
“I don’t believe you,” you say. “You saw something. You figured something out.”
“I just remembered I have somewhere to be,” she says, rising and adjusting her skirt. “I’m sorry, but I can’t finish our session.”
“Oh, come on,” you say.
“Shop’s closed.”
“Please. We both know you don’t have an appointment or anything. Whatever it is you saw, I can handle it.”
She sits down and crosses her arms, not exactly resigned, but at least done with the charade. “You know, knowing the future is kind of overrated,” she says. “Some things can’t be changed, and knowing the truth about what’s going to happen in those kinds of situations will only make you anxious. It’s not the kind of thing you’re going to be able to prepare for or redirect.”
“If you leave me in suspense with a warning like that, don’t you think I’m going to be imagining things even worse, and making myself even more anxious?”
“No.” A pause. “I’ve said enough.”
“Look,” you say, pushing the money back across the table, “I already paid you. I’m not leaving until I get the honest truth from you. And don’t bother trying to make up something else. You’re a terrible liar.”
She sits in silence, sullenly blowing a stray hair out of her face. Finally, she speaks. “Your life line ends next Wednesday.”
“Next Wednesday? How?”
“Look, you don’t really want to–”
“Yes, I do.”
“You can’t stop it.”
“I still want to know.”
A long pause. “I see … creatures.”
“Creatures?”
“Horrible creatures. Massive, with pale skin and long, spidery limbs with multiple joints. Barbed claws. Three rows of sharp teeth. They move fast. There’s a whole swarm of them. Dozens. They chew into your stomach. They pull the skin from your face and arms with their claws. They leave your body shredded.”
A long pause.
“You’re making that up,” you say weakly, but you can read in her face that she isn’t.
“Keep believing that,” she says.
“I’ll get a gun,” you say.
“I saw you with a gun,” she says. “You’re still overwhelmed in the end. There’s too many of them.”
“I’ll lock myself in my home. No. I’ll run away.”
“I saw them crashing into your house to attack you, swarming around you in Tijuana, and reaching between the bars of a jail cell after you purposely got yourself incarcerated. The where isn’t fixed. The when and the what and the how are. I told you. There’s no escape.”
You sit in stunned silence.
“Well? Now do you wish you’d settled for a lie?”
“Yes,” you say.
“I’ll never understand why people think honesty is the best policy,” she says.