Just another Writing Prompt!

Well, here is another prompt that I posted in April on the Writer’s Digest wall.  This premise is why you were late for a meeting.  Hope you like it!!  Please feel free to leave a comment, they are appreciated!

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Hannah stared down at her phone as it lay on the white tablecloth while she waited for her food.  She pushed the refresh button again to see if Roger had emailed her. She was getting impatient.  Instead the dreaded email of her boss displayed with a ding. 

“What could she possibly want?” Hannah growled.

 “Where the hell are you Miss Riley?” it read. “The meeting is in ten minutes and of course it looks as though you forgot!!!  Get your soon to be jobless ass here immediately!”

 “Oh crap!” Hannah mumbled as she threw a twenty on the table and hurriedly grabbed her suit jacket from the back of the chair then bent to grab her purse on the floor.  She rushed toward the little gate that separated the café’s patio from the sidewalk and began to run.  Just as she rounded the corner she was enveloped into a rush of passengers coming from the ferry that had just docked and now filled the entirety of the walkway. 

The panic set in as she realized that she wasn’t going to make it and would have to deal with the evil that was Cora.  She made it to the crosswalk and while waiting for the light to change she realized that she had left her phone on the table.

“Shit!!”  Hannah was close to tears as she turned to make her way back through the crowd to the cafe.  She was in full sprint now and trying to think why she had even decided to go out to lunch? She knew why, it was Roger and her stomach jumped with excitement at the thought of his daily salacious emails.  She was now at the table she had been sitting at and no phone in sight.  She looked around and called out to a passing waitress.

 “Oh my God!  This can NOT be happening!”  She cried as she followed the young girl to the bar area where the lost and found was.

She looked up at the clock above the bar that teased her with the fact that she was already fifteen minutes late.  She wasn’t going to make it back for the meeting, which meant the bitch would surely fire her now.  She sat down on the nearest stool to wait for the waitress when she heard the sirens.  She looked up at the breaking news on the flat screen mounted in the corner and the reporter standing in front of the building where she worked.

 Hannah was listening but the words didn’t make sense.  She watched as people were running from the revolving doors with their hands up, some bloody and some being helped.  Police and SWAT teams were running inside along with paramedics.  The waitress came back with her phone as she listened of the shootings on the 17^th floor.  Her floor. She looked down as her phone rang to life and Roger’s smiling face displayed on the screen.

 
“Honey, I think you just saved my life!” She whispered.

Those Blessed Writing Prompts

I made the dreadful mistake that I am sure (I hope) quite a few of you have made as well.  What could that possibly be you ask?   I allowed someone to read part of my novel(s) that I am working on and they were so disinterested and said the dreaded words “pretty good” while setting the papers down on the table that I call my workstation, then moving on to other discussions or food.  Bleh…

So I did what any insecure aspiring writer would do. I quit.

But just for a time, how stupid was that?  What was I expecting from these readers that I had ambushed to do when they read my little short stories or the jewel encrusted folder that is the haven for my novel?  Well I’ll tell you…

I wanted gush people!!    

So after I realized the errors of my ways, I dusted off my sparkly folder and went back to work.  I did however notice that my writing had changed and just as I go to the gym everyday, I really needed to write the morning pages that I had become accustomed to and exercise my thoughts, writing and words. 

I feel like my writing is back and although I am still trying to find my style, I feel good about it. I no longer am writing for gush but for me. So I am back to writing prompts and I want to enter competitions again.  My novel is coming along now that I am back at it.  I tried not to go back to page 1 and edit for the thousandth time, I just continued on with the story and figure I can change or mesh the styles later?  What do you think?

Anyhoo..  Here is a writing prompt that I posted on Writer’s Digest in April.  Its premise is Bribing an IRS Agent.  I changed it up a little based on a comment made by a wonderful person named Ann.   Hope you like it!!

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The doorbell rang and I sat at the kitchen table trying to pretend it wasn’t going to play out this way.  After the last several years, why even pretend?  The mess she and that spectacled bean counter left would never end.  I got up from the table and with the memory of that bitch’s voicemail I opened the door for the IRS. 

“Mr. Gauthier??”  The man at the door in the shiny black suit and sunglasses said darkly.

“Yes, please come in.” I moved back to let him in.  We sat down as he opened his briefcase and began to pull out folders.  He explained the discrepancies of my last two years tax returns and then went on to explain the consequences of blindly signing tax returns and listening to big breasted blond idiots.  Wait, I think that was just in my head.  I hadn’t heard a word he had said until I heard the word jail.

“Listen, isn’t there something we could do here?”  I said with sweat pouring down my temples.  “I mean to make this go away?”

“Are you attempting to bribe an agent of the IRS Mr. Gauthier?”

“I think I am kidding?”  I said clasping my hands together and looking down.

“Maybe there is something we can do” I looked up with relief in the distance. “ I see that you owe over a hundred thousand which would be the right amount of money needed for a hit job.” 

Did I hear him right?  I looked up and he was staring directly at me with those cold blue eyes.  After hearing him out and understanding the object of his murderous desire, I finally agreed.  I would kill the man about to testify at his fraud trial and he would correct my taxes so that all went away.  Hands shook and the deal was done.  What was I doing?

I moved in a fog for the next few days as I studied maps, schedules and photos of the soon to be deceased.  Then it came to me, I knew what I had to do to fix everything.  The plan was in motion already, might as well run with it.

The day had finally came and I was scared.  Armed with the gun Mr. Agent had given me, I followed his witness to the location that I had carefully planned for and just as I thought at 1:30 PM, in that familiar suburban alley. The Mercedes was there.  I walked up and fired two bullets into each of them.  I smiled as I watched the blond hair absorb the blood and the shocked look on his face.  I pulled off the gloves and wrapped the tape with the fingerprints of the IRS agent on the gun and tossed it. 

The next morning, I drank my coffee and read the insurance policy that would take care of all my problems with pictures of my Ex wife, my CPA and the IRS agent flashing across the TV in the background. 

*gush

Crazy Creative Emotions

Sometimes as I write on my blog, my short stories, writing prompts or the book that I just know I will be able to share with the world one day. I am often brought to tears at my own writing.  *dork*   Yep, as I am writing the tears just begin to flow.  I once wrote a story in the middle of Costco so I could test the keyboard of a laptop and just boo hoo’d as though noone else was there.   

With each heartfelt stroke of the pen or keystroke I find that some things just jump up and become something that I didn’t even know I had within myself.  Like a memory of personal tribulation or great joy, even a story that was told to me by a friend or passing stranger that I have held onto deep within. I can also say that certain stories bump up against my pocket of happiness or my bubble of sadness even though I thought I had blown that bubble away.

So today I wrote a story for a writing prompt on Writer’s Digest.com (which I love!) that wanted us to write about a special anniversary.  The story started as something I had once heard from a friend and ended up a story about two people I never met, but now consider friends.  Yes, I cried.

So I thought I would share this with you all and please if it connects with you or someone you know please let me know.  I would love to find out if others have the same experiences and if not, what are yours?

Thanks so much!!

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In the Rearview Mirror

He pulled up in front of the old church as the whispering winds swirled the leaves up around the tall steeples on either side of the building.  Martin walked in through the large oak doors and waited in the vestibule for Henry.  He could see him standing there with the others holding a chip.  They were patting him on the back and everyone was smiling.  As the crowd made their way to the refreshment tables for coffee and desserts, Henry looked up and finally saw him then walked over and looked Martin carefully in the eye and said what he said every year.

“I thought you wouldn’t make it this year.”

“I told you I would come as long as you needed me even though I don’t agree with it”

“Ya Ya, I know.  Look eight year chip”

“Nine year anniversary, are you ready?”

They walked out of the church together and down the steps to Martin’s car and they began the drive they made every year to Tahoe and back.  As the familiar drive took them through the freeways, tree lined and mountainous roads they talked about Martin’s new baby and his job.  Henry wanted to know everything that was happening to him.  Oh the joy of a good life!  Something that Henry knew deep down that he would never have but wouldn’t admit it.

Martin finally pulled into the familiar parking lot at Henry’s old watering hole, McP’s pub. They entered and sat at the bar.  Martin ordered an ice tea and water for them as they sat in silence and remembered that night so many years ago.  The drinks, the women, dancing and getting in the car for the long drive home, then the crash, the fire, the blood, the sirens, the chaos, the hospital, the regret and the enduring sadness that will forever linger.

“Are you ready for the drive back?”  Martin said with an understanding look as Henry nodded.

Back in Martin’s car they drove in silence until they came upon the site where it all happened.  Martin grabbed the flowers in the backseat and got out to lay them against the scarred tree as Henry stood with his hands folded in front of him.  They stood in silent comradeship.  Martin then walked back to the car and got in while Henry took a minute more then followed him for the long ride home. 

“Just drop me back at the church man,” Henry said as they drove into town. “I’m going to need another meeting.”

“Are you sure?” Martin asked with a heartbroken break in his voice. “You need to forgive yourself, it’s not your fault she died.”

“That’s what they keep saying but I was driving.  I am just glad you were ok.”  Henry was out of the car now and walking up the church steps towards the oak doors. As Martin drove away, he looked in the rearview mirror at the old abandoned church to see his friend vanish into thin air.

*sniff*