I like the idea of prompts to invoke inspiration and generate stories. Personally, I think real life situations work better for me, but I'm willing to give this a try.
In order to try to keep this blog on my designated schedule, I'm going to utilize writing prompts to generate posts. Here are the rules, if you will:
- The prompt will be written above the generated story.
- The story must be written in 500 words or less. (This will be a BIG challenge for me, and I'm looking forward to it.)
- At the end, I ask for your comments. If you post your comments on Facebook, I'll copy them to the blog and give you credit. Please remember that all criticism is welcome, for an artist in any craft cannot improve his or her work without the honest opinions of those who would be his or her clients or customers. (In my case, my readers.)
You’ve been writing a blog for a number of months now without issue, then suddenly you’re confronted with an anonymous commenter who posts unwarranted slams against you. A techie friend helps you use the commenter’s IP address to get the address of this rogue. You head to the house ready to pick a fight—but when you knock on the door, the person who answers is someone you know. Write this scene.
(credit: writersdigest.com)
The door bell echoed through the house as I waited for the door to open. I was still fuming about the comment left on my blog by this anonymous scum ball. Who the hell did this guy he think he was saying such degrading things about my character?
I paced the porch for a full two minutes. I knew someone was home. I could hear footsteps moving through the house.
When the door finally opened, I stood aghast. Clad in the worn flannel pajamas I had given her for Christmas when she was just eighteen, stood my now-twenty-six-year-old daughter. Her blond hair looked freshly brushed, perhaps to look more appropriate for answering the door this early on a Sunday morning.
"Celia?" I said, still dumbfounded. "You're the person?"
"I'm what person?" she asked in a haughty tone.
But my shock kept me tongue-tied, and I stood there just staring at her.
"What do you want, Jack? It's too early for unexpected reunions." She huffed out a breath before closing the door in my face.
That broke the spell. I rapped hard on the door. It opened almost immediately. This time I was ready.
“Celia, please,” I said a way to stall her.
“Please what? What do you want?”
“You live here alone? Doesn’t look like much,” I said. “I’d wanted better for you.”
“Yeah? Well, you didn’t seem to want anything to do with me or Mom when you walked out eight years ago, Jack. Why the hell are you here now? Are you dying, or something?”
Her words and tone cut to the bone. “I deserve that,” I said on a sigh. “But, no. I’m not dying. I actually came here to speak with the person who left a nasty comment on my blog a couple weeks ago. Do you anything about that?”
“Why would I care about your blog? Or anything else about you for that matter? I’m doing fine without you.”
I turned my back to her and sat on the top step, bracing myself for the confession. “I traced the IP address of the commenter to this address, Celia. I was pissed. That comment was so raw.”
“People needed to know those things, Jack.”
“Are you admitting to writing the comment?”
She stood there looking down her nose at me, arms crossed over her chest. Lifting her eyes toward the sky, she said, “Yeah, I wrote it.”
Nothing more was offered, so I probed. “Why?”
Tears streamed from her eyes, and a sob shook her as she said, “Mom died a month ago.”
As she broke down, I stood and wrapped her in my arms. “Oh, honey. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
“Does it even matter to you?” she accused.
“Celia, there are many things I regret in life, but losing you is the biggest. Can we go for coffee and talk?”
She sighed. “I guess so. Let me get dressed.”
This was tough. But it was a great exercise for me. Please tell me what you think.
No comments:
Post a Comment