Welcome to the Wednesday Write-in!
Welcome to the Wednesday Write-in. This event runs every week to help any and all writers take control of their productivity and imaginations. Please join in; we’d love to read your work.
Prompts
fly in the ointment :: suspect :: fairytale :: green :: shame
Guidelines
There are no rules, but here are some guidelines:
- Use the prompts as inspiration or try to work them into your story somehow. Use as many as you want.
- When your story is done, post it online (your blog/twitter/in a comment here), tag with #wednesdaywritein if you like, and comment with a link so we can read it.
- Please take the time to read and comment on as many other stories as you have time for (but we won’t shout at you if you don’t).
- If you want to write a poem, a script, or something completely different, feel free.
Get Involved
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Any questions? Otherwise, have fun writing!
CAKE.shortandsweet 
Morning, everybody…
My story for this week is to be found here:
Prime Suspect
Looking forward to reading everyone else’s.
SJ
Like
All the evidence in the fat envelope the fat and I suspect lazy copper thought was a bribe?
Great twist
Roy
Thanks! 🙂
This is short short. Kids on holiday, but for the sake of participation, here it is. Look forward to reading yours over next wee while.
‘Come into my fairytale,’ said the green, spiky trees. ‘No one will suspect this is the route that you took. The flies in the ointment can be boiled by your fever; your shame can drowned in the sweat from your brow. Come rest in our branches; fill your head with sleep.’
your shame drowned- no can. Sorry.
A journey into delirium
I hope the patient recovers
Clever
Roy
Creepy, and shadowed, and weird. I like it. It reminds me of a hallucinatory dream during a time of illness, or something. It’s a bit ‘final’ – as in, it looks as if the hallucinator won’t be coming back out of the fairytale again – but perhaps that’s the effect of all good fairytales. We never fully leave them behind.
I enjoyed the “green, spiky trees” description. This piece could be a dark song or the beginning of a folktale.
Like it! Made me think of Lord of the Rings, for some reason 🙂
Dark and inviting! Love it.
The White Garden
It was a billed as a fairytale garden. The immaculate lawn was such a pristine green and the edges so sharp and precise I could almost suspect it was artificial. I searched in vain for a trace of moss or a stray weed.
White blossom clouded the trees above and white tulips marched in regimented rows in the beds. There were other shrubs and flowers, with white blooms naturally. I started to feel something like panic. Where was the colour? I wasn’t ready for heaven. I wanted life with all its weeds and imperfections, not this soulless, clinical place.
I had an urge to spoil the grass with heavy footprints and trample the tulips, but there was a fly in the ointment – according to the sign visitors were not allowed in. And an official was hovering.
Something went snap inside me. As the guardian of the white turned away I hopped over the low barrier and ran into the garden hurling poppy seed in all directions. I felt no shame. In fact I’m proud of my action.
As I sit in my own garden surveying the dandelions in the grass (that should have been cut a week ago) and the rampant Forget-me-nots pushing their way between the red and yellow tulips, I smile and spare a pitying thought for the white garden. But I’ve saved it. In time vibrant reds and oranges will bring warmth to that sterile place, but no-one will know it’s all thanks to me.
I wasn’t sure until the very end whether you were talking about an afterlife, or not, which was brilliant. I really liked your take on the prompts and your character’s rebellious spirit. I’m sure that sterile garden will be all the better for it!
Than you, I hope so! I always admire ‘perfect’ gardens but I wouldn’t want to have one.
Love the passion and the description of the white garden. The ending wrapped up the story nicely. You can really get a sense of colour she wants to see. Well done!
Thanks Tessa. I think we all need a bit of colour in our lives.
Loved it
I also love colourful gardens
But who says heaven is like a white garden I’m hoping for a lot more colour
Very good
Roy
I’d hope so too but will all the angels in white robes sitting on fluffy white clouds I’m not sure – we’ll see if we get there!
Story is short and well done, but if to be honest what I enjoyed the most was the way you described flowers and garden, and thoughts of the character!
Thanks for commenting Alisa.
I really liked this whole take. It’s really interesting and well handled. Loved ‘guardian of the white’.
Pingback: Weekly Wednesday Write-In | Tessa Sheppard
Hello everyone! Here is my submission for this week.
http://tessasheppard.wordpress.com/2014/04/16/weekly-wednesday-write-in-6/
Here is my contribution
Sorry I’m rather late. Busy today.
Roy
Cake
Prompts: fly in the ointment :: suspect :: fairytale :: green :: shame
The Problem
The problem with Ronnie Jackson was that he was always perceived as ‘the fly in the ointment’. At school he tried his best to conform, do what he was told, do his homework, never bully anyone; he wanted to be good. He would have loved to be a teacher’s pet, a milk monitor, a prefect, a library helper, a team captain; but he was never chosen for anything. In fact if anything untoward happened which required a culprit, a mysteriously broken window, a stolen football, a ripped page in a book, spilled paint on a desk seat, Ronnie always featured as a suspect. Despite his pleas of innocence he would often be found guilty as charged and punished for misdemeanors he had not been responsible for at all; and he hated the feeling of injustice and shame afterwards.
As a young child he could not work out why he was so disliked, despised and mistrusted. Maybe it was because he was large and rather clumsy or because he was not the sharpest knife in the drawer. He was not the best dressed pupil in school, his Mum could not afford to buy new clothes for himself and his two young sisters; he always had to wear hand me downs from his cousin. Since his father had left, his Mum worked hard and he loved her very much but the family was trapped in a life of poverty and limited opportunity.
It was the army where he found his first appreciative supervision. Sergeant Harris was a tough disciplinarian and to please him you had to get things right, in fact spot on; but if you did he recognised the fact.
‘Well done son,’ he would say with a pat on the back as he staggered first back into barracks after a tiring ten mile run or, ‘perfect target Jackson, all centre bulls, clean as a whistle,’ as they came off the firing range.
Ronnie liked Sergeant Harris so when he was asked if he would like to try for the Royal Marines, he knew it was because Harris had recommended him. When he eventually worked up the courage to ask him Harris replied frankly.
‘Yes I recommended you Jackson.’
‘Why pick me Sergeant?’
‘Simple lad, you’re the best bloody squaddie I ever had by a bloody mile lad. You deserve to be with the best lad and The Royal Marine Commandos are the best soldiers in the whole bloody army lad.’
‘Do you think I could make it? It would be like a fairy tale for me.’
‘Make it you’ll bloody sail through lad,’ he said, with another pat on the back, believe me lad you were born for a green beret but it won’t be any bloody fairy tale lad.’
*
A brown envelope dropped through the door and Mrs Jackson picked it up and tore it open expecting another bill but it was an invitation to a ceremony at the local school to unveil a plaque to her Ronnie; Sergeant Ronald Jackson VC of the Royal Marine Commandos.
*cheers* Yay for Ronnie! I’m delighted he finally met someone who saw his potential. I really liked your use of dialogue here, particularly with Sergeant Harris – it was very effective. Great story.
Thanks SJ
Oh wow, gave me chills and pleasant smile! It is so great that Ronnie found someone who saw him for a great man he was! Great! Enjoyed it A LOT! 🙂
Thanks Alisa
Wonderful, feel good story. I was worried the ending would spell out something dire but instead was delighted by Ronnie’s success. Well done!
Thanks Tessa
What a feel-good story – from unlikely beginnings … I hope the plaque ceremony wasn’t a posthumous event.
I had intended it to be
However as I wrote it I changed my mind
I left it to the reader
Personally I prefer to think that his Mum now helps out while he gets on with being a hero somewhere
Thanks for reading it anyway
Roy
‘if anything untoward happened which required a culprit’ – lovely word choice. Great read.
Thanks Elaine
A good rule for both partners in a marriage if you wish domestic bliss. You must learn how to be a willing culprit (if one is required) when you are totally innocent.
Roy
Pingback: Short story. Dirty layer. | go ask alisa
Here is mine this week: “Dirty layer” – http://goaskalisa.com/2014/04/16/short-story-dirty-layer/
Rather short, but I hope somehow more or less okay.
🙂
*lawyer 🙂 I was in a hurry and did not realize that, UGH!
So much venom. That is good.
A couple of tips I hope will help, take care to avoid repetition, use of colons and the suitable use of analogy in descriptions.
I liked the subject though; it is time someone decided to give the lawyers a hard time.
I enjoyed it, keep writing
Roy
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