Friday, July 30, 2010

A writing challenge from Magpie Tales...

I found a blogger who has a great way of encouraging writers to exercize their brain.  She posts a prompt of some kind and invites people to write to her prompt.  Writers post their submission on their site, and then link back to Magpie Tales.  So, here's my first go at it.  (It's a freewrite... not a lot of planning or editing involved.)

Jackhammer... no, it's my heartbeat pounding out decibels of pain in my head, and my shoulder, and my hip.  A sliver of light in the dark... everything is fuzzy.  Blink blink.  OK, something's coming into focus.  A lock.  I can't move, it hurts too bad.  My eyes pan around and find... chaos.  Where the hell am I?!  I don't recognize the disheveled room or the antique table I'm laying on.  I need to try and sit up.  OUCH!!  Ok, I'm up.  I take a couple of deep breaths.  I hear voices beyond the lock and it all starts to come back to me.  I knew these people were wierd at dinner.  But Cici was with me and I figured we had each other's backs.  My pulse quickens... where is Cici?  How do I get out of here?  How did this happen?  Am I OK?  I have clothes on... yep, including underwear.  Nothing hurts except this hangover headache and the hip and shoulder I was sleeping on.  Something soft moves in the corner... panic... it's a guy.  As he sits up and shakes off sleep, he looks vaguely familiar.  "Are you OK?" he says.  I instantly feel safe.  His eyes are tender and kind.  I know he fits into my evening somewhere, but... "Do you remember anything?" he said.  "Who are you?" is all I can get out.  "I'm Dan Warner.  We met at this dinner party in Old Town.  It was all cool in the beginning, really elegant.  Then the hosts, Natalie and Van, started acting really strange.  They hauled out all of this freaky stuff and started to get everyone to play some stupid fantasy game.  I was pretty sure I saw Van slip something into your drink.  I tried to get you out of there, but you took a few drinks before I could convice you to leave.  I think you had a good bit to drink before that" a little grin slipped out of his handsome face.  "Where are we?"  "I grabbed a couple of other people and ... it was pretty crazy getting us here to my place.  The cab driver had to think we were some kind of partyers."  "My friend Cici... is she here?"  "The redhead?"  I nodded.  "She's in the other room."  A long pause.  "This could have turned out a lot worse."

10 Comments:

At July 30, 2010 at 3:40 PM , Blogger Helen said...

Should we be trusting Dan Warner? Your writing style is vivid and entertaining ... I enjoyed this.

 
At July 30, 2010 at 4:03 PM , Blogger Kathe W. said...

hmmmm-there has to be more to this story!
Nice read!

 
At July 30, 2010 at 4:57 PM , Blogger Brian Miller said...

glad you joined magpie...fun write...and yes it could have been a lot worse...

 
At July 30, 2010 at 5:18 PM , Blogger Gabriela Abalo said...

an interesting take on this week Magpie.
Nice story

 
At July 31, 2010 at 6:59 AM , Blogger Linda Bob Grifins Korbetis Hall said...

lovely tale,
you leave readers lingering...

 
At July 31, 2010 at 7:32 AM , Blogger Berowne said...

Interesting story, well told.

 
At July 31, 2010 at 6:44 PM , Blogger Unknown said...

Quite a different take ... much enjoyed it.

 
At August 1, 2010 at 3:02 PM , Blogger Tess Kincaid said...

Shivers!!

 
At August 2, 2010 at 9:08 PM , Blogger Tumblewords: said...

Sounds like a bad night to me - nicely written!

 
At August 3, 2010 at 8:01 AM , Blogger Jessie said...

interesting...you may be onto something here.

smiles,

 

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