Petrov

Two weeks earlier, Petrov had been a farmer. He was a simple man, young enough to not yet be married, but old enough to be looking for a wife. He grew sugar beets on his father's land, but in two years time he would likely have land of his own. The war called all this into question. There were always wars, that much was sure, but until the well-dressed officer came into town, his pockets heavy and clinking with coin, Petrov had never entertained the notion of becoming a solider. When the officer finished his speech in the crowded beer hall, Petrov surprised himself by being among the first to step forward.

His parents wept for him, even after he assured them that he would hardly be gone long enough for them to notice he was missing.

The well-dressed officer was never seen again. He had gone off to some other town, in order to charm more of the farmers and miners around Kəlbəcər. The fresh recruits, men of various ages, builds, and fitness for the military, were brought to another officer. This other man was heavy-set, with a scar that showed from under his collar and presumably descended across his chest.

They didn't march, as they weren't really an army at all. Their new officer, the fat one, didn't even give them orders. They followed him though, having nothing better to do, and thinking mostly about the promised pay that came at the end of service. Petrov didn't talk much with them, mostly because the older men seemed to have already settled into a pattern of jokes and stories without him. They would gather around the campfires, eating food donated from local farms, and Petrov would listen, adding nothing to the conversation.

If you asked an Azerbaijani, you would hear that Petrov never entered into Armenian territory at all. To use neutral terms: Petrov crossed into contested territory in his second week of military service. Their fat officer didn't even mention the transition, but it became clear one night when they stopped near a farmhouse and the farmer refused them resources.

Petrov never saw what happened, and only bore witness to screams of the farmer's wife and daughters as they were raped. He felt bad about it, but ate the chickens they had taken anyway. When they left the farm, Petrov didn't see any blood, just a farmhouse with people inside it, indistinguishable from the thousand others that dotted the countryside. It was almost eirie how things like that could happen and look so normal so soon afterwards.

Their small band entered into Susha after most of the looting had already started. There weren't just soliders making a mess of things, but normal people too. Windows were smashed in, dead bodies lay in the streets, and the air was thick with the smell of smoke and sweat. Later on, when Petrov was forced into telling this story by his children, he would say that it was a nationalist fervor, that only some of the people were acting like animals.

I apologize for how historically inaccurate this probably is.

Story #7

Seed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shusha_pogrom

This story is due May 12th at 11:59PM.

The Atomic Man

Daniel was the best actor at Richardson's Theatre, and some went so far as to call him the best actor in all of England. Among those who followed the lives of actors, there was talk about why he stayed there; certainly, there were better troupes to be acting with, such as . When the enthusiasts approached him, they found him polite and gentle, but always somewhat remote. Once he stepped from the stage, the emotion fell from his face.

Away from the crowds, he lived a simple live. His room contained a small bed packed with straw, a bedpan, and a large pile of scripts which he read by candlelight. He ate simply, refused liquor, and kept his distance from the women of the troupe, most of whom were little better than prostitutes. Noble men would come backstage after the show to speak with the women of the stage, talk that eventually came round to money and the lack thereof, and if the noble men later slipped into their tents, no one would call it a transaction.

On stage, Daniel dropped away, and the characters seemed to inhabit his skin. He studied the scripts not just to learn the lines, but to divine the emotions of the men he was playing. When he was finished reading, his knowledge was intimate, and the words came from his mouth unbidden by rehearsal, as though they were being said for the first time with the full force of emotion. It was as if he did not even notice the audience. At times, his devotion to the craft detracted from the performance; he did not like to cover for the mistakes of his fellow actors.

In his eighth year with the troupe, Daniel was introduced to a petite young woman who had recently joined the troupe. Her name was Eliza, which he committed to memory, and about whom he promptly forgot.

Later that week, during a staging of Hero and Leander which had been adapted from the poem by Marlowe, Eliza was playing a friend of Hero's. This was an original invention of their writer, who was following the time-worn tactic of having a close friend make bawdy puns which would be completely inappropriate coming from the virginal Hero. Daniel, as Leander, saw her for the first time. It was not merely her youth or beauty that caught his eye, but the unflinching way that she played her role. Daniel held a low opinion of comedy - the masses would burst their guts laughing at any old penny gaff - but this was something different. She did not play to the crowd, but to the other two people on stage. Daniel found himself laughing, though he'd heard the jokes told a hundred times before.

Late at night, after the third show, Daniel found himself wondering what it was that attracted him to her where so many other women had failed. After some time, he came to the conclusion that it must have been Leander; perhaps his love for Hero was not as pure as once thought, and his mind strayed to other women. With that in mind, the next night went much better - Daniel succumbed to the desire, and wrapped it into his act, a new facet of Leander for the audience to see.

A few days later, she was on his stage again, this time during an original play of the standard love quadrangle variety. Daniel played Orville, a brooding poet, while Eliza played Candice, the smith's daughter. In the end, after much chasing around and various hijinks, along with brief intervention from both gods and fairies, Orville ended up with a different character. Daniel stood beside Eliza during the curtain call though, purely by accident, and could not help but glance at her - stripped of her character, she was flushed and full of excitement, basking in the afterglow of adoration. Daniel had never gone in for audiences, had seen them merely as a distraction, but through her eyes he could somehow see the appeal.

She came to him that night, after the crowds had cleared out. She looked shyly at the floor, then cleared her throat and locked eyes with him.

"What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?" she asked with a sweet smile.

"The exchange of thy love's faithful vow for mine," he responded almost automatically.

She approached his small straw bed, where he lay with a script on his lap, and he felt his strength and security fall away, as a wedding veil lifted up after the nuptials had been completed.

A Trip To 1803

Mona stood above the patient, a white mask covering her face and her mind drifting off. She had been employed at Maple River Dental for over 20 years, and while she knew everything about her employers, she often felt they knew nothing about her. Mona was the weak silent type. Physically, she was thin and tall. Her almost albino features nearly faded into the beige walls. With hair too white to be blonde and too brittle to be beautiful, Mona looked older than her forty-years. That is, she would have appeared older if anyone had ever bothered to look at her. As it was, Mona was as close to invisible as a person could be.

Today was like every other day for the past twenty years. Dr. Cindy Fellomy was rushing from room to room, frantic to chip away at her patients' teeth. It was as if she were a little god creating and recreating the crumbling landscape in the planet of the mouth. Because of her godlike powers, she had gone a little mad. At times Mona almost worshiped Dr. Cindy for her pure energy. Dr. Cindy was one of those women who lit the room on fire when she entered, and left it as cold as ice. Despite this, (or more likely because of it) she had a difficult time retaining either her employees or patients for any amount of time. If anyone ever took any notice of Mona (and no one ever did), it would have been obvious that she was in love with her boss.

Today, like most days, Mona watched over her patient as the nitrous oxide began to take effect. This was her favorite time in any day, because Mona could become someone. No one was watching (at least no one who was aware), and she could crawl into their brains through the widening pupils of their eyes, the small narrow vacancy widening to let her jump into the adventures so impossible in her own life.

Mona had discovered this special skill thirteen years ago and indulged in it (as if it were a drug or a king sized candy bar) daily. On her first trip, Mona had fallen quite by mistake. Her patient at the time had been an elderly man, with quite awful bridge work. As he motioned for her to increase the amount of laughing gas, she leaned forward to note the size and shape of his pupils. As Mona drew closer, she began to reach out her hand to steady herself and realized that there was nothing on which to steady herself. She was no longer in the dentist's office, but in the backstage of a very small, long theatre.

When she got her bearings, Mona began to explore a little more. The backstage of theatre ran directly behind the stage and was about four feet wide and a hundred feet in length. At the moment, Mona was alone except for the sound that rushed in over the top of the stage wall. She began to creep slowly toward the apron, and looked out onto the stage. As soon as she grew near, a man dressed in 17th century garb grabbed her arm and threw her onto the stage, "Your turn lad. Remember, we are all merely players."

Though normally Mona would have been frozen to the spot, shuttering and shaking with fright, this time things were different. She strutted to the middle of the stage, and she began to dance. She became a whirling dervish, tipping and spinning, seemingly losing control if only to regain it in the last moment. Mona flung her limbs to and fro, her mind and body in seamless meditation.

Story #6

The next three stories will use a random article from Wikipedia as their seed. I reserve the right to reject technical things, stubs, and things that otherwise wouldn't offer any meat for a story.

Seed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richardson's_Theatre

This story is due May 3rd at 11:59PM.

Gym Class

Sitting alone in the cold middle school gym, the afternoon light pools on the hardwood floor. I stretch out awkwardly, and reach my arms as far as they can extend. Exhaling gently, my mind starts to drift to theorems and equations. Everything is still, and my brain is reaching and pulling toward an answer. My gray matter is strong and graceful, and comes quickly and surely to the answer. In my head I climb back down to the starting point, gather another problem, and begin the exercise all over again.

As the ticking of the caged clock grows from mute to thunderous, my mind slows and my hands begin to shake. I hear the approaching herd, and I lean down to tie my shoe; hoping to avoid the stampede that is surely headed my way. The battered doors open, the metal bar slamming loudly against the wood and shaking me finally from the last of my mathematical reverie.

At the head of the herd is the biggest one: the alpha male. He takes no prisoners and if you get close enough to look him in the eyes, you can see the murderous gleam lying there. He is bulbous around the hips and the midsection, his stomach spilling over the top of his gray clad legs. In the middle of his forehead a misshapen lump stands at attention, as if a testament to his ferocity and general meanness. Behind him stumbles his clan, looking strikingly the same as they fill the gym with their grunts. They huff and snort with idiotic delight as their leader makes crude noises resembling the expellation of excrement. It is as if he is showing his soul to the world: loud, expletive-inducing shit.

I huddle into myself, as if a tortoise weary from the general chaos of his surroundings. Despite my gross reduction in size, I do not escape notice. He comes toward me, stupidity incarnate, and nudges me with the tip of his battered shoes. His nudge grows rougher as I keep my eyes down and my body curled into my legs. This is it, I think. He will finally accomplish today what he has been trying for years. He will crush me until the air can no longer enter my lungs; until my fragile and meek heart can’t force one more beat.

And then I am saved as suddenly as I am attacked. I hear the herd back away as a rough voice breaks between their legs and lands like the gentle squawk of a macaw, “Ropes today gentlemen.” For a moment, I have seen my escape only to be cruelly fooled into security. Ropes are almost worse than large mentally underdeveloped middle school jerks; ropes are something that will destroy an already concave reputation. I want to stay on the ground hidden in my shell, but instead I walk to the back of the line and pray for a fire alarm, an F5 tornado, or for one of the herd to fall off of the top of the rope and break a leg.

But none of this happens, and as I get closer to the front of the line I can hear the taunts and jeers echo throughout the gym, each person impersonating the distant ancestors of whom they so closely resemble. I slowly step onto the blue mat, and stare at my tennis shoes. My lace is loose on my left shoe, but it hardly matters anymore. A loose lace won’t hinder me; my scrawny arms and unnatural lack of athletic ability have already laid the course.

As I look up the rope, the gym seems to swirl. The floor is now covered in foliage and the squawks and squeals of my classmates are far away jungle animals. I grasp the rope in my hands, and my mind starts to calculate the distance from one knot to another. I am Tarzan, this is my vine, and immortality through legend is my goal. I start to climb, never looking down.

Weight Loss

It had started harmlessly enough.

Mary had wanted to get in shape. After two years of failing to go to the gym, she knew that she lacked some essential quality which fit people have. In her darkest hours, when she was eating candy bars - plural - from her secret stash above the refrigerator, she imagined that this failing was a lack of willpower. She was twenty pounds overweight, and carried it poorly, in part because she was of the understanding that this was her fault.

So the new year had come, and with another resolution. This time, after having read in one of her magazines that those who exercised with a partner were more likely to stick with it, Mary roped one of her friends into going to the gym with her. Elena was two years younger, and slightly less out of shape, but they both agreed that they had goals in common.

They went to the gym together three times a week, talked about their diets, pushed themselves to finish exercising, and so on. This lasted for about two weeks, until Mary got sick with a mild cold and begged off from exercise.

This coincided with a decision to take a small break for her diet. Mary was no expert on dietary needs, but she had read in a magazine once that cutting sweets out completely was a bad idea, as the body didn't like it and would start to retain fat as a defense mechanism. So Mary, feeling sick, had stopped by the gas station to pick up some cough drops, and saw a small package of bon-bons which, as luck would have it, was on sale. She bought them telling herself that she would reward herself with one after every workout. They were gone by the end of the night, whittled away in weak moments.

Some weeks after that, with Mary now finding excuses to beg off from their workouts nearly once per week, Elena came up with a new plan; they would make a bet between them. After three months, whoever had lost the most weight would win the pot of money. To Mary, this seemed the perfect motivation to buckle down and start in on some hard work. The sum was sizable enough that it would be a real impact if she lost.

Two and a half months later, it was clear to Mary that she hadn't done enough. When they went out to lunch, Elena ate better than her, and it was clear from the look of her, and from the frenzy of her workouts, that she was in much better shape. Mary, meanwhile, had privately weighed herself and found that she had lost roughly a pound - though whether that was true or not depended on how much water she'd had, what she'd eaten recently, whether she stood on her tiptoes, and the weather.

She went online, looking for a way to lose weight fast. It wasn't really about the money - she just wanted to put on a good showing, so that Elena wouldn't think less of her, and so when people asked her about the bet, she would at least be able to tell them that it was close. Eventually she found it; savilica dintari, an all natural herb from the middle east that burned through fat while you slept. She felt guilty after ordering it, but not guilty enough to cancel the order.

It came two days later in a nondescript brown box. There were no instructions, just a brick of leaves. Mary had to go online to find out what to do with it; eventually she settled on making it into a tea, which a number of commenters said would activate the chemicals in it. She let is steep for a few minutes, added some honey, and drank it down the dark liquid in just a few gulps.

She started feeling it an hour later. A cold sweat broke out across her skin, and soon her shirt was sticking to her back. Mary went to sit down for a bit, and began feeling light-headed. She woke up sometime later - it might have been an hour, it might have only been minutes - and noticed blood dripping from her nose. She had the energy to call 911, but dropped the phone and passed out again before hearing anything from the operator.

The next time she came to, she was in the hospital. Elena was there, and it was only with sluggish effort that Mary remembered that she was her emergency contact. Her words came out slowly:

"Did it work?"

Story #5

Seed: "A gym is the location, jealousy is the theme. A plant is an object that plays a part in the story."

Seed six will likely be something different - as in not generated by a machine. Any ideas for what to do can be posted in the comments.

This story is due April 19th at 11:59pm.

Soulmate

When Thomas sat next to me, I shivered. It wasn’t that I was cold, I just felt this shudder go through my body. My mother used to say that this happened when someone walked over the place where your grave would one day be. I wasn’t superstitious, so I had other ways of explaining it; maybe if auras did exist then this body shake happened when yours came in close proximity to another’s that was either completely in sync or completely opposite of yours.

Thomas wasn’t really a man that others would take a second glance at. He wasn’t striking, didn’t have an aquiline nose, didn’t have shiny hair, or perfect teeth. He was just a regular man, who wore regular clothes and presumably had a regular wife and kids playing in a house with a white picket fence.

As he reached above me to place his carryon in the overhead, I barely glanced up. At that moment I was deeply engrossed in the book on which I was writing my thesis. Being afraid of flying, I was trying to leave the areoplane mentally if not physically. I only looked up when Thomas lightly placed his hand on my shoulder, as if to beg my pardon for the interruption.

From the moment he touched me, I was absorbed in him. My eyes lingered on the pages, but my mind wandered, and circled. It dove and spun, and danced. Thomas had created a neurological reaction in me that was akin to an opiate coursing through my veins.

Only when the stewardess came along to offer us beverages did Thomas and I begin to converse. He was polite at first, asking me about my trip and my job. I was quietly responsive, saying more with my gaze than with my voice. It wasn’t long before all conversation ceased, and we held each other in unvoiced contemplation. I’m not sure how I came to understand so much about him, but beneath the brown business suit, battered briefcase and mousy hair I saw an artist’s soul. It was a soul which I recognized, and it mine.

Passing over Toronto, Thomas’ hand grew closer to mine, as if searching warmth from the cold Canadian sky. Our fingers entangled beneath the thin airline blanket, and each touch was electrifying and smooth. Clasped hands eventually become sweaty and sticky when they are holding another’s; ours became as hot and beautiful as dry logs placed in the center of a fire.

By the time we began our descent into Minneapolis, I knew that I would never again be whole without Thomas. I decided with bone crushing clarity that I must stay with him and be close to him. Our energy together was the kind that could make all darkness and evil disappear. If I had been happy before, I now knew that was only because I had no idea of what pure joy was.

The areoplane landed smoothly and the pilot come onto the loudspeaker, “Thank you for flying Eastcoast Air with us today, and enjoy your stay in the Twin Cities.” Thomas released my hand gently, and reached into his right pocket to pull out his cell phone. He flipped it open and held down the power button in one smooth move. As the phone chimed on, he glanced over and smiled at me. “Gotta check in with the old ball-and-chain. You know how it is. Nice meeting you… Andrea was it?”

“Audrey,” I said, and silently put on my jacket.

The Long Ride

The aeroplane shook and shuddered its way through the air, twin engines spewing smoke. Donald's jaw was sore from clenching, but if he stopped he was sure that his teeth would be shaken right out of his head. His seat folded down from the wall, which meant that his back had to follow the curve of the hull.

At the time, he had only been concerned with getting down to South America as quickly as possible, but now there was a tinge of regret. Donald could have lived with a delay of only an hour if it had meant that he were able to get on a standard commercial flight. More often than not though, people took the steamers down to Brazil, which meant that the passenger flights there would cost a huge sum of money.

The call had come from Donald's brother not five hours before. Richard spun a wild story about Brazillian Communists and an overthrow of the military dictatorship there, claiming that he was being held hostage by them, that he needed Donald to come save him. Ever the big brother, Donald had told his secretary he would be out of the office for a week or two, kissed his wife goodbye, and hopped on the first plane going in his general direction.

When they stopped in Cuba for a refueling, Donald got out to stretch his legs for a bit. He felt sick, and ready to abandon his brother to whatever fate laid in store down in Brazil. The trip had been begun though, and Donald was carrying a suitcase with five thousand dollars American, so it seemed a poor time to give up the quest. He used some of his pocket money - not daring to open the suitcase around here - to buy a lunch off of a plane mechanic. He overpaid, but Cuba was Communist these days, and that seemed to mean that everything cost more.

Twenty minutes later, the plane was in the sky again, and Donald was throwing up the last remnants of the burrito he had bought. Afterwards, he regreted that he hadn't throw up in his hat. The vomit was spread across the cold metal floor of the aeroplane, and Donald had to live with the sick acrid stink of it until the next touch-down, which was in Venezula. His pilot, Fillipe, cursed at him in rapid Spanish and made him clean it up. Donald was careful to keep the suitcase out of view.

At first, when he had been trying to find a plane in the Florida airport, Donald had thought Fillipe to be a godsend. Not only was he going straight to Brazil, but he spoke the language, which meant that Donald would have a guide - or at least someone that would be able to help him find a guide. Now though, with more time to think on it, Donald was getting worried. The plane was loaded with anonymous looking crates, but there was still considerable room for more cargo. To Donald, who had been an engineer before going into business, this said that whatever was in the crates was either very valuable or very heavy - especially if they were being flown direct to Brazil.

The landing in Rio de Janeiro was rough, in part because the plane was running out of fuel. Donald was taken aback by how many rifles were pointed at him when he exited the plane; his brother had said that things were bad here, but had given no indication that the military power would be so ready to draw their weapons on foreigners. Fillipe got out of the pilot's seat and quickly started talking to the men in Spanish, seemingly unconcerned with that they had guns pointed on him. After about two minutes of this, they lowered their weapons, and a dialog followed that Donald wouldn't have been able to keep up even if he had studied Spanish. There was some pointing to him, which was worrisome.

"He wants to know what's in the briefcase," said Fillipe finally. His face betrayed no sympathy.

Donald stalled for a moment. "It's just letters. Clothing."

One of the men raised his rifle and pointed it squarely at Donald's chest. He handed over the briefcase, and watched with despair as they opened it. There were smiles and laughing all around. From that point on he was ignored - Fillipe was the only one who could understand him anyway. The men got busy unloading the plane; it was now clear that the crates were filled with weapons.

Donald wandered off of the dirt runway, towards the tall buildings in the distance, hoping to find his brother - and somehow get both of them out of Brazil.

Story #4

From now on, Anni and I will be moving to a five-day deadline.

Seed: "An aeroplane is the location, blood is thicker than water is the theme. A telephone is an object that plays a part in the story."

This story is due April 15th at 11:59pm.

Helga

Helga sat on the park bench and watched the people pass by. She put her hand into her purse, and pulled out a baggie with a somewhat squished sandwich inside. She removed the sandwich from the bag and began to move it slowly toward her mouth. Watching Helga eat was like slowing down just a little too much to stare at the aftermath of a car crash. She didn’t savor her food, she inhaled it. Helga should have probably developed better table-manners considering the fact that she was born during an era in which Emily Post was both well-read and imperatively followed. Unfortunately for anyone who had the misfortune to see her eat, she was from a working class family with a mother who was a chronically depressed alcoholic, and there hadn’t really been social lessons of any kind.

Helga hadn’t aged gracefully. In fact, she hadn’t really had the opportunity to do so. As an ugly baby, she had grown into an even uglier toddler and things only ever got worse from there. At 76, Helga was overweight with cheeks like a bulldog and hair like a balding poodle. Even the kindest of passerby would have difficulty believing that this woman had ever been loved. Despite all of her faults, Helga did have something in her past that no one would have guessed at: she had loved a man as truly as anyone could love.

When Helga was 16, she met Jimmy. Jimmy was 24, headed off to war, and quite drunk upon their initial encounter. After a few words and a quick shag in the back of his Ford Coupe, she was smitten. Even when he was a little more sober (because like her mother, Jimmy was never entirely sober), Jimmy still seemed to find some redeeming quality in Helga. Perhaps it was his kind heart that let him see past her lack of looks and abundance of really annoying qualities, but more likely he knew he could get laid anytime he wished. That being neither here nor there, Helga loved Jimmy wholeheartedly and was heartbroken when he shipped out to Korea.

The night before Jimmy left, Helga had given him a lilac and lime green silk scarf by which to remember her. It was garish and screamed silently for attention, and in that respect would remind him exactly of Helga. She had embroidered with great care “Jimmy and Helga Forever” and upon handing it to him, made him promise to keep it near him at all times so she could be close to him. Helga, though not very bright, was very romantic. Jimmy had died two months later and Helga, though resigned to a life of loneliness, was reassured by the fact that he had died with a part of her next to his heart.

Now, as Helga was an old woman, she would sit on this park bench and think about the only man she had ever loved. She’d watch the young lovers walk by, and remember to the point of pain what that was like. Wiping her hands on her brightly flowered dress, Helga struggled to rise from the park bench and return to her efficiency apartment.

A Day in the Park

Kat and Henry went to have a picnic in Central Park with a wink and a nod. It would, of course, have been entirely inappropriate for people like them to do this earnestly.

Kat had received a sizable amount of money after finishing high school. Her grandparents had bought a long-term bond when she was little, and it matured along with her until she was eighteen and ready to go out and see the world. It wasn't enough that she was now independently wealthy, but it would have been a good start towards paying for college. Instead, she had decided to move away from the Midwest to New York City. The money would be there to ensure that she could settle in before finding a job. Her father was furious, while her mother was just sad. There were long talks about bettering oneself, and about what grandma and grandpa would think if they were still alive.

Kat had met Henry ("Like O'Henry, but without an O", he had explained when she had misheard him) at a record store. This was after she had been moved in for a week, and was starting to feel restless. She knew no one in New York, and found it hard to actually meet people. Before Henry, she had had two conversations with random strangers, but neither of them had said to her, "Say, would you like to hang out some time? Can I have your phone number?" and because they hadn't, Kat didn't push it.

Henry was skinny, with a full beard that partially hid his smirks. He wore jeans that followed the contour of his legs, a T-shirt with "TEH" printed on it, and an overly long scarf that wrapped around his neck twice. He stood there among the vinyl, leafing through the records with a detached look. Their eyes met briefly, and he asked her about what bands she liked, and when he learned that she was new to the city he offered to show her around.

Their first date was to the Statue of Liberty, where he showed her how to make fun of the tourists. On their second date, Henry took her to the top of the Empire State Building for more people watching, and afterwards they went to the Wo Hop Restaurant for dinner, and later to his place where Kat lost her virginity.

This picnic in Central Park was technically their third date, though she'd stopped by to see him at his work in the interim. He had seemed preoccupied, and Kat worried that she had overstepped her bounds. They didn't talk about it, instead enjoying the sunny park, laid back on the checkered blanket after having finished their sandwiches, their hands almost touching. She was wearing his scarf, the one that he had been wearing when they first met. He had given it to her as a gift, and she wore it now as a mark of possession. This had gone without comment by either of them.

While turning over onto her stomach, a gust of wind took the scarf from atop her body, and sent it fluttering through the air. Kat looked to Henry, hoping that he would go after it, but he wasn't watching, and seemed to have fallen asleep. She slowly got up and went after it; the scarf had gone to the trees, and tangled itself in the thick brush.

As she was unhooking the thick wool from the branches, she looked up and saw a man standing not ten feet from her. Her parents would have called him a vagrant; Henry would have called him a bum. His clothes were caked with the accumulated filth of street life, and he was watching her while pleasuring himself.

Kat turned away as quickly as she could, and sat back down on the blanket. Now that she knew he was there, she could hear him panting. She shook Henry awake, and whispered in his ear. He didn't seem shocked at all. He gathered up their things and walked away, and Kat followed behind him, willing herself not to look back.

Story #3

Seed: "A park is the location, bad taste is the theme. A silk scarf is an object that plays a part in the story."

This story is due April 8th at 11:59pm.

The Amateur Detective

Elanor walked down the length of her car, discretely looking through the sliding doors of each cabin to ensure that no vagrants had snuck aboard. It was a pointless exercise really, because she had already checked twice before and felt it quite unlikely that a hobo would leap onto a speeding train on its way to Manchester, but the other option was to go to the luggage car with the other girls and gossip.

Tiffany was the worst of them. During their downtime, after everyone had been brought aboard and settled, but before the dessert trolley was taken from cabin to cabin, Tiffany would instigate a round of talk about the passengers of the day and which particular boy had taken her fancy. There were even times when she would trade cars with another girl to get a look at some of the other passengers. It was galling really, to treat these people - people just trying to go about their business - as though they were animals in a zoo, there for entertainment.

There were plenty of war veterans, of course. At this stage, to get sent home usually meant that a man was far too ill to fight. Elanor had seen men with missing arms, missing legs, and others with bandages wrapped all the way around their heads. It was ghastly really, and she tried her best not to bother them too much, or to look at them for too long. The other men that went by train ... well, Tiffany was of the opinion that any good-looking man must have something wrong with him if he wasn't off to war. Now this was obviously not true, because of course the crown needed all sorts to help at home with logistics and planning and things of that sort, but it did sometimes seem as though the country had disgorged all its eligible men in the last few years, leaving only the old and infirm behind.

Elanor was making her rounds for a fourth time when she noticed that the curtains had been drawn shut on one of the cabins. This happened from time to time, especially on a light load when a person might have the whole cabin to themselves and was desirous of a short nap. Elanor almost passed it, but then remembered that the cabin in question had been occupied by a man and woman. She paused briefly, mulling it over, then went back to have a peek.

Now according to Tiffany, people got up to funny business on the train all the time. According to her, it was practically impossible to walk down the narrow corridors without stumbling across a tangled mess of arms and legs. This was demonstrably not true, as most of the cabins didn't even have both men and women in them. While Elanor might have been able to conceive of people choosing to engage in lewdness on a train, say, a young couple just recently married before the man is to go off to war, it was entirely beyond her imagination to think that her train would be home to, well, buggery.

The curtains hadn't been closed neatly, and only offered notional privacy to begin with, and so the view offered to Elanor told a sort of story. The woman was leaning away from the man, but he was sidled up close to her, talking in a voice too low to be heard, an urgent expression upon his face. This went on for some time, the man making animated hand gestures, as though he needed his whole body to get his point across. Finally, the woman turned to him and snapped something at him, which sounded like but probably wasn't "stagnant". She produced a letter from her purse and brandished it at him, urging him to take it, but he stared straight ahead with a scowl on his face. She laid the letter between them. The couple - if that's what they were - stopped talking completely.

Elanor quickly moved away, feeling a burning shame for having eavesdropped, even if she'd only heard one word, and heard it wrong at that. Her first thought was to tell someone, Tiffany most likely, but she quickly checked that impulse. Instead, she tried to figure out from the clues what it was they were arguing about. The train was on its northern route, away from London, which meant that neither of them were off to the war. Besides that, the man didn't have a military bearing, which meant that he fell under the category of "suspicious men who should be at war, but are not". They were both young, if not as young as Elanor.

She mulled it over until the next stop, when the woman exited the car and the man did not. Elanor snuck a quick peek into the cabin on the pretense of bringing the dessert trolley, even though the girls weren't usually supposed to knock on cabins with the curtains drawn. The man looked a bit dazed, as if he'd had the wind knocked out of him, but the letter remained beside him, unopened.

He got off at the stop after his friend, or girlfriend, or mistress, or wife, or whoever she was, and Elanor completed her duties as quickly as possible so she would be able to go back to their cabin. Inside she found the letter, sitting there on the broad seat, exactly as the woman had left it. Elanor picked it up, muttering under her breath "The kinds of rubbish people leave ..." for the benefit of anyone who might be spying on her. She stowed it under her blouse, pressed against her skin, until a half-hour later when she had the time to lock herself in the lavatory and look it over.

The envelope smelled faintly of lilacs, and was made of higher quality paper than one could normally find in wartime. Elanor opened it gingerly, keeping one eye on the door, and when she finally unfurled the letter, it turned out to be five pages with writing on both sides in a thin, neat cursive. She began to read ...

The Return

Mary rested her head against the train window. Looking out at the trees passing by, she was remembering the last summer she visited Cape Fern. It was a little over a decade ago, and under quite different circumstances: she had been so young and naïve then with her pressed pinafores and plaited hair. Now she was ten years older and felt many decades wiser.

Mary fidgeted with her gloves, slowly loosening each finger tip, and then tugging the glove firmly back into place. She couldn’t exactly explain why she was feeling so agitated, though she though it probably had something to do with returning to a place that brought back so many memories.

Since Mary had last been to Cape Fern, she had gained much more poise and confidence. She was now something of a lady, though she was sure that Mrs. Forester would see the same girl she had hired all of those summers ago. Mary wasn’t exactly sure why she was going back. The letter had arrived a fortnight ago, and she had immediately started planning the trip back east without a second thought.

She begun by packing all of her nicest things and placing them carefully in her travel chest, laying her most fashionable hat in hat box on top. When she was finished, she sat on her bed and sighed, returning to the chest and removing each garment slowly, placing it back into her closet. Mary made the choice at that moment that she would return exactly as she had left; with only two common work dresses, a few books of poetry and no pretentions. She had decided that she needed to get back to a simpler time, and the only way to really return was to return as she had left.

Mary let her mind drift back to the first summer she visited Cape Fern. The train ride had been very different from this one. She had been quite nervous and a little lightheaded with giddiness. It was her first time away from home, and she stared out of the window of the train through the entire three hours, only looking up at the porter to hand over her ticket. Mary had watched the forests speed by, the coniferous trees swaying and dancing like sprites in the wind. As the trees had begun to thin, she saw bits of ocean and sand in the distance, and had raised herself slightly from her seat, eager to catch a longer glimpse. To her, the ocean had represented the endless possibilities. Now, it was just water and sand, and a reminder of the things that she had lost.

As the train pulled into the Cape Fern, Mary looked down from her dusty windows and scanned the waiting area. No one was there, but then again she really hadn’t expected anyone. She rose from her seat, and slowly made her way down the aisle, as if willing the train to move on before she had exited. Gathering her skirts, Mary stepped down the short ladder onto the makeshift platform. Suddenly tired, she took a seat on her travel chest and withdrew Mrs. Forester‘s letter from within the folds of her skirt and begun to reread it once again.

Story #2

Seed: "A train is the location, shyness is the theme. A letter is an object that plays a part in the story."

This story is due April 3rd at 11:59PM.

Tourist Season

The Ocean Breeze was fairly slow for the first few weeks of tourist season, with only two elderly couples to fill the twelve rooms. In truth, those first few weeks ran at a slight loss, but management felt that it helped to build customer loyalty and spread the good word about low rates and a beautiful view.

The hotel was sized to fit the island; small. There were perhaps twenty families who called it home, most of them fishermen or retirees who had no taste for so-called civilized life. There was ample space and little in the way of commerce. The hotel and the Black Rock Cafe made up the entirety of downtown Pequot. There was no mayor, and most inspections were carried out by dour government officials shipped in from Shaferton. Mail came once a week during the summer, and twice a week in the winter. There were no cars, and no proper roads for them to travel on, but everyone owned at least one boat.

Sadie looked out over the ocean from the second floor of the Ocean Breeze. The two old couples had gotten up with the sun to go walk along the rocky beach, and she cleaned up their rooms and made their beds. It was unlikely that they would return anytime soon, but management felt that swift cleaning was one of those small touches that people noticed. Management also felt that uniforms were the sign of a professional place, which is why, underneath her thick wool sweater, Sadie was wearing a polyester robin's-blue number that always looked faintly ridiculous.

Management had an inflated idea of how difficult the housekeeping at the Ocean Breeze was, in part because of how often Sadie took these long moments to stand near one of these windows and look out on the water. Sadie loved the early weeks, when it was more spring than summer, and the wind was still cool. Even as a child, she had liked the spring goose-bumps. It felt like her very skin was getting excited for the touch of the titular breeze. Pequot was far enough north that it never quite got hot in the summers, but all the same the warmth didn't play well with Sadie.

Sadie heard a polite cough from behind her, and turned around to see management staring at her.

"Have you finished with both the Carters and the Johnsons already?" asked management.

"Yes mom," replied Sadie, in a tone that smelled vaguely of irony.

"Well," said management with a sniffle, "your father has left with the ferry to go get another couple from the mainland. So we'll be needing rooms 6 and 8 aired out."

"Yes mom," replied Sadie again.

Sadie had been making beds since she was sixteen, by now it was automatic, just something that her hands did while her brain was elsewhere. The hotel had originally been a mansion, built by someone in the 20's and re-purposed after the original owner went into default during the Great Depression. Sadie opened the windows a crack to get the musty smell out, then went into the bathrooms and ran the water for a few minutes until it was no longer rust colored. She always felt better after airing out a room.

From the window of room 8, which had once been a baby's room and tended to have a slight draft from the southern wall, Sadie watched as the euphemistic ferry (really just a simple outboard motor on a boat that seemed small amongst the waves) came around the side of the island.

Though Sadie enjoyed the solitude of the winter months, and the quietness of the island during that time, guests meant something different was coming. Summer always felt like an expansion of the family, as though the guests were relatives who came to visit and let you catch up on what they'd been doing. Some of the repeat guests had been coming to the Ocean Breeze for so long that they had practically watched her grow up.

Sadie stared out at the small boat coming in, and waited until it was right up to the dock before turning away from the window and going down to greet them.

Toy Boats

The late afternoon light seeped under the dusty vinyl blinds and sank heavily in the tepid air. Alex stood barefoot on the stale carpet, his liquid brown eyes even with the top of the cheap hotel mattress. Standing on the tips of his toes, he gazed at his sleeping mother. His stomach rumbled softly and he extended his hand, pulling back before he touched her tear-stained face. Her auburn hair was matted to her head and flecks of mascara had made the journey from her eyelashes to her cheeks.

Alex pressed his back to the side of the bed and slumped down to the floor. He started softly counting, hesitating when the numbers grew. The reverberation of the nearby highway nearly drowned out his diminutive voice as the afternoon sank into early evening. Alex rose from the carpet like an old man pushing his way out of a sinking armchair. Crossing the room, he peered at the leather purse perched on top of the corner chair. Glancing tenuously over at her, he pulled the purse toward his chest and gently set it on the floor.

When he was younger (he was four now), she would say that she had everything that she needed in that bag: band-aids for scrapped knees, wet wipes for sticky fingers, and lemon drops to pacify impatient children. Alex’s stomach rumbled like a nearing thunderstorm and he slowly reached his hand into his mother’s purse. His little fingers grasped and clutched, pulling each item to the top and immediately releasing it back into the depths. Alex paused for a moment and crossed his arms over his chest. Moving stealthily, he grabbed the purse and quietly tipped it over, releasing its contents. Leaking pens, old receipts, and unwrapped pieces of tobacco-covered gum littered the stained floor. He carefully extracted the gum from the pile, and tentatively placed it in his mouth. Chewing once, he gagged loudly.

Alex quickly covered his mouth, his eyes wide with fear. His mother rolled out of bed, with a vacant look in her eyes. Coming over to him, she roughly grabbed Alex by the right arm and yanked him close to her. His eyes watered at her fetid breath.

“Alex, how many times have I told you that my purse is not a play thing? You’re just like your father. You can’t leave well enough alone.”

Muttering low expletives, his mother crossed the room to scoop up the contents of her purse. She turned back to him and, seeing his small eyes filled with tears, came back and crouched down till her face was level with his.

“I’m sorry Alex. I guess I’m just not cut out for this. If you’ll be a good boy and stay here, I’ll go find something for us to eat.”

Alex nodded numbly and she gave him a quick kiss on his cheek, crossing the room and heavily opening the hotel door.

As the door closed, Alex began to cry with great heaving sobs. He ran to the window and looked over the dusty window sill down the narrow balcony. Abruptly, stark determination crossed his face and Alex turned, marching to the small bathroom.

He remembered a time when he had made his mother laugh; she and his father were holding hands, her head tilted comfortably near the crook of his neck. They were watching him as he motored his toy boats around the large white claw-foot tub. When his boats crashed, Alex would make loud noises and his mother would throw back her head, her laugh ringing out like wedding bells.

Alex reached up to the sink, his small hand grasping for the wrapped cups he couldn’t see. His tiny fingers pinched the plastic and a cup tumbled to the floor. He picked it up, excitedly tearing at its protective cover. Moving back to the bathtub, he climbed in and plugged the drain as he had seen his mother do before. He opened the tap, and as the water filled the tub the plastic cup danced on the surface like a small plastic boat.

Story #1

Seed: "A hotel is the location, happiness is the theme. A boat is an object that plays a part in the story."

This story is due March 31st at 11:59PM.

In the beginning ...

Over a long brunch at Chester Creek Cafe, Anni and I decided that writing is something both of us would like to do more. The best way get better at writing is to establish a schedule and to have someone who pressures you to keep churning out material. It's with that idea in mind that this blog is being created. The rules are as follows:

1. Every three days, I'll be posting a new idea for us to work on. At the start, the ideas will be taken from this generator. Later on, we might have free periods, theme weeks, and other fun stuff to mix it up.
2. At the end of three days, both of us will have posted a story to this blog.
3. Stories will be 600 words, give or take about 100 words.
4. At the end of 150 days, when each of us will have written 50 stories, the project will be considered a success.

So there it is; wish us luck.