FLASH-FIC IS HERE
PLEASE JOIN US EACH FRIDAY TO SEE WHO'S FLASHING US
Each Friday a new prompt will be posted along with the previous week's winners.What exactly is a Flash-Fic? It's pretty much a spur of the moment, tiny story, prompted by words, images or silliness. Not sure if you've ever been on twitter when this has happened, but it's pretty awesome when it does. It also happens often in threads, with a combination of people contributing.
How does it work? Each Friday one admin of TLS posts a picture prompt here to the blog. Using this image, entries are created by commenting on this post. Submissions must be 100-300 words ONLY. No more, no less. The entries are then judged and we post the winners here, each Friday, to share with all of you.
You will have until next Wednesday at 9 p.m. EST to submit your entry.
Picture prompt and judge this week is:
Surething302
Please leave your submission in the comment section at the bottom of the post using this format:Your name (use your Twitter, Facebook or FFN name)Your link to your FFN profile if you choose to share it. Submissions will be judged on Thursdays and on Friday the winning entry will be posted here, on the TLS blog. This feature is open to everyone, so come one, come all!
LAST WEEK'S PROMPT AND WINNERS
"If I love you, is that a fact or a weapon?"
FIRST PLACE WINNER
@boomboom_jones
Word Count: 185
"If I love you, is that a fact or a weapon?"
You don't understand what I mean. Your face is hard. Unreadable. Deliberate.
You reach out to touch my hand. I pull it away.
We used to live in a bubble made from stone. It's almost like we're there now, but the bubble is translucent. I'm aware what's on the other side.
You begin to speak and I beg for you to tell me what I need to hear. You close your mouth. I want your lips on my neck. Don't say it. It's all wrong, isn't it?
Press my cheek to your leather jacket, let me smell wood and winter. Mask the exhaust in this parking lot.
Let's pretend for a while. Cover my ears with your hands. Take me away and unbutton my blouse then say things you'd never say anywhere else.
Your expression is here and now and it kills me.
Okay.
Okay.
"Fact or weapon?" My god, I don't even recognize my own voice.
A million seconds pass before you say, "I don't know." And then you admit, "Both. Mass destruction."
SECOND PLACE
http://www.fanfiction.net/~honeybeemeadows
Word Count: 253
"If I love you, is that a fact, or a weapon?"
You always had a funny way of showing your affection.
As though you knew a language, but forgot all the words. Lost the ability to speak, even though nothing was wrong with your tongue. Just stared at me with raging emerald eyes and your tongue tied between your teeth like stitches holding together a wound.
Scarred across the mouth and right through the very center of your heart.
“Everything about you is infuriating,” you say and I wither, a flower caught under the baking rays of the run. “I didn’t want to do this,” you whisper and I fold, an origami creature smashed flat under your weight. “You made me fall for you,” you hiss and I shatter, the slow motion view of a bullet through a water balloon.
When you tie me down, it’s your adoration speaking.
When you blindfold me, it’s your lust.
When you wrap your palms around my neck and fuck me with no air, it’s love.
You still haven’t said the words, but I know they’re there, somewhere. Between my skin and the metal around my wrists. Beneath the silk of your blindfold, dipped in acid truth and my eyes can see everything, even in the dark. The gag in my mouth tastes of stone-washed regret and I wonder why you can’t just say it. Why you can’t show me in a way that doesn’t involve weapons and handcuffs.
Body armor and a battle plan.
I am a prisoner of your war.
I’ve already given myself up.
THIRD PLACE
@chocaholic12345
http://www.fanfiction.net/~chocaholic123
Word Count 297
It starts with a rose; fleshy, red petals laying softly on the porch. She picks it up, inhaling the sweet, fresh fragrance. Carrying it into the house, she places it in a glass of water. A smile curls at her lips.
Weeks pass. She finds more gifts; old, dusty books, classics she has loved. She opens them and motes dance in shafts of light, particles itch her nose.
Then a note. Lipstick smeared on dirty glass.
I love you.
Months pass. From the corner of her eye she sees a dark-haired stranger, the blur of a car as it accelerates away from her house. She pulls her collar up, keeps her head down. Wishes herself invisible.
A newspaper cut up to form new words.
You’re mine.
Spring becomes summer. Windows are flung open, doors left unlocked. A doll on her wrinkled bedcovers, its once shiny, brown hair has been ruthlessly chopped, body mutilated. She comes home late from work to find the stove burning hot, a stainless steel pot full of steaming, bubbling water. She is too afraid to look inside.
A note next to it, this time handwritten. Only one word.
Dinner?
This time she calls the cops. They laugh.
Years pass. Plump thighs turn slender then thin, lush hair becomes lank. Her natural posture is stooped, body shaking like an old man. Her eyes dart from left to right, rarely meeting anybody’s gaze.
Work is her only escape. She arrives early, leaves late, is grateful for the security guards. Her computer screen is her friend, until the day an IM slams onto her screen, making her heart drop.
I love you.
She leaves the office that night, her body weary, her gait slow. He waits. She walks. He wields love like a sick weapon. It burns.
HONORABLE MENTION
@sparrownotes24
http://www.fanfiction.net/u/4244397/SparrowNotes24
Word Count: 300
The knowledge you can't have something makes the unattainable shine.
It lures you with curls brushing the delicate skin of bare shoulders, lips wrapping around words that steal your attention, bright eyes holding a thousand promises across your heart.
"Maybe you could come by the coffee shop sometime, Edward?"
She's a break in the clouds, a caress of wind on a deep summer’s day.
Everything I need.
Everything I can't have.
"I'm not sure that's a good idea." I hate the lines of disappointment I’ve etched onto her face.
"I'm sorry that was inappropriate."
Her embarrassment is unnecessary. I want to tell her I think about her when I shouldn't, picture her smile when I'm alone.
"No I’m sorry. I should go." I wish she could see every facet of my apology.
There are so many.
~
She's kept her vigil, curled on the window seat.
Her breath frosts the glass where she traces patterns, eyes glittering navy blue in the dim light. "I've missed you."
"I'm home now." I pull her into my lap. Relief wilts her body while guilt settles heavy in my chest—bleak as the snow covered garden.
"Remember when I lost control and crashed my car into the crab-apple?"
Memories of the night I’d forgotten to call home shudder deep in my bones.
"Yes." My voice croaks, breaks, cracks.
"The tree hasn’t blossomed since. Do you think I killed it?"
Love for her strangles the answer in my throat. "No, you didn't."
In weighted silence, I trace the silver scars on her arm, translucent in the moonlight. My penance for the night I stayed out too late.
This love binds us in shackles that maim and slice. She believes holding my heart is worth more than the beat of hers.
So, I let her crush it.
HONORABLE MENTION
@JennaReads
http://www.fanfiction.net/u/3763428/
Word Count: 298
Funny how time can shudder to stop, a tiny breath, a tortuous frozen instant when you reach a pivotal shift in your reality.
A light mist coated the quiet street and my skin, chilling, moist, bitter. Better to hear the sound of my heart ripping wide, I suppose.
I stared through open blinds at one of the dozen quaint little tables in the quaint little cafe. Jake leaned across the white Formica and pressed a kiss to Leah Clearwater's lips. As though he had to taste her now, this very instant, couldn't wait until the hindrance of the table was removed.
I stood in pained stillness, my breath fogging the window, but not enough to obscure the couple holding hands inside.
No, I wouldn't be so lucky.
Someone jostled against my shoulder in passing, but my gaze didn't falter from the pair. A quaint little bell tinkled as the stranger opened the door, the chime harsh in my frozen quiet. Jake looked toward the sound. I felt the burn of his gaze the instant he saw me, fiery and excruciating, even as the icy mist coated my skin. He shoved away from the table, said something to her, then strode quickly to me.
Too late.
He stood beside me—not true. I'd always been one step behind, never more proof than the dark-haired girl waiting patiently for my boyfriend inside that cafe.
He stood near me, his voice low, intense. “Bella.”
I shook my head.
He reached for me, tried to pull me into an embrace.
He would lie. Tell me he loved me, that I was reading the situation wrong. My naive love for him his greatest weapon against me. If I loved him, after all, I would trust him.
I sucked in the frigid Washington air. “No.”
The Lemonade Stand would like to also thank all of the participants. We thoroughly enjoyed ALL of the entries!
