Fionagreywrites

Week 27 of Odd Prompts

More than half through yet another year. Wait. That’s the wrong way to look at it. We aren’t judt drudging along killing time. For what? No, let’s enjoy every minute of it because that minute isn’t coming back again. Vice versa, if the moment is painful, it’s not going to be back again.

But if you need something to fill the time, grab a prompt!

Prompt fromAd hoc promptPrompt to
Cedar Sandersonscatter brained took on a whole new meaningFiona Grey
AC YoungAccording to the menu, the restaurant’s special today was “Roast lion of pork”. NB: A genuine mis-spelling spotted in a hotel restaurant.Leigh Kimmel
Becky JonesGoing through her mother’s things, she was shocked to find…nother Mike
Leigh KimmelThe light was a licorice scent, and the rainfall had an oval tone.AC Young
Fiona Greyink suspended within stoneBecky Jones
nother MikeThere was an angel on the bus…Cedar Sanderson

Didn’t send in a prompt? No worries. We’ve got spares. And you know, you can send in a prompt and then not do anything with it. Life happens, and we don’t always have a spare moment.

SpareOh, say can you see…
SpareThe warning tag on your zombie indicates that they should never be put in a washing machine…
SpareThe flowers were singing in the sun…
SpareThe fireworks at the VA hospital brought on severe PTSD attacks in too many patients…
SpareThe pilot sounded apologetic as he announced, “I have to warn you, we are not in Kansas anymore…”

Don’t regret life. Just keep on… and post the prompt responses here in the comments.

Header image by Fiona Grey

16 comments

  1. This week I took part in a prompt exchange with Leigh Kimmel, who offered up: The light was a licorice scent, and the rainfall had an oval tone.

    This was a little difficult. I struggled to find a way in. It was only when I vaguely recalled a condition called synaesthesia, in which at least one of the senses bleed into another, that I figured out how to make the prompt work.

    Apparently synaesthesia comes in many variants, but I have no idea if the following is realistic.

    —

    The restaurant was wonderfully intimate. The table was small and square, with a white embroidered tablecloth – pleasantly it evoked a scent of lilies. The cutlery was stainless steel, to my delight – steel smelt of strawberries, whereas silver always gave me the sense of an acrid stench. There were a pair of white scented candles on either side, the true scent being a generic floral, like rubbing my fingers lightly through soft wool, whereas the white wax and flame smelled of vanilla.

    Sitting opposite me was my date, the lovely lady who had in a moment of insanity agreed to go out with me. Fiona had come tonight in a red dress – red material was weird, evoking a wide range of scents, some cloth smelt of blood, but this dress smelt of roses. Her hair was lemon-scented blonde. Her eyes were blue – people’s faces were scentless.

    We were chatting about nothing very important. Her voice was what had first attracted me to her. It evoked a soothing picture of waves on the sea. I know, the sound of someone’s voice is a very superficial basis for attraction, but I couldn’t listen for very long to some people speaking – our mutual friend Eleanor’s voice dropped needles from the sky.

    The waiter came across to take our orders. Her voice would have been quite pleasant, were it not that every word she spoke generated a nine-pointed star, sharp and unpleasant to the eye.

    We gave our orders, and went back to discussing anything that came to mind. Fiona was very easy to talk to. Almost no subject was off-limits.

    Our orders came. I’d ordered the beef and mushroom pie. The smell was like water on my face. Fiona had ordered the roast chicken. It smelt like bedsheets running over my forearms.

    The food was very good. The rest of the date went extremely well. Fiona even kissed me as I dropped her off at her front door.

    As I drove back home it started to rain. I pulled onto my drive just as the summer sun was starting to sink to the horizon.

    My front window gave me the perfect view of the sunset. The sun gave off a red light that smelt of liquorice. Meanwhile the rain was still falling. The sound of the drops on the window, each one creating an oval when it hit, was starting to lull me to sleep.

    I went up to bed.

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    • Well done. I have a little bit of synesthesia — music has motion, with some songs feeling like pistons going up and down, others like a wheel turning or legs kicking or the like. However, a friend’s daughter has a form in which numbers have color — which made it hard for her to learn math because the sum of two numbers often has a different color than the colors you get when you combine the colors of the two numbers she’s adding.

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  2. Becky Jones opened Pandora’s box with the little line:

    Going through her mother’s things, she was shocked to find…

    [argh… letters? A collection of her grades from elementary school? A box of jewelry? So many things that can be shocking to find. A last will and testament? Shares in Microsoft? What will she find… and why is she going through her mother’s things? For that matter, what things? argh!]

    Helen wasn’t quite sure how she ended up delegated by the family to go through her mother’s things. Sure, her mother was in a home, and wouldn’t be coming back. Her memories were running thin and strange, and she really needed someone to take care of her. But why wasn’t the rest of the family also involved in cleaning out her home?

    But she settled down and started going through them. But as she was going through her mother’s things, she was shocked to find a birth certificate. Carefully folded and put away, it crackled as she unfolded it. A little ink blot of a foot, and someone’s scratchy writing… it was dated three years before she had been born? And the name was William? Wait a minute, she didn’t have an older brother. Did she? What?

    She sat down, right there in the middle of the mess, and stared at the aging paper. She read it again, slowly and carefully. Yes, that was dad’s name, and mom’s name, and… William.

    After a few moments, she pulled her cell phone out. She looked at it, and wondered. She couldn’t call her younger sister or brothers, they wouldn’t have any more idea what was going on then she did. Her dad was dead, and mom… mom didn’t have a cell phone in the home. Not that she would be likely to know what she was talking about, anyway. Who… she couldn’t think of anyone to call, really.

    Finally she tucked the cell phone away, and slowly folded the birth certificate up and put it back in the envelope. She stood up, and looked around. Enough for today. She was going to get some food, and think about what to do next.

    And see if she could find out anything more about William. Heck, call him Bill! After all, if he was her big brother, she could call him by a nickname if she wanted to, right?

    That’s when she started laughing, and couldn’t seem to stop for a long moment.

    [hum, that could be interesting. Now, does she find William? and what happened to him?]

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  5. […] This week, Cedar Sanderson prompted me with “scatter brained took on a whole new meaning,” and I’d just had a conversation with Spouse about a zombie virus that manifested like normal (and abnormal) aging, taking its time until it was too late…how’d I do? […]

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