Week 11 participating in the very popular #vss365 challenge on Twitter. The aim, to write a daily Very Short Story in less than 280 characters, a single tweet. Yes, that’s characters! Not words.
The prompts themselves are seemingly random single words, the whim of this month’s challenge setter. This months fun has been organised by @AuthorBertEdens. I’ve taken some liberties with formatting simply because WordPress is not Twitter and to make it easier to read.
This week’s gnarly cover photo was taken on the Pilgrims Way overlooking Maidstone on another very lucky sunny October walk. There were quite a few of these trees with their route systems exposed.
He was an irritant, a parasite that had burrowed into her life.
She should have shown him the door, but deep down she loved him.
So she set her mind to change him.
Patiently, year after year she blanketed him in her love until she’d
turned a worthless speck into a #pearl.
Growing up in the ’60s was tough, especially if your name was Jim.
Constantly you’d hear the line “Damn it, Jim … ”.
Every single day the same unoriginal joke.
Well, I had the last laugh, the day I stood over him. “Is he hurt?”
“It’s #worse than that, he’s dead Jim!”
“Remember, I’ll always be with you”
Those had been his last words that rainy October day, all those years ago.
We buried him a week later.
That should have been the end of it.
Unfortunately, he didn’t see it that way.
He’d keep his promise, I never was #alone.
Not once!
Wednesday 16th October – Chunk
He fell to the ground clutching his calf, writhing in agony.
He’d almost made it, but they were coming.
They were going to catch him, beat him.
With gritted teeth, he dragged himself the last few yards across the finish line.
He’d won and taken a big #chunk out of his PB.
Thursday 17th October – Darkness
He pointed back towards the streetlight she’d been waiting under.
“You’ll see far more standing in the #darkness than you’ll ever see standing in the light.”
And he was right, she could now see the seemingly empty street was alive with shadowy people about their business.
He was a #ghost, a pitiful echo of a lover she’d long forgotten.
Just another one-night stand that didn’t see the dawn.
One of the legion that silently haunted her,
waiting for the day she’d find justice at the end of a rope.
Reunited with her sins, her vengeful lovers.
Saturday 19th October – Devour
He was an avid consumer of words, a glutton for stories.
He loved the tiny words and the humongous ones, rolling each around his mouth.
He’d #devour entire volumes, nothing could quench his appetite.
Until the day he bit off more than he could chew.
Supercalifragi-croak!
