*Very/Very Short Stories please

[chegrimandi]

Very/Very Short Stories please

this should test yer writing skills........a short story......in 50 words. Any subject, fictional or otherwise....

 

[Wowbagger]

Once, there was a bulletin board for a website that was very popular.

And one of these posters decided to set a story competition for his fellow posters, to write short stories.

Sadly, nobody gave a toss, and the thread died a slow and agonizing death.

The end.

;-)

 

[Lollybelle]

What about the famous six-word story (IIRC):

"For Sale. Baby's shoes. Never worn"

Will come up with my own one shortly....

 

[Dubversion]

"I would so like to tell you of my success."

 

[Lollybelle]

83 - shortest I can reduce it to.

Victoria Station, winter...

Heaving as always, as he waits, observing. Tourists with trundle-bags, businessmen in long coats with mobile phones (calling their home? Kids? Mistresses?). He wonders why he loves this place so much….. maybe it’s that warm, sweet smell of fags and croissants, or maybe the sound of the flickerboards, or maybe even the way you can hold your head high as the sea of commuters becomes a stream of moving shop-window dummies around you.

Or maybe it’s because he’d met her here.

 

[Lollybelle]

Yes! exactly 50

Not exactly Sainsbury’s

Martha nodded sideways to Enid to indicate that the bus was on its way. As it hurtled towards their suburban stop, no intention of halting unless the correct ‘request-stop protocol’ was followed, Enid nodded back and they stepped out; fragile spindly bodies followed by empty trundle bags.

 

[Lollybelle]

And another 50...

First sunny day of the year....

...upstairs on the number 12, rolling across Waterloo Bridge, light gleaming on the slow-moving river and buildings alike, schoolchildren chattering excitably at the end of their day in a studiedly-identical south London patois, Marina felt the sun kiss her shoulders; it reminded her of home.

 

[Lollybelle]

60 this time.... I need to get on with some work, really

Gonna see the river man...

“…Gonna tell him all I can” he murmurs as he turns to face out across the water. The nights are cold, deep, frozen cold, and he wonders each morning what the fuck life is for. But in some previous life, with his guitar, he used to sing to her; he hasn’t yet forgotten the words.

 

[chegrimandi]

good efforts lolly, like it - gonna write mine tonight........aw don't all wet yerselves in anitcipation.....

 

[Jangla]

Lolly - you should write these down in a book and sell them on to aspiring authors as opening lines. I think they're brilliant!

and now my paltry effort...

The words stuck in his throat even as he rehearsed them in front of the bathroom mirror. Shoulders hunched, heart pounding, he tried once more; but how could he tell her without losing everything? And then the familiar sound of keys in the lock, stilleto's on wood flooring. She's home. With a deep breath he pulled himself into some semblance of calm. "Honey? I'm..."

 

[Dubversion]

he was trying to get back to the womb. it didn't matter which womb, as long as it wasn't his mother's.

typically, this only occurred to him as he watched Mary slam the front door behind her and get into the taxi.

he'd run out of teabags, too.

 

[Lollybelle]

Nice one Dub and cheers Jangla! Here's a cheesy one....

He wanted to walk beside the pushchair – little-Joe was wearing his badge so everyone would know he was three today! He carries his orange butterfly carefully, and gives it to the dirty-scruffy man sitting on a brown blanket singing softly to himself; together they watch it fly, bright against the sun.

 

[infobomb]

Pont des Arts

There was this old man who was always on the bridge last summer, painting the river, the buildings and the sunlight. He was Afghan, apparently, though I always thought he looked like some Indian patriarch with his brilliant white beard and guant frame.

Now, the sky is dark and it's cold and he's no longer there.

 

[Lollybelle]

Ah, I could churn these out all day...

Touch

She ran her fingers through luxuriantly, loving his hair, the moment, him. Thick, lightish brown, straight, long… a few greys here and there … she wanted to bury her face in it and never face the world again. And then – the fucker – he spoke: “no.1 all over, please”.

 

[Cloo]

'At least', he said,'you'll get a story out of this'.

(NB, not my idea, paraphrased from a great poem I read ages ago)

 

[Dubversion]

Ah, I could churn these out all day...

Originally posted by Lollybelle
Touch

She ran her fingers through luxuriantly, loving his hair, the moment, him. Thick, lightish brown, straight, long… a few greys here and there … she wanted to bury her face in it and never face the world again. And then – the fucker – he spoke: “no.1 all over, please”.

top one!!!!

 

[fucthest8]

My eyes open and she’s leaning over me, concern etched on her face. She’s trying to say something, but I can’t hear her. Now, I know that I came into the wrong room unannounced, but who the hell actually sleeps with a knife under their pillow? I close my eyes.

 

[Dubversion]

By The Time I Get To Swindon

i was already on the train out of town when i remembered i'd left my watch on her bedside table.

i thought about jumping off, running back. but i'd never have summoned the escape velocity to get that train again. better that i leave the watch behind.

along with all the other things i used to pretend were trying to keep me there.

 

[Dubversion]

it wasn't that he lacked ambition. he just didn't see anything out there he wanted. what was he supposed to do, pretend?

he was starting to wish he had pretended. maybe that was better than endless conversations where people tilted their heads slightly to one side in a ghastly parody of concern.

 

[Furvert]

'I'll love you till the day I die,' he said.

He even put it in writing, last Valentine's.

So she didn't doubt that he meant it. Still, opening the cutlery drawer, she slid a carving knife up her cardigan sleeve.

'Best to be sure,' she said.

 

[Dubversion]

(erm, is it still safe to come round? )

 

[Furvert]

Originally posted by Dubversion
erm, is it still safe to come round?

yeah, i'll be starting the cooking any minute!

 

[Dubversion]

oh dear. just heard.

all the streatham buses cancelled. forever, like.

 

[Cid]

All is dark, lonley, painful - a prison of... she opens her pale, beautiful eyes - but she see's nothing... there was a time when she knew happiness, when there were sights and smells - music... That time is gone, but the music comes and she closes her eyes for the last time.

 

[Balbi]

He half turns, his breath frosting the air, watching the retreating headlights into the night. “What do we do now?” she asks softly, hugging her jacket close. He sits on the kerb and she walks over to him and they are both haloed by the streetlight. Standing, they embrace, waiting.

 

[Balbi]

The light, dappled by the tree outside the half open window. A play on the breeze stirs memories past. Laughter, people, a party. As well she is alone with her chair for she never wants people to see her cry. Because for all the memories, time locks that world away.

 

[chegrimandi]

God/ And a Brief History of Man



'I'm going to subjugate you to my omnipotence said god'. And then he sent forth pious men of certain conviction. And duly man acquiesced. And other god men came forth with different rules. And then man argued over Gods and Land. They killed each other for God and Land ?

 

[dwen]

here is my pitiful attempt

Fifteen floors up, curiosity got the better of him, that terrible insatiable inquisitiveness that is afforded only to the very young and inexperienced. A whole new world lay just beyond that balcony which he duly toppled over. Splat.

 

[fucthest8]

dwen

LOL!

My second attempt. Probably been done before and better, but hey ...


The music swells and soars and I am swept away, arms aloft, head thrown back, as a fierce kind of joy grips me. It is like nothing else I know, pure somehow, elemental, making the hair on my arms stand up. All this in the privacy of my own home.

 

[Lollybelle]

A chirpy one for the weekend, this...

Cube

He woke up to the sound of alarms. Not one, but hundreds, screaming, endlessly. And not where he’d lain to sleep… he could see nothing but his fingertips explored, nails screeching against steel on all sides; as a thick, viscous liquid began to fill his prison with deeper blackness…