Day 357 Writing Short Stories

Woven

The pattern thick and woven wrapped around the world, making a cocoon, soothing the nervousness, shielding the future from stagnation. There was no need for alteration. Just a movement of small things in the undergrowth, between the shamrock, between the rocks, the moss, the little sticks. It was where life made sense. Where the worst and best thing was a cup of tea with biscuits. Where celebrations were celebrations, and there was no sense of the outside world and all the connections, demands, the perfection. There was just wild hair, the inquisitive eyes, and the tongue that was cheeky and creative, dragons and orcs and all the dangers in the world blessed with light.

It was that endless summer.

Dreams

He had always dreamed of freedom, leisure, of slow days, and they were here. He had gotten the news yesterday. He had been fired, and he was sure it would be a catastrophe at first. The loss of income was a loss. But now, here, as he didn’t have to hurry to work, there was a sense of possibilities.

Soldiers

The earth shook, trapping them inside an underground cave. The fire between the two men now crackled, letting in the light and needed heat. There was enough air to endure the fire. Air wasn’t the issue. Neither was claustrophobia. The men opposite each other had been killing each other before the ground collapsed underneath them, trapping them inside the cave.

They had fought for opposite kingdoms. Now it all seemed foolish here in the immediacy. Killing for commands and silly reasons had no point. It was a game not meant for them. Yet, there was the distance and alienness. They were nothing like each other. But both bled, shivered, and felt hunger. There was that.

“We need to get out,” that was the message on both their lips. What would happen after that was not in their power to decide. Both were marked by their birth.

The prompts are from the book A Year of Creative Writing Prompts.

I want to go where the small wild things go. I want to sail the seas, roam the undergrowths, swing in the jungles. I don’t want to care, and I want to care. I want to alter the world anew, reshape its fabric, make the cars, the buildings, the computers, the tiks and toks go away. I want the flight of birds to mean everything. I want the stars in the sky to show. I want the rain to feel like a welcome. I want to go where the wild things go and run as my hair tosses in the air. That’s where we, you and I, meet, with the wild things.

Thank you for reading ❤ Have another day of adventures full of wild things!