Fantasy

Hi all,

enjoy the following piece of 20 minute writing prompt fiction. The prompts are below the piece.

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I thought I knew Greenodd.
His leather doctor’s bag was open on the table, a tiny car tucked into one pocket, a plastic house in the main pouch.
My wife was upstairs dying. According to Greenodd.
“What is..?”
“A new therapy,” said Greenodd. “Quite the latest.”
“Play the disease away?”
He snapped the bag’s simple clasp closed and walked to the stairs where the wreckage of an invalid’s breakfast: grey oatmeal sodden with watery milk, tooth-white tea in a thin mug sat waiting to be disposed of.

Said Greenodd: “You are the problem.”
“Don’t go near her!” I said.
“She asked for me. I will see her now.” He ran up the stairs. His black shoes were polished sloppily, the polish overlapped onto the lifts of the heel.

Angela broke up with him after we met and I knew she still felt sorry for him. It would have happened anyway. Greenodd was not easy to be around.
He slammed into the bedroom and the door closed in my face.
“Angela!” I saw her pale face before the door closed. I hammered on the door. Behind it I could hear Angela, quiet and patient. Greenodd was whispering but triumphant.
She was telling him that she had called him, not to heal her – had he ever healed anyone? – but to ask forgiveness. I could imagine it so well. But I was nervous about him being with her. She wasn’t well, wasn’t strong. And she was desperate: the baby was due next month. Who knew what Greenodd could talk her into.
I grabbed the chair from the nursery and banged on the door. The wood splintered. I put my arm through the hole. Burst into a bare plastic room.
Not completely bare, there was an upturned doctor’s bag.
A motor revved. Looking through the gap where the window pane should be I saw Greenodd and my wife in his little car. They drove off, growing smaller and smaller.
I clambered through the fake window, ran after them. The car was barely visible as it turned into the nursery. I dived onto my hands and knees. I could hear the whine of its engine but no longer see it, as it slipped between the fibres of the carpet. And Angela’s voice, patient, calm. Greenodd elated.
I had to move slowly so as not to crush them.

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The prompts were:

elated

tiny

wreck

plastic

simple

“Greenodd” is the name of a village in the north east of England. I came across it in the book Nella Last’s War and liked the sound of it for a character. He seems interesting. I have a good feel for what he’s like. We might be seeing him again.

Here’s a 20 minute prompt exercise. I didn’t edit it apart from fixing typos and punctuation and deleting a few words. I put a bit more effort into trying to add specific details to appeal to the senses as I mentioned in a previous story post. At least in the first paragraph, then I got into the story.

The prompts I used are below the piece. Enjoy!

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The scalpel slid into its pocket in the cloth roll.
“He’s adamant.” The doctor shrugged as he spoke.
Georgia’s hands left damp traces on the creased black leather of her wallet.
The doctor counted with her as she pulled out ten pounds. A two pound note, five single pounds. The rest in change. The wallet released lavender as she scraped through the coins. The jingling turned to clinking as she emptied them out.

Payment per visit, not per cure. That was the rule.

“Will he..?” She watched him tuck the coins away into his richly patterned frock coat. A deep inside pocket, three ivory buttons to close it.
“He’s as comfortable as I can make him. Without operating.” He rolled up the velvet lined roll of instruments and tucked them into another pocket.
“He probably shouldn’t scratch it but if it asks him to, well…who knows?”
Georgia followed him to the door, feeling oafish in her starched white linens, muddy from housework, muddy from farmwork too. The doctor stuck the toe of one riding boot, scarlet leather with the high heels that were so fashionable and swung his other leg gracefully over the horse’s back. There was a green and black patterned rug tied onto the saddle for him to rest on. The horse was new, too. He’d had an old white one. This was a gleaming black creature with bands around its thighs. He raised a hand in dismissive farewell.

In the bed Hannie waited for her. He was in trouble, he knew that. But the oil the doctor had given him had had a relaxing, therapeutic effect and he looked forward to have her scold him. Once it was fully grown he’d have an extra pair of hands to help him around the farm.
“Another mouth to feed,” said Georgia.
The growth on Hannie’s neck moved its eyes to follow her around the room, opening the curtains, tidying away the basin and towels the doctor had used to wash himself after examining her husband. It couldn’t see her she was pretty sure, its eyes weren’t yet ready, they glistened like wet raisins.
“How could you?” said Georgia.
“It was an accident,” said Hannie.
“But why won’t you let the doctor take it?” She sat on the edge of the bed. The far side from the lump that was already recognisable as a head.
“He has enough of them already.”
“I was happiest when it was just the two of us.” Georgia took his hand.
“You’ll learn to love it.” Hannie smiled down at the lump on his neck.

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The prompts are:

adamant
rich
scratch
oafish
therapeutic

Here’s another piece of 20 minute writing prompt fiction. As usual I haven’t changed anything apart from deleting, punctuation and typo correction. The key words are below the piece.

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Hammering and birdsong. Then just birdsong and his own breath. Had they gone? He pulled the bedclothes down for a few moments and it started up again. The pixies beat against the door again.
“Get up,” said Flair. “We’re hungry!”
Henry groaned and stood. “I’m up!”
The birdsong intensified. He opened the bedroom door and they swirled in, a cloud of scintillating tiny beings. Flair flew right into his face, brushing his grey cheek with her hand. His skin prickled where she had touched him. The pixie cloud was yellow, pink, purple, blue, green, dashes of colour darting about the room. A couple went to the window, the rest went to his bed, darting into the rumpled bedclothes and settling on his pillow.
“It’s my day off,” said Henry.
“You still have to feed us,” said Flair. The others kept up their birdsong. Henry opened the window and went downstairs to make coffee and toast for himself. Through the kitchen window he could see some birds getting closer, attracted by the noise the pixies were making. The kettle boiled and he drank slowly. When he went back to the bedroom there was no sign that anything was amiss. There was a feather near the window which might have just blown in otherwise the room was as spotless as when he had left it. The pixies were sleeping in his bed. Food always made them heavy and lazy. It also made them approachable.
There was a momentary whirl of wings before they recognised him and settled down again. He perched on the edge of the bed, careful not to come too close and crush any of them. Flair slept on the middle of his pillow, in the dent his skull had made. She smiled at him, the others weren’t friendly but they tolerated him. Flair had said he was their friend so they accepted him.

He had rescued her from a tangle of flypaper more years ago than he cared to remember. His wife had still been alive then. The pixies had brought them lots of joy. It was a constant miracle to see their tiny iridescent wings and the manoeuvres they could do. And the birdsong. The sound of birdsong was his constant companion. It had consoled him when Rita had died. He shifted in the bed, the body moving awkwardly. It was the birdsong he’d miss most when they were gone. He reached out a hand carefully towards Flair, not touching her but wanting to get closer. There was a burst of birdsong as she moved closer to his finger.

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The key words for this piece were:

few
friend
scintillating
tiny
whirl

If I was rewriting it I wouldn’t use the word “hammering” to describe the noise the pixies made when banging on the door. And the tone is a bit inconsistent. But I like the open ending. And I still can’t think of anything other than pixies to use the word scintillating.

In other news I managed to catch up on my missing pages for my novel’s first draft. 83% done as of yesterday and starting to wonder how to tackle the second draft.