draliman on life

Here is my contribution to Mondays Finish the Story, a prompt challenge which supplies not only a photo but also the first sentence!

I’ve decided not to slaughter everything in sight this week and go for a more thoughtful piece. So let’s see how that works out 🙂

We have 100-150 words not including the first sentence, which I have highlighted in bold in my story. Click on the blue froggy to see this week’s other contributions!

“They say that life is a game of chess…”

“Chess, Grandfather?”

“Yes lad. You see, everybody has a different way of doing things. Take the bishop.”

The boy picked up a piece. “This one, Grandfather?”

“That’s the one, lad. He’s sneaky – diagonal mover. Just like knights, popping in all of a sudden. Then you have your rooks. They’re straight-movers.”

“So, straightforward and sneaky people, Grandfather?”

“That’s it lad. Your pawns, they’re the workforce, but if they apply themselves  – reach the other side of the board – they achieve real power. The king is the key, but while he stays at the back, his queen ranges far and wide destroying everything in her path.”

“Cool!”

“And on top of everything, you have to think several moves ahead, plan everything out.”

“Just like in life!”

“Exactly. Now, lad, let’s play.”

“Okay, Grandfather. Hey! One of my pieces is missing. That’s not fair… oh.”

“Now you’re getting it, lad. Just like life.”

It’s time for Mondays Finish the Story! Which will never be on a Monday for me, as I only have an hour and a half free from 0600 until 2300. Mondays are nasty 😦

Fresh from not reading the instructions last week (I thought the supplied first sentence was included in the word count), this week I thought I had 200 words! Nope. So much frantic editing was done.

We get a photo prompt, the first sentence (which is in bold in my story below), and 150 words to tell our story, and you can see all the stories for this week here.

Donning her fins and snorkel, she headed out into the deep water. She knew she was foolish to dive alone. She knew she shouldn’t have ventured so far from the boat. Now she was tangled helplessly in the discarded net of a careless fisherman, deeper than she had ever been.

If she could only reach her diver’s knife! A few more centimetres…

Bracing herself, she twisted sharply, dislocating her shoulder. Screaming, she found her desperate manoeuvre had worked – she could now reach the blade. Sawing frantically, her air running out, she managed to free herself, pushing towards the surface, her injured arm dangling uselessly.

Her vision grew darker as oxygen starvation set in – only a few more metres. The surface, safety, grew closer, closer…

Their boat suddenly lurching, the startled exclamations of the tourists turned to screams as red blossomed past the glass underside of the boat, followed by a woman’s body as it was drawn inexorably toward the thrashing propellers.

There’s a new(ish) photo flash fiction in blog town! It’s Mondays Finish the Story – not only is there a photo but the first sentence is written too.

We get 100-150 words, not including the starting sentence. Of course, I didn’t read the instructions properly and spent several desperate minutes cutting my story down to under 150 words including the first sentence. So I’ve put some words back in.

The first sentence is in the present tense, so I’ve stayed with that with some past tense in the middle. I hope it works okay.

This challenge uses the little blue froggy, so click on him to see this week’s other stories. I have put the provided sentence in bold in my story.

Sorry about the snow on my blog. I must have switched it on last year and I can’t be bothered to track down the setting right now. Because I’m lazy like that.

In the compound on the hill, lives a man with a dream. He walks up the marble path admiring his creation, already half-built –  domes rising, palm trees providing shelter from the baking sun.

“You’ll never do it!” they’d said.

“You’ve never amounted to anything!” they’d scoffed.

Yet here it was for all to see, rising from the barren sand.

It hadn’t been plain sailing. No-one would back him so he’d had to turn to “less reputable” sources of funding. People had warned him not to get involved with such people, but his dream would not die. Suffering cash-flow problems, he’d shrugged off the threats of his faceless investors. And besides, he would ensure that they would see amazing returns!

One day.

One day soon.

He opens the door, pushing past the pile of final demands on the doormat. Preoccupied with his dream, he doesn’t see the two shadows detach themselves from the wall and follow him silently up the stairs.