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Weekly Contest #344
Recently furloughed, Jacinta was reinventing herself as host of a new podcast called Bees in Our Bonnet. “It’s received positive notice in the New York Times,” she humble-bragged to her friends, “so I need your help to keep it afloat.” She had a wide circle of friends and acquaintances whom she unapologetically dragged into amateur focus groups, testing the waters for a variety of topics, everything from the Big Leap principle to Emotional Intelligence models. Tonight, Jacinta had invited Kenneth and Leland, guys she had known since first-ye...
Shortlisted for Contest #343 ⭐️
Mrs. Adamson, vice-president of operations at a big corporation, was too busy for Death. Not today, not this week. And definitely not next Tuesday.Her beleaguered assistant Samara called over the P.A.: “I have a Mr. Thanatos on the other line—kind of a pushy guy. He claims you agreed to meet with him any time. What should I say?”“Let me talk to him,” Mrs. Adamson said, taking a deep breath before she hit the speaker button. As a twenty-year veteran of financial markets, she believed she could handle all comers.A baritone chuckle filled her o...
Weekly Contest #341
In the middle of Louis Vinson’s grand summer tour for his 13th book, the weather turned uncooperative. His tour was literally a washout, with the AirBnB places cancelling at last minute and hotels and motels filled to capacity and unable to accept him.“You’ll be driving a teensy bit out of the way,” his publicist Maude advised him. “And staying the night at Barberville.”He had sworn he would never go back to Barberville. Yet here he was, the victim of Mother Nature and tight schedules. “Now that you’ve made it big,” Maude had advised, “you s...
Weekly Contest #340
For weeks I was hanging out at the Takapuna Market on a long metal rack with dozens of friends and acquaintances. “Hey, zzzzip!” we called out to each other. There were the Camo bros, decked out in splotchy green and gray; the Hello Kitty kids, looking cute in pink-white-red canvas; the North Face squad, looking seriously professional; and the various Disney crews, from Aladdin to Frozen, sporting all colors of canvas. All of us with our shiny zip fasteners, our strong adjustable straps, and rows of perfect teeth that promised never to get j...
Weekly Contest #338
Ella wriggled from one position to another on her chair but could find no comfort today. Glancing around at fellow readers in the No-Tech reading room, she saw only books and paper—exactly what had attracted her to this enclave at the London Library.At University of Warwick, study hall had been a circus of clacking keyboards, beeping devices, and whispered curses at the assorted technology gremlins, not to mention conversations between people or one-sided chats from their phones.And yet... maybe it was too quiet here in the No-Tech room. Too...
Weekly Contest #337
Nurse Alford noiselessly opened the door, just wide enough to poke her head around it. “Did you buzz?” she said to the woman who lay on the half-raised hospital bed.“Yes,” said the woman, tapping the translucent IV line attached to her arm. “Please get me some more of whatever this is. I can’t bear how these afternoons drag on.”“Mrs. McKennitt,” the nurse said firmly. “I’d gladly ask the doctor to increase your meds, but you will need a better reason for it. An ‘afternoon dragging on’ is not reason enough, you know.”“Really? Then why was coc...
Weekly Contest #336
There are always expectations, and Hercules hates to disappoint. “Aw crap,” he says to Jack as they are unpacking the camper, a refurbished Airstream, “I completely forgot about the three-chili guacamole.” What the hell kind of friend is he? He’d told Jack he’d bring the guac and yet here he is, empty-handed. Jack, the friend he’s known longest of all, the one who’s stood by him since kindergarten.“Well, that’s it,” Jack says. “I’m packing up and going home.” Then he laughs, and Hercules laughs, and suddenly they are eight years old again an...
Weekly Contest #327
“That’s it,” Joe yelled. “Final straw—I can’t connect!” He darted from kitchen table to rickety verandah, holding his laptop: the dance of the fading WiFi. “Hello, sweetheart,” Griselda crooned as she sidled up the path to their cottage. In the distance two ravens cawed and a motorboat hummed across the wide blue lake. A bucket swung on her arm; it held her beloved stinky newts and toads under bunches of noxious herbs. “Were you talking to me, dear?”Joe averted his eyes quickly—before she could mesmerize him. He forced himself to look only a...
Weekly Contest #321
Nervous as hell, Stanley did the job he had to do. He strode into First Savings & Loan at 11:05 AM and held up the bank. He steeled himself against the reactions of panic and fright, as much from patrons and employees as himself, repeating the mantras “I deserve a piece of the pie,” even if he had to “rip it from the hands of greedy capitalists.” How else would he feed his hungry boy Roderick? How else would he pay the sanatorium fees for his sick wife Helen? The country was staggering under the worst economic times since the civil war, ...
Weekly Contest #320
In the desert a fountain is springingIn the wide waste there is still a treeAnd a bird in the solitude singingWhich speaks to my spirit of thee.― Lord Byron We dilly-dallied in Green’s Grocery, Katrina and I, listening to the hit “One More Time” by the teen sensation Britney Spears playing over the crackling loudspeaker. Eventually we selected our Drumstick cones, and grumpy old Mr. Green shooed us outside. We didn’t care. The song was over. We had other things on our mind.We strolled down dusty Lake Road, tearing off the gaudy blue Drumstic...
Weekly Contest #318
I finish washing up—one cup, one plate, one fork. I’m passing by the door on my way to watch TV all by my lonesome when I hear voices. The words are muffled, but the tones are unmistakable: exasperation and persuasion. I fetch my trusted ear-cone and press it to the door. “What are you doing here?” Rhiannon’s tone carries clear as a bell. She used to sing in a popular choir until she quit it a couple years ago because she was working so many evenings.“One last chance, babe. Hear me out.” Eddy’s voice is half-comfortable sweater, half-existen...
Weekly Contest #317
On Thursday a bunch of us data jocks got together over drinks to celebrate end-of-quarter. We ran out of conversation, so people started boasting about where they’d spent their last vacation: skiing in Dubai and surfing in Antarctica. That’s when Lancaster, the renowned “early adopter” in the office, brought up time-travel. He’d spent a wild weekend sampling the Roaring Twenties in a gin joint packed with flappers. It had been arranged through ChronoPort, the company that had taken time travel out of CERN and privatized it. “Think of chronos...
Weekly Contest #315
Legs splayed over the arm of the biggest chair, Shane chews the neckline of his Old Navy T-shirt, holding a deluxe Time-Life book to use as camouflage. He’s brooding over his next Top-Secret project, and has decided to hide it among the pages of this book, titled Abandoned Places. News junkie Dad has sections of the Sunday New York Times fanned out over the circular coffee table. He’s nursing a shotglass of Jameson’s whiskey. Mom reclines on the large Mouflon sheepskin rug and three cushions in front of the unused limestone fireplace. She’s ...
Shortlisted for Contest #314 ⭐️
Eddy runs out to the parking lot, ahead of the others. It’s flat and hot, like Grandma’s frying pan when she turns the burner on high. Letting it warm up just before her butterknife slices off a waxy square of yellow butter and chases it around the pan. Round and round the butter goes, the square losing its sharp corners and the butter slip-sliding in a greasy puddle, getting smaller and smaller until it vanishes and there is only hot brown grease in the pan.Eddy always ducks his head near the pan to smell the browned butter. And Grandma, la...
Weekly Contest #313
Once upon a time in the village of Wishyouwell there lived a crabby old woman called Ears-A-Plenty. She was called Ears-A-Plenty because it was true, she did have more ears than the average two or three that we might have nowadays. Yes, she even wore the extra ears, sprouting from the top of her head, gathered up with a velvet ribbon like a bouquet of posies. Ears-A-Plenty was a shopkeeper, the best shopkeeper for miles around. Each morning, smells of coffee and buttered toast wafted on the breeze, gathering customers to her. Once inside the...
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