Writing prompt: YOUTH
Provided by: Claire Goverts ,
a fellow A-Z challenge participant. Please visit her excellent blog!
Can’t believe I have one more post left to go…Z, and we’re done!
Genre: Fiction
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The magnolia tree outside his apartment lit up his eyes as he wrote. He had to hurry, because they would be here soon. He had to write of his lost youth, of his encounter with the butcher, how he was spared, and became a butcher himself.
But first he had to take out the .45 bullets, the cold, sharp, dead things. Not his weapon of choice on the flowers he picked up, the boys who fell for the hush, the softness of his voice, never recognized him for who he was until too late. Youth was stupid, that way. No grown man would have entered his car.
Knives had life, they hummed and sang with each spurt, but not the easiest things to use on your own throat. Things could get messy. He wanted a clean end and he knew how to shoot a .45 ACP from his days in the army.
The pistol readied, he sat down again to write, but the words would not come. He thought of the last boy, the one that almost got away, of how he lay under the earth, carved and peeled, so close to him.
He needed to decide how to end this.
He took one of the pale pink blossoms he had gathered that morning on his table. Magnolias should be red, he said, like blood, or youth. Not magnolia seeds. He began peeling the flower. The butcher had taught him this way of making up his mind.
I will be here when they come, he said, and tore a petal. I won’t be here, he said, and tore another.
He heard a bolt slip somewhere at the back, and knew they had found him. He wondered how he had missed the sound of cars pulling up.
The pale pink petals, having done their job, lay on the parquet around his feet.
He scribbled on the pad before him: Under the magnolia tree.
Let them find out the secret of the thriving posies that weighed the tree to the lawn.
As the door opened, he fired his shot, and a tiny red magnolia blossomed on his throat, where his voice had been.
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You write such compelling stories that draw readers in like kids to a bowl of candy. It’s really great!
This is how writing teachers try to get their students to write, but they rarely succeed. Short sentences — unadorned, honest, and powerful. We can see it happening. Great work.
Another amazing post. The combination of violence and sadness and resignation and beauty just amaze me. Wow.
Oh, and it’s especially disturbing that your character waited to off himself until someone came in the door. That’s so twisted. Who was he punishing?
Nice storytelling. I wanted to stop him from doing it. My first husband committed suicide, and I know the horribleness that comes as a result.
Now I need to go read something uplifting. =D
It amazing how you’ve put beauty into such a ugly event and background. This is some good story telling.
Hope you’ll join us for The A to Z Challenge Reflections Post on Monday May 2nd.
Lee
Another great one! You truly are an inspiration to me. I have learned so much from reading your writing.
Wow! Disturbed! And the way you can describe things is most creepy, in a good writers kind of way. Blessings!
Another great one and then some! Can’t wait to read Z.
how he lay under the earth, carved and peeled…phew.
One more day of AtoZ, but I def hope not the last of your writing.