55 Word
Challenge
Week
Forty-Four
Welcome back to #55WordChallenge!
For those that are
uninitiated, the 55 Word Challenge is a contest to write a story in 55 words or
less. Not an easy task, but fun and I have been blown away by some of the
entries. See for yourself, all the past contests can be found here. (List has been updated)
The challenge begins at noon Eastern time every Wednesday and ends at noon Thursday. The story is based on one of three photo prompts and can be written in any genre you choose. My only request is no porn. I don't want to hear graphic details. If it is erotic, make it titillating, not obscene. I know that can be done and done well.
The story is to be posted in the comment section below, along with your twitter handle or email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner. If you don't want to list your email address, send it to me at jezri@writing.com. I promise I won't distribute it, but if you are the winner I need a way to notify you and to send you your prize.
The challenge begins at noon Eastern time every Wednesday and ends at noon Thursday. The story is based on one of three photo prompts and can be written in any genre you choose. My only request is no porn. I don't want to hear graphic details. If it is erotic, make it titillating, not obscene. I know that can be done and done well.
The story is to be posted in the comment section below, along with your twitter handle or email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner. If you don't want to list your email address, send it to me at jezri@writing.com. I promise I won't distribute it, but if you are the winner I need a way to notify you and to send you your prize.
And what does the winner get? This purty badge for one. This week I have a special prize, thanks to a donation by @HLPauff. He deferred his prize two weeks ago and said to put it back in the pot. So I have decided to offer all three books by Timothy Hobbs as the prize package. I am really excited because I love Tim's writing and I think you will too. You can read more about him below.
If anyone is
interested in contributing a prize, a book, cover art, whatever you want, let me
know and we will work something out. If you are an artist that would
like to have your work featured, let me know!
Photo Prompt:
Timothy C. Hobbs was born in Temple, Texas. His older brother was a lover of horror movies and
literature. Tim naturally followed his brother's lead and was seduced by all
things that go bump in the night. Tim started writing horror stories in the
sixth grade and has never stopped since. His books, Music Box Sonata and The Smell of Ginger, are published through Visionary Press Cooperative. A third novel, The Pumpkin Seed, will be released sometime in the near future.
Timothy also writes for Minor Insanity.
All I had to do was find the red door. That’s all he’d said. Red door. Be there at noon. I leaned against the wall opposite and waited, heart pounding. The minutes hit twelve, but no bells rang out the time. The red door merely opened, and children boiled out. I grinned. Fieldtrip day!
ReplyDelete54 words
@SiobhanMuir
I saw you today but you didn’t see me. I didn’t dare approach you, I knew I couldn’t speak. My mind drifts back to that fateful day. The scene plays out, the rusted padlock on the abandoned garden gate, two young lovers looking for fun, the blood drenched roses, the emptiness of her lifeless eyes.
ReplyDelete@me2annnoyed
She walked past that red door every day for twelve years. The eye that appeared through the grate made her walk faster but it was the padlock on the door that gave her nightmares. What was behind that door? What unholy creature had locked it inside? On her graduation day she found out the truth.
ReplyDelete55 Words
@vatrask
You people think we are all three feet tall and hanging out at the end of a rainbow, sure we are a diminutive race but we aren’t that short. The end of our rainbows is a stranger’s pocket beware the green shoes because when you are looking down we get richer.
ReplyDelete@antonioangelo21
51 words
I knew I shouldn’t have worn sneakers. Red and black sneakers, no less. And jeans! I’m an idiot. All of these speakers are dressed so nice, and here I am looking like a slob. What is wrong with me?
ReplyDelete“Hi, Mark!”
“Oh, uh, hello.”
“Are you ready for your self-confidence motivational speech?”
“Ready as ever!”
55 words
@rastrohman
Garza stopped short of the perimeter. The padlock swung free. He had an hour to find her before involving outside agencies. Shackling that wild brilliant mind was criminal but the primate was too valuable to Global and too dangerous to the public to roam free.
ReplyDelete- - - - -
55 words / @bullishink
This comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteDeath By Irony
ReplyDeleteIt was an amusing irony the lock barring admittance to the abandoned vicarage of St. Philip had been manufactured by Sterling, when its condition was anything but.
Thomas led his carousing friends through the red-painted door never imagining none of them would ever leave ever again. Vengeful spirits, they learned most horribly, have long memories.
55 words @klingorengi
Detective David Carlisle touched his gloved hand to the door marking the dead woman's threshold. It came back covered with a red substance.
ReplyDelete"Blood."
Carlisle turned around and acknowledged the young man behind him. Detective Harold Cliff. One of the new officers on the force. "Who's blood?"
Cliff looked sick as he said, "The victim's."
55 words @bookwormattack
As I walked along the fence one morning, I came to one of the gates, and checked its lock. The lock was broken. The chain it held the gate shut with hung loosely. Something had come in. I secured the gate with a new lock, then headed to the nearest village to sound the alarm.
ReplyDelete55 words
@LurchMunster
We should’ve been safe in the old stone church with its heavy red door and the padlock and chains binding us in. We should’ve been safe, we kids in scuffed shoes and wide eyes, even as terror raged outside.
ReplyDeleteAnd we might’ve been, maybe.
Except, turns out one of us was one of Them.
Oops.
55 words
@postupak
She’d been alone for so long she’d forgotten what it meant to be two. She clasped his hand and trembled.
ReplyDeleteHe tilted her face to his, traced the lines of her life with his finger and pressed his lips to hers. This simple gesture unlocked inhibitions and allowed her rusty self-confidence to begin to flourish.
(55 Words)
@LastKrystallos
Her hands were going orange as the rust on the padlock mixed with her sweat. She had to get it off, she had no time; she could hear the footsteps behind her. As the grit split under his shoe, she felt it give. She burst through, entering the crowds on the other side; free.
ReplyDelete54 words
@PurpleQueenNL
Redneck Rumba
ReplyDeleteNot breathing, I paused, door at my back. They shambled across the cold stone floor, two lines of them, feet beating a ragged tattoo.
They’d seen me!
They turned as one staggering in my direction. The putrid stench was choking and twenty disintegrating faces regarded me curiously.
I hated being new at zombie line dancing.
55 words
@nickjohns999
My eyes slowly focused, registering the broken chain. The rusted lock still clutched its link, the clasp unyielding. It didn’t matter I was freed from my prison. His tormenting words still held me captive, echoing in my head as my screams had echoed off the walls the night before. I would never be free again.
ReplyDelete(55 Words)
@Janeen_FluffyJ
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteShe locked him in the house. If she couldn't have him, noone else would. If she couldn't be loved by him, noone else would. He stole her heart, she stole his life.He called it revenge, she called it justice.
DeleteHis body started shaking, waves of power started splashing against her.
Clear victory.
53 words
@MaryPapas2
Their footsteps approached as he ran to the bright-red door of the church where he could find sanctuary. A chain was on the door, but the padlock was only latched to one end. He entered. An unrepentant sinner, he had evaded the true Christians and now felt safe among his own kind.
ReplyDelete53 words
@LupusAnthropos
I was surprised by how calm everyone was during the walk to the emergency meeting point. No one ran or jostled. No one talked. I tried to remain calm too, to keep up the façade of innocence, but I couldn’t. I let out a cackling giggle as I watched our office burn to the ground.
ReplyDelete55words
@StuffedO
(just playing with some old prompts!)
ReplyDeleteMy teeth dislodged, now circulating my mouth. Spitting them into my hand, I turned, only to see it coming again.
ReplyDeleteBlack.
Alone and without any sense, I waited.
‘He was hit with a sock and lock’, as light returned. ‘The 21st century equivalent of a mace and chain’, his elaboration brought back the pain.’
55 words
@luke_rative