girls make trouble

Today’s prompt: Invent a character who sees a phone number on a restroom wall. Describe what happens when he or she dials it.

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Long Distance

“Hello?”

“Mom? It’s me.”

“I know who it is sweetheart, I did spit you out after all.” Her voice was a Manhattan: all smoke and clinking ice. “Now, what can I do for you?”

“Just figure I should call every few years, make sure you’re not dead.”

“You’ve always known what I am, Charlie. I never made a secret of it. So you’ve got two choices: accept it, or go to hell and quit calling.” Click.

No Mom, I thought as I slid to the restroom floor. There’s another way. I started redialing the bold black digits on the wall.

First, by way of explanation, I wanted to try out some flash fiction since it’s a form I really enjoy but don’t know much about. So I’m going to try to get into a routine of writing one short short (100 words or less) every day or two based on a prompt from my “Writer’s Block” book. Today’s prompt is just a word, “Deadline.” Here’s hoping this little project doesn’t get too tedious.

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The Bag

A pack of girls scattered in front of me. Twisting to the right, I thought I saw an opening. But crowds move like the ocean, angry and impenetrable.

Suddenly I was there. I raced to front of the line, not caring who got shoved aside. “The plane,” I panted, “Please.”

“Shirley” behind the desk just raised a finger. My eyes followed it, along with the plane slowly gliding out of sight.

For the first time in four days of running I started to cry. The bag in my hand just throbbed, waiting for my next move.

I’m sorry, but I have to brag about this: I won the Icky Thump giveaway on Cool Hunting! I’ve never won anything in my life (at least, not anything worth remembering), so I’m plenty excited. The fact that I won based on my smutty humor was just icing on the cake.

The point was to come up with an original definition of icky thump, like in Balderdash. My answer? “An icky thump is the terrible, rhythmic pounding you hear when your parents are having sex in an adjacent room. Add extra ickiness points if there’s any audible dirty talk.” Yeah, suck on them eggs, everyone else!