Dec 23, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
PHOTO PROMPT – © Scott L. Vannatter
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
Genre: Death-myth fiction
The Mower
©December 23rd, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
The farm-cat knew it. Both dogs knew it. Even the little mice scurrying behind the walls knew it. The sheep in their pens knew it, and baa-aa-ed nervously. The cow and her calf in the shed moo-ed forlornly.
Only Simon sleeping in his little farmhouse bedroom didn’t know it.
Suddenly, he awoke. A Form had glided into his room, carrying a scythe.
“It’s time, human,” said a voice, dry as deserts.
Simon protested. “I haven’t mowed the fields. I’m NOT ready. Go! Return at season’s end.”
Simon’s cat stared. Hesitating, then nodding, the Form faded.
Simon lived till season’s end.
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Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields for being our gracious host at Friday Fictioneers, and to Scott Vannatter for the photograph-prompt!
Tags: #Death, Cat, Farmer, Mowing fields, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, Scythe, Season's end
Dec 23, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
PHOTO PROMPT – © Scott L. Vannatter
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
Genre: Animal Tails
Mesmer (Dog-Tail #2)
©December 23rd, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Hypnotia, our cat, had trained us well. Her lamp-like stare could arrest us in our tracks. We’d play the piano for her any time she needed to yowl.
Then, Mesmer, our dog arrived. He was three months old when we brought him home, milky-sweet and eiderdown-soft. And though he disgusted Hypnotia by peedling everywhere, she was fascinated by his alarmingly excessive canine charm. They became inseparable friends, and often sang together, not heeding our strenous objections.
We laid down the law: No more singing.
We lost that battle: They left us. We heard that they were last seen in Bremen.
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Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for being our Fairy Blog-Mother host on Friday Fictioneers, and to Scott L. Vannatter for that arresting photograph.
Tags: #Dog-Tail#2, Cats and Dogs, Mesmer, The Musicians of Bremen
Dec 16, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
Genre: Canine Fiction
Keen Dog
(Dog-Tail #1)
©December 16th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
My family had gone away. Strangeness was in the air. Someone was waiting outside.
Looking out the window, eyes adjusting to the hazy dawn, I saw nothing.
I padded to the back door, worked the handle, pushed aside the thing that held it in place, and walked into the bright dew of morning.
Before me stood the biggest, most formidable dog I’d ever seen.
I dropped to my knees.
“Who are you?” I keened through my nose.
“I am Freedom. Come with me into the wilderness. It won’t be easy, but you’ll have me.”
What can I say?
I left.
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Thanks, as always, to our gracious Fairy Blog-Mother Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting Friday Fictioneers, which (despite its name) meets every Wednesday (when Rochelle furnishes a new photo-prompt sent by readers and writers) and continues up through the next Wednesday, when a new prompt is set at her table for us eager writers. Thanks for the photo-prompt (also by Rochelle) for this week.
Tags: #Dog-Tail#1, Canine Freedom, Dog-Tales
Dec 9, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Short Story
PHOTO PROMPT © Luther Siler
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
Genre: Realistic Metaphorical Fiction
Block-Cage
©December 9th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
The prisoner beat his head against the cage, and died …
I stopped typing, and shook my head. I didn’t like the story.
My eight-year-old came into my room, saw the fallen bird, and said, “Sorry Mom, it fell when I reached up to touch it. I’ll fix it.” And she did, after which I hung it from its hook. For a moment, I looked at it fondly, smiling, then went back to my computer, erased my first line, and began again:
When the prisoner beat his head against the prison-bars, he grew wings …
Time melted away.
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Thanks, as always, to our Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting Friday Fictioneers, and to Luther Siler for that surreal photograph!
Tags: Bird, Bird-cage, Setting, Writer's Block, Writing
Dec 9, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Short Story
PHOTO PROMPT © Roger Bultot
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
Genre: War/Ghost-Fiction
Doors of Deception
©December 9th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Once, there was a house.
Once, there were warm, living people in this house.
There was a house, with warm, living people in it — now there is dry heather. Wind moans through empty spaces amidst iron scraps. Doors open into the wild, where the sun (or is it a small bomb, or an army Hummer?) shines, blinding me.
Beside it, offices go up, glass-blindingly oblivious to lives gone.
Wandering here, I wonder, Was it worth it?
A soldier steps out, points his gun at me, says, “Move along, citizen.”
I step through the doors, and vanish.
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Thanks, as always, to our Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields (sorry I’m a whole week late with writing this one, since the new one already came out today!), for hosting Friday Fictioneers, where writers meet and write 100-word short stories based on photo-prompts. Thanks to Roger Bultot for the evocative photo!
Tags: #Loss, 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt, Doors, War
Nov 27, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Sisyphus The Second
©November 27th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
Genre: End-Times, Greek-Myth-Sci-Fi Style
They condemned me to hell.
I’d committed a crime beyond forgiveness. I’d destroyed the oceans, and lied about it.
When They heard about it, They plucked me from my mansion, and set me down hard on petroleum-covered beaches.
Now, I have to scale that ravaged cliff, build a lighthouse atop it, occupy it, destroy it, climb back down, re-scale the cliff, rebuild the lighthouse, and repeat it all, while the methane burns above me, and the seas boil below me.
And I have to flick the lights on and off.
I don’t see why.
There’s nobody out there.
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Thanks, as always, to our Fairy Blog-Mother and brilliant story-teller, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for being our gracious host every week at Friday Fictioneers, and to Sandra Crook an amazing story-teller and photographer, for this week’s photo-prompt.
Tags: #Original Short Story by Vijaya Sundaram, 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt
Nov 19, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Short Story
Cigarette Butts and Dead Leaves
©November 19th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
I sit on the sidewalk near the gutter by our flat, and wait.
Smoking cigarette after cigarette, my fingers stained yellow, my eyes blank, my hands trembling, I wait.
The seasons come and go. Long ago (a year or two, or more?) there had been a bombing near our place.
He’d gone to meet an old friend at our favorite restaurant. “Don’t wait up,” he’d said.
“You know I will,” I’d replied, kissing him.
And I do, every evening.
He was a pillar of flame when he courted me. Now, I am a pillar of ash.
A leaf flutters down.
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With thanks, as always, to our beloved Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for her gracious and lovely leadership as host of Friday Fictioneers, and to the pithy and imaginative CEAyr, for his evocative photograph.
Tags: France, Love and loss, Original 100-word short story based on a photo-prompt
Nov 15, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Flash Fiction
PHOTO PROMPT – © J Hardy Carroll
Where Have All the Flowers Gone?
© November 15th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Genre: Realistic Fantasy Death-Fiction
Word Count: 100 words of text exactly
So much sorrow in the world, so much war, so many dead! All that waste, all those fathers gone, those flowers with their heads in the dust make me thirst for life.
I sit day after day in this cemetery, not because I love death, but because I mourn life. I tend to the graves of those whose families have forgotten them. That woman and her child over there come every day. They are beautiful, enshrouded in mystery.
The woman looks up, sees me, pales.
I try to send reassurance her way. My scythe gleams.
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With thanks, as always, to our Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for being a lovely host to all of us who write as Friday Fictioneers, and to J. Hardy Carroll for that touching photograph.
I type this at my brother’s home in New Delhi, India. I’ll be leaving to go back to Pune, India, where my mother lives, to spend the rest of the following week there. Back in the US on the 23rd. Missing you all. Sorry about not being able to comment much — Internet connectivity is an issue.
Tags: #Death, #Life, #Peace, 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt, War, Where have all the flowers gone?
Nov 5, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Flash Fiction
Wife-Earth-Mother
©November 5th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
I walked in her footsteps.
Grace had tended our arid acre of land, pouring her spirit into it. That which was infertile, she’d made fertile, and that which had died, she’d made live. For twenty years she grew corn, beans, squash, tomatoes, pumpkins, peppers – enough for our family of three. Her love fed and nourished us.
I had gone to work in the coal fields, and my lungs rattled and hissed.
My son had died in a war begun by evil politicians. Then, Grace died, heartbroken. With her gone, the land died. I was alone.
I picked up a shovel.
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(P.S. Thanks to Rochelle, our beloved Fairy Blog-Mother as I dubbed her, for hosting Friday Fictioneers each week. Thanks, also, to Connie Gayer …(Mrs. Russell) for her evocative and sombre photograph.)
(P.P.S I’m heading off to India tomorrow morning via Emirates, so I may not be able to read people’s posts today, unless I can find a few minutes (haven’t packed yet!). Please know that I will check out your stories, and respond to anyone who makes a comment at some point before next Wednesday!
Love to all, Vijaya)
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Tags: #Death, #Dirty Energy, #Life, #Loss, #Love, Climate Change, Original short story based on photo-prompt, Politics, War
Oct 28, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Short Story
PHOTO PROMPT – © Dale Rogerson
Genre: Greek neo-Myth
Word Count: 100 words of text exactly
Rebirth of the Hydra
©October28th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Why did I fight Alcaeus? I should’ve recognized him when he arrived. I should have known when he and Iolaus cauterized eight of my heads. I should’ve known that he, named Hera’s Gift, would be my nemesis. And though he severed my one immortal head, and placed it under a rock, I had my revenge, for an arrow he dipped in my blood caused his death.
But they don’t call me Hydra for naught. Aeons passed, water collected around my rock, and a deep basin formed around it. Strength returned.
I was ready to strike again.
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And, as always, a warm “thank you” to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, our gracious Fairy Blog-Mother, for hosting Friday Fictioneers every week. Thanks, also to the delightful Dale Rogerson, for that intriguing photograph!
Tags: 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt, Greek Mythology, Heracles, The Hydra