Oct 22, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Flash Fiction
PHOTO PROMPT © Ron Pruitt
Genre: Vehicular Fantasy
Word Count: 100 words of text exactly
Jefferson’s Big Day
©October 22nd, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Jefferson was waiting. He was bored. And he felt mischievous.
Waiting was irksome. It wasn’t his forte. He felt positively homicidal.
After an age, there were streams of passengers, appearing out of nowhere — large, small, dumpy, attractive. Jefferson eyed them surreptitiously, formulating his plans, while they boarded him.
Among them was a little old man with sky-colored eyes and ancient wrinkles who gave Jefferson a conspiratorial wink. Jefferson ignored him studiously, but knew in his piston-pumping heart that today was the big day.
Then, with a lurch, he took off into the air. Screams followed.
Couldn’t people take a joke?
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With thanks, as always, to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, whom I have dubbed our Fairy Blog-Mother, for hosting us for THREE years! What a paragon of graciousness, generosity and creativity you are, Rochelle! Here’s to many more years of your gentle, but firm, steering of the Friday Fictioneers ship! And I love so many writers who contribute to this site — all of them thoughtful, kind, and creative (and occasionally hilarious)! Thank you all for being so supportive to one another, and for making me feel welcome. Thanks, also, to Ron Pruitt, for the charming photo-prompt!
Tags: 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt, Bus Fantasy story
Oct 14, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
PHOTO PROMPT -© Rochelle Wisoff-Fields
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
The Thing I Held
©October 14th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Rain poured down like tears while I stood at the railing. My hands shook. My eyes were wet, like rain.
The blurring in my eyes flooded my throat, like smoke pouring down the chimney, asphyxiating me.
In my hand I held the thing that had destroyed a life.
Behind me, in my room lay that life, the man who’d almost destroyed mine. No matter that he deserved it. No matter that he was wrong. No matter that I was broken.
He was dead. And so was I.
The rain washed away the thing I held. It washed me away, too.
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Thanks, as always, to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, our Fairy Blog-Mother (as I dub her) for hosting Friday Fictioneers for us fiction-loving writers from around the world, and for that evocative photo-prompt which served as our springboard today.
Tags: murder fiction, Self-Defense, Violence against men, violence against women
Oct 8, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Genre: A Swiftian Tale
Word Count: 100 words of text, exactly
The Tiny Carnival and The Captive
©October 8th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Emerging from the tunnel, sore from being squeezed by its crushing metal, Aliya stood, brushed off her dress, smoothed her hair, and stared.
A tiny carnival exploded in color. Minute people whirled through the air, and little shrieks of delight swirled around them. A miniscule booth announced “Tickets” in pink icing. A blue-and-yellow fence protected the grinding metal machine that whirled the people in their airborne seats.
Aliya screamed. Everything froze. People turned, and stared at her.
“I’m sorry,” she squeaked.
Not answering, they just advanced.
The ticket-collector rubbed her hands gleefully that night. Another for my carnival, she cackled.
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Thanks, always, to our beloved Fairy Blog-Mother and Muse, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting Friday Fictioneers, our weekly favorite writing soirees, and thanks to Ted Strutz for his inspiring photo-prompt!
Tags: a new fairy tale, captive, carnival, Jonathan Swift, Lilliputian, Transformations
Oct 1, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Genre: Sci-fi/fantasy
Word Count: 100 words of text exactly
Mouse-Trap
©October 1st, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
The mouse sat innocently upon the desktop.
There was toast with peanut butter, left there by the human who’d been working at her computer. The mouse just wanted a little nibble. There’d be no harm done, would there? After all, he came every night to clean up after the human went to bed.
The computer, still on, glowed warningly at the mouse, whirring a little.
A small zap crackled in the air.
The mouse was gone.
In its place, stood another mouse. And it was NOT innocent. In the carnage that followed, the computer died.
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With thanks to our Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting Friday Fictioneers diligently and lovingly every week, and inspiring all of us to keep a date with our Muse! Also, thanks to Marie Gail Stafford for her photograph which has drawn so many different reactions and stories from so many of us!
Tags: 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt, computer mouse story, Fantasy, mouse-traps
Sep 25, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
PHOTO PROMPT © The Reclining Gentleman
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words of body text exactly
The Dividing Line
©September25th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Some people teeter on the brink of madness; others straddle it; still others go right over the edge.
Fourteen-year old Jonah was half-way over that edge, eyes flashing blue fire, the fiery madness of a fanatic who’s found God.
His mother had left home, his father was catatonic, and his sister plied the oldest of trades.
He’d stand every day, arms akimbo, haloed in sunset gold, and laugh. Someone reported him, but the police weren’t interested — they had other things occupying their attention in Jonah’s drug-addled neighborhood.
Jonah was still laughing that day, when the water arose to meet him.
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Thanks, as always, to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, our brilliant Writer-in-Residence and Fairy Blog-Mother, and also to the mysterious Reclining Gentleman for the evocative photo-prompt.
Tags: 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt, bridge between sanity and madness, on the brink of madness
Sep 16, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Photograph ©David Stewart
Genre: Realistic Magical Fiction
Word Count: 100 words of text exactly
Gateway
©September 16th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
I remember that gate. I was eight when I last saw it.
Everyone told me not to go near that compound. Did I listen?
One day, swinging on that gate, loving its rusty groan, I fell into the compound. A chasm opened.
Now, here I am thirty years later. I head to where my home used to be. A curtain flicks aside. A familiar-looking woman comes out.
“It is I,” I tell her. “Raman.”
Her eyes fill with tears. “Where …?”
I remember that gateway to the stars. I remember when I was thrown off their world. I am heart-broken, silent.
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Thanks, as always to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, our Fairy Blog-Mother, for hosting Friday Fictioneers, an online writing community that posts 100-word story responses to photo-prompts which are posted every Wednesday (yes), and thanks to David Stewart, for that evocative photo-prompt!
Sep 9, 2015 Friday Fictioneers, Original Short Story
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words
Charon-Me
©September 9th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
The canoe was beautiful — cedar jointed together snug and tight, it curved gracefully like a swan that could slice the waters.
Inhaling deeply, letting the scent of the wood drift into my bones, ignoring the cancerous pain in them (my everyday reality), I pushed the canoe into my beloved glacial lake which mirrored the blue bowl of sky above, finely hammered into hot blue steel.
I did not wear my life-vest. I could not swim.
I rowed energetically to the middle of the lake, and looked down. Something swirling in the ninety-foot depths invited me in.
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Thanks, as always to our Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields for hosting Friday Fictioneers, and to Jennifer Pendergast, for that lovely photo-prompt!
Sep 2, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words
Glimpse
©September 2nd, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
All of life was mirrored in those bay windows. The sky went about its business, pink and gold, to blue, sometimes storm-gray, back to pink and gold, to deep blue to black, back to pink and gold. Clouds played out their drama occasionally. Stars blinked in and out of existence.
Another window saw itself reflected in those windows.
Their owners glimpsed each other.
All the desire in the world converged at the intersection of their glance. A universe of possibility unfolded before them. They glimpsed happiness, mad ecstasy, union.
Then, they went back to their wives.
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Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields (our Fairy Blog-Mother) for hosting Friday Fictioneers, and for the photo-prompt!
Tags: #Romance, 100-word original short story based on a photo prompt, forbidden love, realistic fiction
Sep 2, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words exactly (text)
Breaking Free
©September 1st, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
With a blend of euphoria, weariness, and anger, she shut her classroom door for the last time.
She’d spent years teaching, engaging and inspiring. Many students had matched it with hard work, creativity, brilliance. She tried to obliterate memories of tears she’d shed in quiet, to forget how some colleagues had susurrated behind her back, and to erase the sense that no matter what she did, she would never belong.
As she walked out, the lockers turned blank faces towards her. No one saw her jubilantly made rude hand-gesture.
Emerging into the bright July sunlight, she laughed.
She was free!
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Thanks, as always, to Rochelle WIsoff-Fields (whom I have nicknamed our Fairy Blog-Mother) for hosting Friday Fictioneers, a community of writers from around the world who await the photo-prompts she puts up on Wednesdays, and respond with brilliant stories. Thanks to Claire Fuller for this thought-provoking photograph prompt!
Rochelle, I made it! I was away this past week, and finally got to this past week’s prompt tonight. Now, tomorrow, we’ll have the new one! Can’t wait!
Aug 20, 2015 Friday Fictioneers
Photo-Prompt: ©C.E. Ayr
Word Count: 100 words (sans title, name, etc.)
Genre: Realistic Fiction
A Different Kind of Air
©August 20th, 2015
By Vijaya Sundaram
Living in a concrete jungle is not for the weak. Rage makes you strong. You forget sadness.
So, when the demolition-men gutted our neighborhood, we snapped and organized ourselves. Walking the streets in our skins spelled an early death, anyway. What did it matter what we did?
Today mattered. We were armed, ready. We’d robbed the local store for our supplies, ’cause we were badass.
“Let’s git to work!” yelled Duane.
And we did. A seascape, with killer whales swarming into our city, was born in demolition dust.
When we were done, we breathed a new kind of air.
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Tags: Art, Inner City, Rebellion