Welcome back to the home of Paranormal & Dauntless Romance. Today is Thursday and that means it’s time to start flashing. We’re at the beginning of our ninth year of weekly prompts. It’s amazing we’ve gone this long! This is Week 489 of #ThursThreads, the challenge that ties tales together. Want to keep up each week? Check out the #ThursThreads #flashfiction group on Facebook and the Group on MeWe.
Need the rules? Read on.
Here’s how it works:
- The prompt is a line from the previous week’s winning tale.
- The prompt can appear ANYWHERE in your story and is included in your word count.
- The prompt must be used as is. It can be split, but no intervening words can be inserted or tenses changed.
Rules to the Game:
- This is a Flash Fiction challenge, which means your story must be a minimum of 100 words, maximum of 250.
- The story must be new writing, not a snippet from something published elsewhere with the prompt added.
- Incorporate the prompt anywhere into your story (included in your word count).
- Post your story in the comments section of this post
- Include your word count in the post (or be excluded from judging)
- Include your Twitter handle or email in the post (so we don’t have to look for you)
- The challenge is open 7 AM to 8 PM Mountain Time
- The winner will be announced on Friday, depending on how early the judge gets up.
How it benefits you:
- You get a nifty cool badge to display on your blog or site (because we’re all about promotion – you know you are!)
- You get instant recognition of your writing prowess on this blog!
- Your writing colleagues shall announce and proclaim your greatness on Facebook, Twitter, MeWe, and Google Plus, etc.
Our Judge for Week 489:
Scientist, Dad, and flash fiction author, Eric Martell.
And now your #ThursThreads Challenge, tying tales together.
The Prompt:
“Maybe word got out.”
All stories written herein are the property (both intellectual and physical) of the authors. Comments do not represent the views of the host and the host reserves the right to remove any content. Now, away with you, Flash Fiction Fanatics, and show us your #ThursThreads. Good luck!
Franks and other Wieners
Frank Luxton turned out to be the type who left breadcrumbs everywhere he traveled. He was a very social fellow. My initial feelings were that I could easily track him down, determine what scams he had going, whether he was playing with a complete monopoly game, or whether he needed to go directly to jail and not pass GO. Solly would be waiting at GO with a few GO goons no doubt.
After a few missed starts, I ended up at Grace’s Diner down on Scotia Rd.
I ordered coffee, a slice of Grace’s ‘Fabulous Pineapple Pie’ and kanoodled the waitress with my just brushed pearlies. “Nice pie. ”
“The bosses recipe. Top secret in case you were angling for it.”
“Nah, “ I rebutted. “Happy to eat the pie of others. Pay for it of course.”
“Good. Another slice?”
She could tell I wasn’t a one slice guy. “You betcha,” I said, showing her my teeth, tongue cleaned of every crumb.
“Coming right up, “ she said, twirled around, scooped a slice on a clean plate and it was in front of me in Olympic pie-serving time.
“Got a minute,“ I said. I pulled out the picture of Frank that Solly had given me. “Know this guy? My friend Frank.”
She nodded, said, “Yeah. Frankie. Hasn’t been here in awhile. Maybe word got out that Solly was after him.”
“Oh, you know?”
“Yeah, the whole Bowery knows.”
Rats, I thought. Frank’s gone to ground.
249 wip
@billmelaterplea
I stood around the dessert table at our fiftieth reunion wondering where the time had gone.
“Looking for John?” asked Melanie my high school rival.
“He’s not coming, maybe word got out you’d be here,” Melanie sniped.
I turned to walk away from her and saw him. The man’s smile lit his face his eyes twinkled and although his hair had thinned and grown sparse and gray, I couldn’t believe it had been fifty years since I’d seen John; for, I’d have known him anywhere.
“Helena.”
“John,” I replied.
“How have you been?”
“Like you cared,” I answered.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “I wish I could have reached out to you sooner.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I was broken. First my parents died. then my number came up and I was sent to Vietnam,” he explained.
“I looked. I couldn’t find you.”
“.I took a desk job working for the VA in Washington; but I have just retired, when I received this reunion invitation.”
“Did you marry?”
“No, did you?”
“No, but I had a son. He’s forty-nine.”
“I have a son?”
“He’s standing across the room. Johnny’s waiting to meet you.”
Johnny and John have a lot of catching up to do and so do we. I’ve forgiven John. He has fifty years of not being there for either of us; but he’s working hard to make it up. We’ll see what tomorrow will bring us; but as for my other classmates, I wish them joy.
246 Words
@SweetSheil
Maura watched her boss pace around his office. His face was a mottled red and he flailed his arms as he charged from his desk to the window to the door and back to his desk. She pretended she wasn’t intimidated and actually huddling in the far corner. Every other word he uttered was a curse. She glanced toward the police detective who stood in the middle of the emotional whirlpool.
“How the fucking hell did all those raids go down the damn drain?”
The detective wisely remained silent, not meeting Alex’s eyes. It was never smart to piss off the District Attorney. Alex glared at her. “Cat got your tongue too?”
Her mouth moved before her brain caught up. “Maybe word got out.”
“Ya think?”
Maura flinched at the level and tone of his voice but she stood her ground—mostly—as he stormed across the office and stopped directly in front of her. “Yeah, Maura, I think. I think half the fuckin’ cops in this town are on the mob’s payroll. And I’m startin’ to wonder of anyone on my staff is involved.”
His meaning was clear. And that got her ire up. She rocked up on her toes and leaned forward, taking back the personal space he’d stolen from her. “Are you accusing me?”
He jerked back and took several steps away. Raising his hands in a placating gesture, he attempted to soothe her. “No, no. Of course, not.”
Yeah, right. Time to update her resume.
****
249 Boston Mob Wolves WIP words
@SilverJames_
“Wake up, Jane.”
Gia’s hologram roused me from a disturbing dream. Only it was more than a dream. A memory of standing on the ledge of a ninety story building, guilt driving me to do the unthinkable. Guilt and a drug induced desire to jump.
“I didn’t kill anybody, Gia. I was framed.”
“Do you remember something, Jane?”
“No. The therapist said the gaps in my memory are constructed in a way that I may never regain those memories. But I know I’m not capable of murder.”
Apex Technologies was behind it. Jeremy, CEO of Apex, and my ex-lover, caught me hacking into Apex’s main computer. He had the drug cartel abduct me and tie me up in their warehouse. The drugs caused the gaps in my memory.
Jeremy expected me to submit to his control. And to his depravities. But I defied him. I escaped from the cartel somehow and joined the resistance. The pro-democracy resistance. We were fighting Big Tech to take back our freedom.
It wasn’t easy living in the 23rd century.
“He won’t stop looking for you, Jane.” Gia’s hologram was always a sobering voice in my head.
“Maybe.” Word got out that I was in the city and it was only a matter of time before Jeremy heard that I was here. “When are you coming back, Gia? I need you. In the flesh.” Holograms were fine up to a point. But I needed her here with me.
I needed to stop Jeremy.
Catherine Verdier
@CatheVerdier
250 Words (from my dystopian scifi thriller WIP)
Why would anyone call the Whitmores and mention the Strattons? Sure, they ran in the same circles, or did, but after I “died” and Paul left, there wasn’t anything more to connect them. At least, I didn’t know about anything.
I swallowed against irrational fear. “Why is that a big deal? Isn’t your mom connected to the Strattons in some way? They used to be friends back in the day.”
He nodded slowly. “Yeah, but he wouldn’t identify himself and he didn’t know Dad’s cell phone number. Seems hinky to me. Especially with the timing.”
I frowned. “What timing?”
“The timing of you being named in a police report after finding the bodies in New Mexico.”
My body grew impossibly tighter, but I kept my voice level. “Why would a call to your dad from someone claiming to be friends with him and the Strattons have anything to do with me?”
“You don’t find the timing really coincidental?” He raised an eyebrow.
I shook my head. “There’s nothing to connect Aeryn Three Lines to your family or the Strattons in any way.”
“Maybe word got out somehow that the Aeryn Three Lines from the police report is the same Aeryn Dreyfuss Stratton who died over twenty-five years ago.”
I shook my head. “I don’t even look the same. My license has a pic from when I’d dyed my hair crimson red, I used a fake name, and I’ve been dead for decades. No one should’ve made the connection.”
248 ineligible #ConcreteAngelsMC words
@SiobhanMuir
Myra and Dalton cuddled in the tower window watching evening shadows stretch over the town below.
Myra shivered excitedly, “It’s almost time, what do you think lives here?”
“Or Un… lives here.” Dalton’s grin only faltered a moment while he completed his thought.
“Hola! Mi amigo y amiga!” Zorro wafted up the tower stairs. “I been looking for you!”
“Hey, Z! What’s good?”
“I got beers, I got chips,” Z presented one hand then the other before hooking his cargo vest with a thumb. “I got smokes. Main spread’s in that sweet sitting room on the ground level. My back, you know?”
Dalton sat up behind Myra, “You need a hand?”
“Hey, yeah! There’s still stuff in the van. Oh! And Myra, Gavin was asking for you.”
Dalton and Z went down for the front door and Myra to the library. Gavin was on a rolling ladder with heavy books in his arms and reaching for another when he noticed Myra.
“Oh, Myra! I found a word I didn’t understand that I was wondering if you could translate.”
Gavin tumbled from the ladder in a hardback shower that made Myra wince.
“Maybe…”
“Word got out,” Gavin gaped dumbly at the open tome atop the pile. He shook his head vigorously, replaced his glasses, then rose from the book pile with the open tome. “It was right here! Alone center page!”
The page was blank now. Myra checked the book’s spine.
“This is the house’s history; I think you’re onto something!”
250 Menagerie words
@DavidALudwig
“Come in,” I said, offering him a smile. It would be the last one he’d see. He’d been waiting for this day for over a year, refusing any offers of leniency. It was unusual for a killer to choose to die; most the men on the row preferred to linger, hoping their appeals would be granted. And while they were waiting, they’d relish the sport, baiting the relatives of their victims and the police, eking out the remainder of their sentences slipping out half-truths and lies.
Haggerty was a cool one. He’d shown no interest in head games, his behaviour more that of one of the hopefuls who claimed to be innocent. His removal from the general population was a matter of routine, not for their protection.
He was a spent force, it seemed. Either that or there was no one here who could satisfy his requirements.
“You’re very quiet,” I went on. “I’d have thought you’d be happy. I know you’ve just had chicken, fries and a quart of root beer. And a pack of cigarettes too – not that you got the time to finish them.”
But nothing. Not even a glimmer of a reaction. I’d hoped to be able to reach him: break through his barriers to release the rage that compelled him.
I tried again. I pressed the button to open the window of the viewing gallery.
“Well, look at that,” I said. “You’ve got an audience. Maybe word got out that you were dying today.”
250 words – twothirdsrasta.blogspot.com
#ThursThreads Week 489 is now CLOSED. Thanks to everyone who wrote this week. We won’t be here next week in observance of the Thanksgiving holiday.