Welcome back to the home of #ThursThreads. Wow. Year 11. Holy smokes! Y’all kept with me past a decade. I’m astounded.
Today is Thursday and that means it’s time to start flashing, like we have for the past 11 years. I had no idea when I started it would keep going! This is Week 579 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 social media handle or email in the post (so it’s easy to find 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 579:
Renaissance Woman, Newfie mom, and Romance Author, Silver James.
And now your #ThursThreads Challenge, tying tales together.
The Prompt:
“How did you see her?”
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!
What Carol Didn’t See
After his detour to the old mining town of Cumberland, Danny headed down island full of disparate thoughts about his interview with Carol Schofield. On the surface, she was certain that she’d seen her parent’s neighbour strike his child in what seemed an aggressive and unprovoked manner.
She had not garnished it with any excessive outrage but acknowledged that she had not seen what event, if there was one, that precipitated the parental outburst.
There was usually some behaviour that a parent felt warranted corporal punishment.
Carol saw what she saw. What Carol didn’t see was massive.
In his thirteen years as a private investigator, Danny had picked up a number of notions about truth and its opposites.
Some of those opposites were lies.
Even within that category, lies that were clearly lies might not be.
He had asked Carol about the wife of her parent’s neighbour.
June.
His client.
“How did you see her? I mean when you told her what you had seen?”
Carol had then gotten quite wistful. June was a pretty woman, older, with children, living the sort of life Carol fantasized she wanted. And yet the price of that life, the perfect fifties family dream, came with a risk.
A possibly violent spouse.
“I liked her,” Carol had said. “But I wondered if I could balance love and hate the way she seemed to.”
And Danny thought, what Carol ultimately could never see was someone elses uncensored life in the raw.
.
250 WIP
@billmelaterplea
The tram clattered past their table, sparks showering from the pantograph above. A tang of ozone followed it, souring the broth in his mouth, making it taste of electricity. He regretted choosing to eat here; it was always more popular with the tourists in the summer months, usually requiring that you book well in advance. He’d thought he’d been lucky until the maître d’ had shown them outside.
George was already studying the clouds above, thinking it might rain. If they both finished their meal quickly, they could find somewhere else to spend the rest of their afternoon. Margaret already looked grey from the cold; there’d be little chance of romance if her mood followed that of the temperature outside.
They were in the in-between phase of their courting. A simple picnic would no longer suffice; they had to dine well and be seen doing it. He was running out of ideas to match the capabilities of his finances.
Margaret had finished her soup. She was still wearing her gloves and had replaced her scarf already.
The prospects were looking grim for them both.
“I saw your mother,” she said, her tone alarmingly neutral. “She asked why we’ve not been to visit. It’s been more than a month since we first met.”
George’s heart sank, the thought of his parents as sobering as a shower of ice water. “How did you see her?” he asked, knowing he’d have to give them a call. “You didn’t make any promises, did you?”
250 words – twothirdzrasta.blogspot.com
Mom invited me over for supper the other night and in the middle of loading the dishwasher, she asked me a weird question.
“When did Destiny get her wings?”
Destiny is the horse I ride for my secret night job.
“Say that again?”
“Destiny. When did she earn her wings.”
“Mom, horses can’t fly!”
The dishwasher door slams shut and my butt meets a rather unforgiving kitchen chair.
“How long have you worked for him?”
“How did you see her?” I ask.
If she knows Horace, she’s not going to take any bullshit from me.
“With age comes middle of the night bathroom trips. I saw her landing outside the barn the other night.”
Sighing, I run my hand over my long ponytail. “Last year.”
I have a question for her, but she anticipates it.
“I worked for Horace about twenty years ago. Your dad and me were in debt from college and we had three kids. Hell of a deal, right? Make the right amount of money to get out of debt in one year. How I kept that from your dad is some Horace voodoo magic. What did you pay off?”
“The farm.”
Dad had a couple payments left, but competition from corporate ag cut into our profits.
“Well. When your contract is up, you have to be firm. Trust me. Be firm and make sure you get out. Got me?”
She walks away. That definitely ranks as one of the most unusual conversations we’ve ever had.
@Aightball
249 words
“Heyyy! This isn’t what I ordered.”
Tristan groaned, much like the other two in their party did. “Forget it, Vale. I think most of our orders are wrong anyways.”
Cara snorted. “The curse of being a Black Widow.”
The black-haired witch with an ill temper was silenced by a look from Iris. “Hush. We are here for discovering what happened to Kailyn, not the food.”
“So, why are we in a run-down tavern then?” Tristan asked.
“It was the only place this Guarda person would meet. Something about no prying eyes here.”
“No prying eyes, huh?” Vale muttered as he looked around the dimly light, dingy space. Every time one of them looked up there was another haggard patron averting their gaze. Some of whom didn’t try to be subtle.
Iris sighed and impatiently looked toward the door, fiddling with her cracked mug. Just where was this person anyways? And could they trust him?</i?
Their food was edible at best and even Vale didn’t finish his mead when he found something questionable floating within, but finally a hooded figure approached their table—though not from the door. The group tensed.
“Relax.” He spoke low despite the drunken guffawing from a corner. “I am a friend, not foe. Now how-“
“Did you see her?” Iris blurted, a desperateness to her tone. “I mean, do you know where she is, how she is?”
Silence hung heavy momentarily. “I know, and there’s nothing any of you will be able to do about it.”
~*~*~*~*~
250 #WiP words
@DaelynMorgana / Website: https://dmorgana.wordpress.com
The crowd poured out of the exit, a mass of heat and humanity and noise. Some people in the waiting area pressed phones to their ears, trying to hear and be heard over the cacophony. Some waved their hands wildly and yelled, as if any one voice could be discerned from the others. I just waited.
After a count of twenty, I leaned close to Tommy’s ear. “Found her!”
“What! Where?”
I pointed. Tommy held his hand over his eyes as if he was shielding them from an invisible sun and stared. The quizzical look never left his face.
I just waited. He’d find her, eventually.
The flow of the crowd began to decrease as the building became emptier, and as people began to disperse, Tommy finally saw her. “There she is!”
“Yup.” I started walking in her direction. Tommy followed at my heels.
“How did you see her? She’s like five foot two!”
“I’ve been looking for her in crowds my whole life. It’s kind of like how artists talk about negative space. I look for where the people aren’t, and there she is.”
*Dear, stop messing with the poor boy.* Her thought was clear in my head, as it was no matter how far apart we were or how many other people were around.
*But it’s so much fun!*
*You are going to have to tell him sometime, you know. Before the Becoming.*
*Yes, Dear. Of course, that’s not for another thousand years.*
*Umm, about that.*
248 words
@drmag00
Lieutenant Sora’s companions were far more capable than anticipated. Just not enough to compensate for his, so far, accurate estimate of their enemy’s strength.
If all else failed, he would ensure Tenko survived to continue her quest. As admirable as her desire to save the captured priests was, Sora found it ill-considered to risk their small party for so few elves when the future of their entire civilization was at stake.
Tenko’s friend, Mana, was improperly equipped for entering the Tigers’ Forest. And yet, his effortless application of both martial and magical skill suggested that the dandy had never worked for or at anything in his life.
After surviving an enemy ambush by luck as much as anything, they had agreed that Arashiko, their fourth, should scout farther ahead. She had left in the direction indicated by interrogation of their surviving assailants nearly an hour ago.
Sora would have been more comfortable with this before starting to doubt whether the archer really was a hunter.
“Okay!” Arashiko appeared at the center of their party. “There’s a tigerling village ahead. They’ve got thirty priests in a wooden cage against a sheer rock face. I saw fifty enemy fighters and I’d estimate that many more again sleeping and away from the village each.”
Sora frowned.
“You would need to get dangerously close to get such precise numbers in this forest. How did you see?”
Her eyes gleamed mischievously as she twirled a keyring around her finger.
“I got dangerously close.”
248 Tale of Tenko words
@davidaludwig on Bluesky
The Return of the Beast
“Where did she go?” Fred asked, his chin and jaws still covered in shaving foam.
“I peered out the window to see her plunge sixty feet into the water with a massive splash.”
“How did she do that?”
“I don’t know how.”
“Did you see her jump?” Fred asked.
“I only saw her fall.” Vernon shrugged.
The two men stood on the balcony peering into the sea below.
The men looked up at the balcony above from where their neighbor had fallen, and then back down into the water.
“That’s some drop. Is the creature back, do you think?” The two men exchanged glances as they heard a rumble behind them.
The growl sounded unearthly and unnatural, like a stick being run down a length of sheet metal, striking off the corrugations before it slowed to a halt.
The men spun to see the beast standing in their living room, ready to spring at them. Between its lips, a recognizable cat’s tail protruded. The beast slurped the tail into its mouth like spaghetti.
“Wasn’t that Mister Boots, from upstairs?” Vernon asked.
The beast’s lips spread across its face, exposing ghastly, razor sharp teeth the colour of flint. Not a smile as such, but a snarl, as it sank its jaws into Fred’s shoulder to take a chunk of flesh.
From the sea below, their spluttering neighbor Tanya tread the water and watched as the two men were eviscerated in their condominium.
241 words @ragtaggiggagon
“You don’t have to hide in the bushes. It’s rude.”
The rattling leaves stopped as the person froze.
“What?” Corlith raised an eyebrow. “Who are you talking to? Did you hit your head or something?”
Ambrose met her gaze then his head whipped to the side as the small gorgon stepped into view.
“By Epona, that’s a gorgon!” He rose to his feet and pulled out his bow in one smooth move.
The little gorgon shrank back into the darkness, her hair hissing like a punctured bicycle tire. Roxanne rose and held her hands out.
“Whoa, there, big guy. Just chill a moment. I don’t think she means us harm, but killing her won’t get us any answers. Put the bow away!”
“Roxanne, that’s a gorgon. They can turn you to stone with just one look.” Corlith blanched white and dropped his gaze to the girl’s feet as he drew his dagger. “Begone! We have nothing you want, beast!”
Roxanne swallowed against the stories she knew about gorgons—Medusa in particular—and shifted closer to the girl without turning her back.
“Everyone just calm down. We don’t know what she wants.” She glanced at the girl’s feet as well. “I’m Corporal Roxanne Bailey, U.S. Army. Can you identify yourself?”
“This is ridiculous.” Ambrose snarled. “How did you see her when she’s camouflaged herself to sneak up on us?”
“I didn’t see her, I heard her. And she’s probably more afraid of us than you are of her.”
250 ineligible #Sirens words
@siobhanmuir.bsky.social
“Pssst,” came a young voice from a nearby stall.
Davey scratched his head but sidled up to the door to peek in. The girl hiding inside placed her finger over her lips and gestured him inside. With a shrug, he obeyed.
Alera probably couldn’t kill him.
“Mama Cat hid her kittens in the stable. I’m going to bond one!” She half-shouted, though her voice sounded hushed. The kid was trying.
“Yeah? How did you see her?” he asked, checking the dark nooks himself. However, fenitals were renowned for their elusiveness. He’d be shocked if the nine-year-old kid could track one preparing to give birth.
“I shifted, used my nose!” A pout formed on her lips after her bold statement. “But the stronger smells in here confused me.”
Closing his eyes, Davey extended his Gift outward. A few moments later, he sensed Mama tending her six kittens in a corner stall. Although tired, she seemed healthy, as did her babies.
“I’ve got some chores to round up,” he hedged. “And I bet everyone is wondering where you’re off to. How about you come back tomorrow after class and we’ll find them together?”
For just a moment, her eyes watered and nose wrinkled like she might cry. Then she sucked it all back in—the sun evaporating water from a puddle—and smiled.
“See you tomorrow, Davey!”
Shaking his head, he watched her skip outside. Then he went to find food for Mama. The old girl was gonna need it.
(250)(I counted in a text message so might have fewer but not more) thia.mackin@gmail.com
Seeing in Negative
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Paranormal Investigations 101. I’m Dr Todd, and I’ll be your instructor. Our goal here is to discover and enhance your natural skills. Once the evaluation is finished, you will be assigned a training cadre. Any questions?”
Andre’s hand was already up.
“Yes, Mr. Phelps?”
“Uh, sir– I wanted to ask about,” he paused then nodded towards the back of the room.
Dr. Todd smiled.
“She’s just auditing this class.”
Andre’s expression was perplexed, but the instructor just began handing out equipment and lab manuals as if nothing had passed between the two of them.
The instructor’s voice had an almost hypnotic effect on the class, but Andre kept turning and looking back at the woman in the back of the room. A woman who was not there. She had never been there, but Andre was all too aware of her presence.
The session turned into a series of 20-minute lectures, a 30-minute test, and a ten-minute break, by the time the day had finished the class was more than ready to head home. As the students filed out, Dr. Todd stopped Andre.
“Mr. Phelps, a moment please.”
“Sir?
“One question. How did you see her?”
The rest of the class hovered around the door, curious to hear his answer.
“I didn’t– I saw an absence around her there was no dust, no light, no shadow. Plus, she was wearing Lilly of the Valley.”
238 Words (not including title)
@mishmhem
#ThursThreads Week 579 is now CLOSED. Thanks to everyone who wrote this week and I hope to catch you next week.