Welcome back to the home of #ThursThreads for Week 646. Year 12! What a fantastic testament to the writing community. Y’all rock!
Today is Thursday and that means it’s time to start flashing on #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 we easily notify you)
- The challenge is open 7 AM to 8 PM Mountain Time US.
- 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, Bluesky, MeWe, and Mastodon, etc.
Our Judge for Week 646:
Desk Jockey by Day, Writer by Night, Pecking her way through life, M.L. Gammella.
And now your #ThursThreads Challenge, tying tales together.
The Prompt:
“I took the long way home.”
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!
It had been an awful day. I got chewed out by the boss for making one mistake. “We can’t afford to make mistakes!” Traffic getting to work had been pure hell, bad enough I was almost late though I always left home early to get to work. I’d seen three sets of emergency vehicle lights, and caught every light on the trip red. It turned a 15-minute drive into half an hour.
Then there was the news. Another plane crash, with more people dead, and our idiot of a president blaming it on DEI, and “non-white people”. I don’t know what else he and his minions did that day. It all just kind of blurred together and left me feeling numb.
I needed to breathe.
That night, I took the long way home from work. I went to one of the last bookstores anywhere and picked up and looked at a million books. I actually bought one. Then, I treated myself to dinner, if you can call fast food dinner. But at least I didn’t have to make it. And I didn’t have anything to clean up when I was done.
I drove. Sure, gas was expensive right then. But I needed out. I needed to breathe. I drove a big loop around the metro area. Managed to take two hours and burn 100 miles. It was late when I got home. But I felt better, and I didn’t care what our idiot did that day.
249 Words (Per Google Write)
@mysoulstears.bsky.social
Winter Night Blues
I’d been missing human companionship for about a week. Snow was so heavy that all the road machinery in town had been doing double and triple duty and still the snow kept falling like there was no end to it, like it would never end, and we’d all get buried and they wouldn’t find us for a millennium.
The family had made a trip over the mountain a few days earlier to visit the in-laws and had gotten held up by the suddenness of the storm.
Yup, I was bushed and finally decided to trudge into town even if it killed me. Haggerty’s Tavern was my usual watering hole, and I craved some of that escapism.
And I made it. Took a couple of hours of deep snow walking.
Can’t say Haggertys was doing a landslide business. Still, there was a dozen of us, mostly folks I knew and a singer, Buddy something or other and he was pounding out some mournful music that suited me just fine.
One song in particular choked me up. It went like this:
Darling. I’ve been missing you so much,
Your smile and just the way you look, your touch.
You went away without saying a word
flew skyward like the saddest ever bird.
Darling, I’ve been looking everywhere
city streets and country roads I’ve roamed
but winters settling in most everywhere,
snow deeper than my love could ever be.
I guess I took the long way home.
247 words
@billmelaterplea
I yanked my arm away. “Go find someone else.”
He got this glazed look on his face and his jaw grew slack before he nodded dumbly, spun around, and staggered off toward the Clubhouse.
I blinked. What the hell had just happened?
Motion back toward the cabins made me focus on them and I recognized Anubis coming for me. I quickly headed for the gate and made eye contact with the Asian woman. Her eyes opened wider in surprise before she inclined her head and opened the gate without a word. I nodded and sailed on through before Anubis could reach us. She closed the gate behind me and I couldn’t help the smirk curling my lips.
I quickly swallowed it as I passed through the group of people hanging around out front, either hoping to get in or engaged in nookie already. Some eyed me curiously, but my costume didn’t matter as long as I made it to my car.
Thank goodness I’d stashed the keys under the rear driver-side fender because it made it so easy to grab and unlock the door. I was in the driver’s seat with the ignition on by the time Anubis made it out the gates. I met his gaze with my own stoic stare and threw the vehicle in gear.
He didn’t bother to chase me, but the look on his face was one of pure frustration.
Back atcha, buddy.
I took the long way home to be sure no one followed.
250 ineligible #ConcreteAngelsMC words
@siobhanmuir.bsky.social
Lara sat in the corner of the coffee shop, eyes closed, hands wrapped around the chill of her iced mocha. The music on the sound system cushioned the hum of conversations occurring around her. She sat up as familiar piano chords followed by the plaintiff harmonica tune penetrated her thoughts.
She hummed along until the song came to the part about settling down and the line Who’s to blame if you’re not around? rang true. “Yeah, she muttered. “I took the long way home.”
“But you did come home, solnishko.”
She looked up—and up and up—at the deep voice calling her sunshine in Russian. She always seemed to forget how very tall Misha had gotten in the years she’d been gone. “I’m not here to stay.”
He claimed the chair across from her. “You have never been able to lie to me. Why do you try now?”
Sighing, she leaned back against the padded bench. “Go away, Misha.”
His affable smile did not reach his eyes nor did it fool her. “Fine.” She slipped her purse strap over her shoulder and stood. “Then I’ll leave.”
She didn’t make it even a step before his hand wrapped around her forearm, not hard enough to bruise but with a gentle grip she knew she couldn’t break.
“Please.” Not a question nor an order, just a soft word from between lips that drew her eyes and made her wet her own. “We need to talk, Lara.”
Those words never boded well.
****
249 Moonstruck Mafia Russians WIP words
Silver James silverjames.com
*With a nod to Supertramp for borrowing their lyrics…
Oops. I miscounted. Make that 250 words. My bad. 😆
I joined her at the bow. Sailing into an adversarial wind, her hair flowed like darkness itself out behind her. She was quiet. Even for her.
I joined her in silently studying a horizon that she had seen untold times before. I could ask her thoughts. Anyone else, I would simply read them. Instead, I waited.
“I took the long way home,” she observed.
I needed to play this carefully.
“Why do you suppose you did that?”
The air was heavy with considered silence.
“I don’t think I was ready to do what must be done.”
“And are you now?”
“I have to be.”
“We could turn back. Call it off.”
“Going through with it is the least bad choice I have.”
She turned with a world-weary sigh, our invasion fleet stretched out behind us.
135 words
@davidaludwig.bsky.social
He cleared every room, switching on every light to check she wasn’t laying somewhere inside. When he was done, he checked his phone, again.
His finger had hit dial before he realised. His friend picked up almost instantly. “It’s okay they’re both still at the university.”
“What about Elena?” He moved back through her house, exited the front door and starting searching the street.
“She’s not there? She left ages ago.”
The road was quiet, only one car was moving. A few lights were on in houses but they were drowned out by the street lights. A chill wrapped round him but it wasn’t to do with the cold. Why had he been so harsh to her again? She’d just been trying to help as always but he’d been a callous jerk.
He suddenly became aware that Kae had been talking. “What?”
“Do you want me to come to you?”
“No, stay with them until Lamont gives us the all-clear; someone might still turn up.” His head snapped round as he spotted a figure moving at the end of the path. “She’s here.” The relief nearly took out his legs.
“Why are you lurking outside my house?”
“Where the hell have you been?” He couldn’t stop himself from snapping, the worry was colouring his tone.
She shrugged, looking weary, “I took the long way home. Couldn’t yelling at me some more wait ‘til tomorrow?”
He pushed open her door and beckoned her inside. “I need you to trust me.”
249 words @Lexikonical
Melinda shifted the backpack over her shoulder. She had things to do and the last of them was to bring food to her cousin who could get his own food. But it seemed that her mother liked to give out food to the guy not working, by choice, while Mel had to work three jobs just to make rent and utilities. If she went over for dinner, she was expected to bring something.
She didn’t care for her family. They were stuck into the mentality that a son was needed to carry on the line. She wasn’t going to get married or have kids. Men were a pain in the ass and more trouble then they were worth. Half of them played the ‘nice guy’ game when they thought they might get something out of it. She took the late bus because she knew the food would be cold by the time she got to his place.
Petty? Definitely.
She could do petty for a long time. With zero shame. She was glad to turn her phone on silent and claim it was out of a charge if her mom called to bitch at her. A glance up and she took the stairs up into the nice stone building that looked like it was at least twice what she paid for her dump and knocked on the door.He pulled it open in a huff.
“You’re late.”
“I took the long way home.” She shrugged. “Sorry.” So not sorry.
249 words
@solimond (Bluesky/Twitter)
generational trauma ripped the family fabric of centuries and left everyone frayed at the edges, stained and wrinkled.
our last night together Dad, four red dots on his arm and Ma, meat fork in hand and Randy yapping and yapping and 𝑺𝒉𝒖𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒇𝒖𝒄𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒅𝒐𝒈 𝒖𝒑! and 𝑯𝒆’𝒔 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒅𝒐𝒈! and a broken dish and 𝑨𝒔𝒔𝒉𝒐𝒍𝒆!
sister with Mom in the city and me with Dad and Randy across nine state lines before the Internet when 𝑵𝒐 𝒍𝒐𝒏𝒈-𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒄𝒂𝒍𝒍𝒔! because 𝑾𝒆’𝒓𝒆 𝒃𝒓𝒐𝒌𝒆!
who cares about a sister anyway when you’re twelve or whatever so that’s how someone fades and physical distance becomes emotional distance and you have a sister but don’t.
everyone knew I was fucked, sent South with the angry man and Ma was the cool one who let you breathe and my sister was lucky which wasn’t true because mostly fast food dinners and Ma made mistakes and I met kids who kind of cared about school or at least their parents did so I could see what normal looked liked and sis met boys who liked sex and substances.
I’m still a year older, but she looks a hundred now with three young kids with one dad in prison, one dead and she only has six teeth and half of her left leg because fuck crack and heroin.
triple bypass last night and she woke up, saw me, 𝒀𝒐𝒖 𝒎𝒂𝒅𝒆 𝒊𝒕! and I broke into a million pieces and told her, 𝑰 𝒕𝒐𝒐𝒌 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒍𝒐𝒏𝒈 𝒘𝒂𝒚 𝒉𝒐𝒎𝒆.
250 words
@krvanhorn@bsky.social
@krvanhorn (X)
Time slips away quickly. Especially when I’m out under the stars with my camera. One minute it’s sunset and the next it’s a couple hours from sunrise. Packing the last of my camera gear into the truck, I glance at Adrianna.
“How many meteors did you count?”
“At least 40,” she says, climbing into the passenger seat. “What the hell time is it?”
The engine in the old farm truck roars to life and I glance at my phone. “4.”
“No wonder I’m tired!”
Dust kicks up in the red rear lights as I head back to the highway, the stars mingling with late summer corn and bean fields. Iowa summers are the best for stargazing and living out on the gravels is even better.
“So when Chris asks what time we rolled in tonight, what will you say?”
Adrianna giggles as I turn onto our gravel and head for her house. She lives a half mile from me on her grandparents old farm.
“Oh, I’ll say. I took the long way home!”
Turning onto her lane, I stop by the garage to let her out.
“Good plan. I’ll use that on Mom, too. Be sure to upload your pictures!l
She shoulders her camera bag and gives me the thumbs up. I wait for the porch light to flash, then yawn and head back to my house. I really want to stay up and look at my shots, but I need to sleep. They can upload while I sleep.
@Aightball
250 words
#ThursThreads is now CLOSED. Thanks to everyone who wrote this week and I hope to catch you next week.