Every single week.
We'll be here.
With a prompt.
If you need it.
Even if you don't, we'll be publishing writing prompts each week to inspire something for someone. Most weeks a voice raises itself and we're delighted by wee stories, delicious tiny tales prompted from that week's prompts.
From last week's Start over…
across the merman’s nose and cheeks like blue and green stars"
bench, watched his little family. Who knew his life could be so full of love?"
some of my body heat…Suddenly I feel a shadow fall and a presence next to me"
We Wanna Prompt Your Writing But…
…we also want to create a bit of a community. A group of people who gather most weeks, see one another's names, read one another's short stories, learn each other's voices.
I know I need community now, all sorts, and if you do as well, well here we are.
Jump in my friends, the writing water is fine and the prompts are hot off the press!
P.S. Anything you write here is all yours, we have no ownership of it whatsoever.
P.P.S. After not writing for weeks I found inspiration to pen something for my own prompt, so IT WORKS!
A shout came up from the basement: “Ah… fuck. Fuckity fucken fuck!”
Christ on a bike, what’s that man gotten into now? Thought Em. “You alright down there Charlie?”, she shouted back.
“Black water! Blaaaack water. It’s comin up outta the sump drain!” Charlie sounded kinda funny when he was panicking, but Em would never say that to his face. His voice would go all warbley and high pitched. It was almost cute.
“Need help?” She called down the basement stairway.
“Um, I don’t know! Call a plumber? Get a mop? No, that won’t fucken help, never mind.” Em could hear him dragging stuff around, accompanied by definite sloshing sounds.
She went down the wood steps far enough to be able to see her man, standing on a makeshift boardwalk made from plastic milk crates, and what looked like… oh goddamnit! Was that her ironing board?
“Damnit Charlie, get off my ironing board! You look like some sort of deranged surfer!” Em was halfway between being pissed and laughing hysterically.
“No! Don’t move. Stay where you are! I’ve seen the X-Files; what if this black water turns into a Martian or some shit like that?” Charlie looked positively stricken.
Em put her fists on her hips, “I’ve watched the X-Files too. It was black oil, not black water. But, I’ll go call the FBI if you like.” She went back up the stairs to call a plumber.
The wind is coming in from the sea and I can taste her salt on my lips, greeting me, calling me home.
I look back to the street that I have lived in the past years, the windows are blazing in all the houses except for mine. I turn away and follow the road to the harbour, leaving the buzz of the town behind me. Soon I hear nothing but the sound of waves.
I walk down the boardwalk till I come up right at the edge. Here I start stripping off my clothes, and I welcome the cold bite of the wind on my skin.
I jump and the moment of reconnection steals my breath away. The current pulls me away from land immediately, but I never meant to return there, so I just give myself over to her.
I’ve picked the spot for this reason, for the strong, dangerous currents that pull me down, so that I don’t even have to make an effort. The transformation starts suddenly and is as painful as I remember. Lungs are not needed here, neither are hands or feet, so they return to their original form of fins and tail.
Once the transformation is complete, I swim out and down, down, down to where the water looks almost black, and I join my sisters and brothers.
This turned into a 221b without me even trying.
Sitting on the edge of the boardwalk, my feet dangle over black water: ink and crow feather black; shadow black; mourning black.
The surface of this black lake, flat as a mirror, reflects no stars. When I peer hard I can discern the distant line of the bio dome reflected in the mirror. Beyond the dome, the Earth circles between me and the Sun. I am not certain, this Martian equinox, where in its path it is, but knowing it waltzes out there, spinning and yet blue, gives comfort to my homesick heart.
(One day, perhaps soon, my Earth will be grey. She spins and dies so far away from me.)
At my back, on the red soil shore, stands the Mars Terraform Project’s water extraction plant. Squeezing the moisture from waste matter and the sweat from our clothes. The precious fluids of the living things that died. The little white mice from the lab. And not only mice. Channelling it into the lake.
And from the ink black, sorrow black lake, comes the soft whispering buzz buzz of all those dehydrated souls. Not haunting; promising.
One day – not soon but one day – you and we and all will quench the thirst of alien soil and make it fertile. We will grow the new world and nourish our successors.
My darling Li Xiu Ling’s whisper buzzes to my ear, reminding me that, to her, black is the colour of prosperity, of health.
One day (not soon but one day) I will be not on but of the lake. I will give everything to the prosperity and health of the future. One day, humankind will survive, because of us. Because of me.
In our lake, black as ink, as elegance, as infinity, Li Xiu Ling and I are the grandmothers, the goddesses, of this brave new world.
Very long, indeed. Was it so long when you came here? Of course it was. It’s the same boardwalk, you’re just walking in the opposite direction. Still… Perhaps you could walk faster. The sooner you’ll be far from the black water, the better. Not that you’re scared or anything, but… Still. Was it so silent when you came here? It probably was, yes. Where are all the sea birds now? Never mind. Perhaps you should run a bit? Yes. Run. Run to the city lights, you’ll be safe there. It’s okay, the lights are not moving away, it’s just an optical illusion. Keep running. It’s okay. Don’t look back. Yes, there’s noise now, but don’t look back. No, don’t—
In black water you see nothing. Pray that you never will.
That’s okay Atlin, I didn’t need to, you know SLEEP or anything.