Writing : Flash Me! NOVEMBER - WAR QUOTES

EDIT!

Obviously I need to stay more on top of this. So, here is the June list of stories and the winner, 'Daddy's Girl' by Rach 122. I am still trying to figure out who wrote 'Dead End.' Rebecca? You recall? Anyone? 

So:

June Grate Eight: With Special Guest Judge Rebecca Jones-Howe.

Moving Up- Covewriter Lisa

     Helen came home from mass and brunch to find Bill watching a western, sitting  in his easy-chair, starting his second beer. She never knew on Sunday mornings if he would be drunk..
"I'm home!"
"Michelle called,” he yelled "She's coming over to take you to lunch."
"I just had brunch! She should have called earlier."
"Well," Bill said "It's Mother's Day. She's your daughter, so go to fucking lunch"
The doorbell rang and Michelle breezed in, dressed in a white suit and high-heels, arms full of roses.
“Happy Mother’s Day!” 
“Oh these are pretty!” Helen said. “Let me put them in a vase. Happy Mother’s Day to you too,” she said. . “Where’s Cody?”
“He’s asleep. He’s taking me out for dinner ..
Michelle’s children are at college. Michelle and Cody are “empty nesters” in their big lake house on Poplar Point. Helen rarely sees them.  Michelle was done with the old neighborhood, as far as Helen could tell, had even heard her call it the “slums.”
“I’m treating you to lunch,” Michelle said.
“Honey I just had brunch. You should have let me know.”
“Helen, go to lunch for God’s sake,” Bill yelled.
“I guess I could have dessert.”
Michelle drove, and Helen asked  “Why is Cody asleep on Mother’s Day?”
“Oh he had a party last night.”
“Honey,” Helen said. “ This happens with Cody every holiday. That’s not good. I think you’ve changed the scenery but not the situation.”
“What?”
“You’re in that big house and got a lawyer husband earning tons of money, but you’re in the same situation as me.”
“Mom,  no. It’s not the same. Cody was just out with friends. He’s not like Dad. He’s a top state lawyer!
“Your daddy never missed   work Michelle. He put you through college.”
“Mom, I know. but it’s not like that. Please, let’s change the subject.”
They had lunch at Ruby Tuesdays. They did not talk much. When they returned to the house Michelle parked and cut the motor.
“I’m not going in.”
“That’s fine. But Michelle..”
‘”It’s not the same.”
“Okay.”
Michelle watched her mother walk through the yard into the house of unpredictability. Bill would never  hurt her physically, but he was mean when drunk. So was Cody.  Her mother, Michelle knew, would always make things work, just like Michelle did all those years her kids were home..
Michelle’s hands shook as she started the car. Cody would have scotch tonight but he wasn’t a drunk like Dad. Cody dressed well, was fun, in shape.  He didn’t drink beer night after night at the house on Albany drive where the air conditioning always broke in summer.
But, he yelled at her the same.. And there was the vodka bottle in the closet. And the kid’s not coming home.
“My God,” Michelle thought.  “ I changed the scenery but not the fucking situation. Tears fell as she drove to the mansion. At least she changed the scenery though. That was something.

Playwrights- J.Y. Hopkins

I sensed an opportunity, so I went for it: "If you replace one the masts on a ship, is it still the same ship? It has the same name, but is it the same?"
"Oh god," she said, "no philosophy. No. None." Her arms waved. She thought she was being emphatic, but she was coming off like a drunk umpire: safe, safe, safe, wait... okay, safe.
"Of course it is," I said, answering myself. "Just because you change a little something here and there doesn't make it totally different. It's not a completely different thing. It's not apples and oranges. It's mostly the same but a little bit different. What's hard to understand about that?" I set the tea-ball on the saucer with reverence, as for a censer. She drank some more gin and I continued, "Look, thinking about things reasonably, with intellectual honesty, doesn't necessarily amount to philosophy."
She scoffed, "No, you'd have to be better at it to get that distinction."
"I agree." I really did. "So don't give it to me. Or at least get better at making fun of me."
"Okay," she said, "no more fucking around. Who cares if it's philosophy and who cares if I'm right? You're just a cunt and I don't want to do it. What're you going to do? Sue me? Go to court over this shit? Nobody even likes it. You don't even like it!"
During all this I put some sugar in the tea and stirred gently so as not to swirl any over the rim, squeezed a little lemon juice in the eddy.
"You'll thank me when it's done," I said, and set the bitter rind beside the steaming metal sphere. In my fingertips and knuckles, up into my wrist, I felt the calm whirling subside as I brought the cup to my lips, just a little too hot. Just barely burning. Just right.
She set down her tumbler and picked up the bottle, wrenching the cap with one hand, cradling the round bottom with the other. "I'll thank you to finish it," she said as she stood. She almost smiled.
I sometimes forget how tall she is.

Daddy's Girl- (Winner by peer voting)- Rach122

My father tells me, “Cut it out, you’re smoking too fast,” an urgent delivery, like it will change the outcome. “You inhale like you’re dying.”
“That’s the point,” I say.
The corner of his mouth twists while he looks at his ten-dollar shoes bought from plastic crates at the wholesale store. Layered with shoe polish, sill dulled. He shakes his head and mumbles, “At least enjoy your death, kiddo.” Facedown, his hair flirts with the idea of fleeing his head. It’s thinner than I ever remember, but I forget and it seems the same.
Eyes glued to rough concrete of the parking lot, his foot scrapes remnants of white parking lines, “You’re going to die a slow and painful death if you keep this up.”
“Oh yeah, and you?”
“I gave them up cold turkey. Never even take one drag these days.”
My mouth forms the last few words in unison with him, hollow movements.  Breaths filling space, my tongue forms around syllables and curls of smoke escape trailing into lines of exhaust. I squint my eyes, encased by his dark circles, looking into their matching pair, “I remember.”
Shifting my gaze to my hand, its “smoking fingers” dashed with marks of rust. I rub the stains of soon-to-be cancer, twisting my thumbnail into them. Looking back into his black coffee stare, the same once reflected in a vanity mirror.
His back bent over the sink, I would stand behind. A steel razor moved along cheeks, his neck spotting with red as it worked its way down, slicing the air. A cigarette dangled from the corner of his mouth, it’s smoke weaving toward the plastic shower curtain.
“Dad,” my forehead cocked, looking away from streaky glass to his half shadowed chin, “Why are you doing that?”
“Rach, I’m shaving.  I have to go to work, you know that.”
“No dad, the cigarette.  Why are you smoking?”
Etched steel of his razor stopped mid air. Black flecks of hair stuck in canned frosting, oozing from a two-edged blade. A tanned fist grasped around it, marked with scars and burns, a lifetime of working in a kitchen. “I’m an adult, kid. Adults can smoke.”
The slicing continued. Squirming my feet in the braided strands of the bathmat, soft yarn filled the gaps between my toes.  “Dad?”
He sighed, leaning his weight on the rested palm gripping the sink's edge. “Rach, what?”
When am I going to be an adult?”
He half smirked, placing the razor back to his skin, “When you stop asking so many questions.”
“My teacher says asking ‘Why’ makes you ‘Wise’.”
“Well if you’re so wise, why don’t you know when you’ll become an adult?” He pointed the clotted razor at me, “Why do you want to be a grown up anyway, you’re five.  You’re not old enough to be sick of this yet.”
Lifting a finger to my lip, I tapped pink flesh, “So I can smoke like you.”

As If The Cosmos Had Stalled-Wickedvoodoo

After a time I left the house I had broken into and took me and my gun in search of the tallest building I could find that didn't have security. I found a multi-storey car park and now I'm up on top, dangling my legs over the edge. I'm going to shoot myself the moment I jump, the best way to make sure I don't screw up and turn myself into a vegetable.
Here's something funny, I was sentenced to death by Angelina Jolie. True story. She might not know it but she's the reason I'm up here.
I never really liked her or her movies much but it turns out she's a guide sent to save me. Metatron and Tetragrammaton and lipstick. God's words from a cute little pout.
Or maybe not.
Maybe she's a succubus, a siren. A daemoness and a harlot. A puppet, sworn to her cause in the dark.
Whichever power she serves, she serves well. Soon, I'll know the truth.
How it was arranged for lightning to hit that exact house at that exact moment I can only speculate. Celestial powers at work, no doubt. For the fork of white light to hit that particular satellite dish at that precise instant, to jar the receiver and to cause the television signal to loop a few seconds of the movie that was playing. To repeat those few seconds as if the cosmos had stalled, to have the volume up high and have me hear Jolie's voice over and over, her providing the key that I needed to unfasten the last chains. To have her release me.
I was never one meant for this world. I have dreamed of nothing but killing this body for years now, dreamed of joining the nexus and finding its core and the answers. I've never been a brave man but I have always known the reality of things.
This is not all there is. 
Something from beyond the veil has given me the power though, given me courage. The words Angelina spoke barely matter, not anymore. It was bigger than that. It was in the way her face moved, her eyebrows furrowing time and time again, the turn of her head and even the flowers behind her in the scene were part of the code. It all fell into place. I read what was being told to me like it were written on paper.
I have achieved all I can of this little moment of life. I have touched every colour and heard every sight. I have tasted all of the shapes this realm has to offer.
Time to ascend.
Or descend.
I watched those few seconds of film loop for what could have been hours, while the woman I had murdered that night bled a lake onto her fancy carpet. After a time I left the house I had broken into and took me and my gun in search of the tallest building I could find that didn't have security.

Help-Roaring Jen

Things are much easier when they are likeable. Jill’s “to do” list consists of things she does not like. Her one day off and she does things like that. “Geez. Seriously?” Jill groaned. “I don’t know why I made this list in the first place.”
Her husband Neil glanced at her as he was going up on his sit-ups. “Hey babe, can I help with anything?” He’s probably thinking about sex as payment for his helping hand. It’s not like he’s prostituting his wife to himself, it’s more of having Jill being more relaxed when she doesn’t have that stupid list in mind.
Jill had her favorite shirt on and looked even more seductive than when they first met five years ago. “Hon, are you helping out just for sex?” Her alluring cleavage always gets him.
Neil knew that while Jill loved her job as a cleaning lady at the Marriott hotel, she hated cleaning their home on her one day off. “Babe, you know I always want you whenever and wherever. It’s your day off! I should at least make it less miserable! Yes, sex, afterward.” He grabs her ass like he usually does. He kisses her in series.
He releases his grip, but still admires what he’s been pounding and gets to pound for the rest of his life. Jill, an unpleasant look on her face, dives her hands in the sink for the soaking dishes. “Neil, I don’t get why you don’t do these things during the week. You just wait until I get frustrated and then do them! You know what’s on the list ‘cause it’s the same almost every week. Go do it!” Neil protested, but wiped his sweat with his towel.
She kissed him long and hard. He liked that. She squeezed his butt a bit. Both hands, one on each cheek, the way Neil liked it. Encouragement to harvest the fruits of their labor, Jill always knew how to get to him.
“Jill, I’m going out.” He returned her affections. Neil took their fruit basket with him and went to the orchard.
Neil would lose track of time every moment he’s outside. He’s the minister of exterior and Jill is the minister of interior in the family. Together, they’d keep things tidy.
At last, the list has been completed, the tasks checked off. It was odd that Neil hadn’t been back yet, so Jill went out.
Jill heard Neil’s voice but it was incoherent. She followed the voice; it led to a fallen husband. “Neil!”
She rushed to his side. Embracing him gently, she caressed his forehead. Neil opened his eyes to see Jill. “Hey, babe. I’m so glad you finally found me. I can’t move but we can still do it here and now.” Neil was paralyzed but still up for action.
“No sex. I’m calling an ambulance.” She kissed him and told him to hold on. Neil moaned feeling a little neglected and unloved. Jill raced back inside and dialed 9-1-1.

Dead End- to be announced once I look it up. I think it was a retraction?

Moving was becoming easier.
She learned to like the new neighbors, the new rows of houses, the polite way people brought over muffin baskets and introduced themselves. The way they gossiped behind your back, watched what kind of car you drove, tracked your comings and goings. That was suburbia for you. But she knew the truth, nothing would ever change. She would end up packing up her boxes again, they would end up moving again, it might take six months or a year at most but soon they would be moving on.
Linda handed the tray of food to their daughter Terry.
“Can you please take this down to your brother?” she said.
She handed her the gun.
Terry walked slowly down the basement steps and put the tray down to undo the lack on the door. She held the gun out in front of her and told him to stand up against the wall.
He grinned, “What do you think I’m going to do? Bite you?”
“I know what you are, you don’t fool me,” Terry said.
“What am I? A monster?”
“Yes,” Terry said, “We should have let those people kill you but Mom loves you. You aren’t human though, I know it. Mom said you came from the man who raped her. The man with yellow eyes. I think you are evil.”
“There is no such thing as evil,” Lincoln said as she placed the tray of food on his bed and slowly backed away towards the door.
“That is just what the devil would say.”
She went to latch the door and suddenly Lincoln pushed her back until she slammed into the wall. He grabbed the gun and struck her in the back of the head.
“Stupid bitch.”
He walked up the stairs to greet his mother.
“Mom, where are you? I have something for you.”
Linda stood in the darkness.
“Don’t worry, Mommy, she will live. I won’t hurt you or her. You are the only ones.”
“Please,” Linda begged, “Don’t do this. I don’t want to have to move again.”
“I can’t help it,” Lincoln said, “You don’t understand what it’s like, no matter how many times you lock me up, move us, I can’t change who I am. It’s all I think about. When I smell the fresh blood, it’s like—what you must feel when you bake the perfect pie. I have to kill—“
“Just try to make it animals,” Linda said, “No people this time, just animals. Not little girls, please. I don’t want to have to turn you in.”
“Oh mother, you will never do that,” he said, confidently, “I know you. You would do anything for me, it’s in your blood.”
She started to tremble watching him walk to the door.
“Oh and Mom? I don’t want to be home schooled this year, I’m going to public school. After all, it’s my freshman year.”
He shut the door behind him.

My New Big, Beautiful Breasts-Fritz Wolfe

I’m scared.
You know a guy is no good if he grabs your arm when you try to leave.  I should have known better.  Stupid, so stupid.  But knowing you’re stupid doesn’t make it go away.  It doesn’t change what’s happening now.
I’m tied to a chair in a dark room staring at a blank wall.  I make this sick mewling sound every time I breathe.
A door opens at my back.  Light splashed against the wall.  His shadow is like a giant spider.  My shadow is a grotesque deformity.  The whole room is whitewashed cinderblocks.
“There she is,” he says.
He comes around, gets in front of me.  He’s wearing a denim shirt that’s wide open showing his chest.  His teeth are big and white, his skin tan.  He’s got a knife in his hand.
“Let’s see these big beautiful things.”  He moves in slow and cuts away the top of my dress.
I was so proud of my new boobs.  The stitches had just come out.  All the guys had looked at me… At ME.  They’d never looked at me like that before.
He’s rough.  My boobs aren’t healed up all the way yet.  I scream and shudder, writhe away some, but none of it helps.  So, I do my best to endure.  I’m pretty good at enduring.  I’ve been doing it my whole life.
“I tell you, girl.  Those have to be the best looking tits I’ve ever seen.”
He makes a guy noise and puts a hand on my knee.
“I wonder if the rest of you is just as beautiful.”
He moves his hand up my thigh.  He touches the thing I haven’t had the money to fix yet, the thing I planned on fixing next.
His eyes meet mine.  I see his shock.  I want to apologize.  Really, I do.
“Son of a Bitch!”  The knife comes up.  It moves fast, like a streak.
#
I wake in a hospital.  I can hear the monitors.  A man wearing a white uniform is checking one of the machines.  He has beautiful blue eyes.
“I’m glad you’re awake, Ms. Blake.”  His voice is soft, caring.  “I don’t know why they don’t have you over on the… on the women’s ward, but don’t you worry, I’m going to take good care of you.”  His smile has little wrinkles on the corners.  He smiles a lot.
“You’ve wearing some pretty big bandages.  Looks like you’ve been through something pretty horrible.”  He pauses and gives me a chance to say something, but I can’t, I just can’t.  He thinks I’m a woman.
“I’m going to go take a look at your chart, find out more about you.  Don’t worry none.  I’ll be right back.”
I don’t say anything. I just memorize his smile.  He’ll go read my chart, find out about me, that I’m a man, and come back wearing a different face, a face I don’t want to see, a face I’ve seen a thousand times.
I’m scared.

Players-spectreO

“I’m not a gynecologist, but....”
“Goddamn it, Tom. Just tell me what’s inside.”
Mary lays on the edge of the bed spread eagle. With her calves resting on my shoulders, I’ve got a flashlight and a front-seat view to something I’d rather feel than see. Well, let me rephrase that. I’d rather feel it if that thing weren’t inside.
“Tom, before I murder you.”
Me being murdered may be the easy way out at the moment. If I tell her what’s in her vagina, she may panic, making it difficult to rush her to the hospital. If I don’t tell her, well, like she said....
“I think we should go to the hospital, like now,” I say.
Mary gives me this look on her face like she smelled a fart.
“The hospital... Are you sure?” Now Mary looks scared and confused.
“Yes, the hospital,” I say. “Trust me.”
      ***
With Mary in the passenger seat, I switch on my Prius and floor it. Mary stops screaming, and strangely, a look of calmness and serenity sweeps her face. She keeps her hand over her crotch and glances at me occasionally. She’s playing with a poker face, but now I’m the one scared.
      ***
At the ER, the intake nurse waddles over and asks what’s the problem. I say there’s something in her vagina, and oddly enough, she doesn’t recoil in horror... until I whisper in her ear what that something is.
“Oh my god.” The nurse takes off and returns with a doctor. Then they throw us in a room.
“Take off your pants now,” the doctor says.
After Mary drops her pants, the doctor points to a chair, one of those kinds used to facilitate the birth of children. With Mary in the chair, the doctor points a light straight up her vagina.
“I don’t see anything,” the doctor says. Bending over with that flashlight in her hand, the doctor looks confused and agitated. The doctor switches the light off and looks up.
“You look pretty calm for a woman who has one of those things inside her,” the doctor says.
“Well,” says Mary. “It’s been in there for a while and-” When Mary laughs, her voice goes up high, and she sounds like a tortured animal.
The doctor stands up and yells, “I’m calling the cops!”
Now I’m laughing.
“We’re getting arrested and it wasn’t even worth it. Just going to the hospital didn’t make it more exciting,” Mary says.
And of course she’s right. She’s always right.
      ***
The scream wakes us both, and it’s only when I notice the scream was mine that I panic.
“Mary, something is wrong.”
Mary tells me to take my pajama bottoms off and lay on my back.
“Mary, tell me. Do you see anything?”
“Tom, I’m not a proctologist, but....”

I love you jizzpuppets, you yolk monkeys.

I just had this discussion with Hoppy. That is not really what we are looking for. This is what I told him:

Yes, they can be related, but I am not looking for a ten-tweet serial. I am really looking at each tweet and how powerful it is by itself--hence stand alone. You have the prompt as a guide. Go anywhere you want with it.

Like that one sentence in a story that just nails you. Or a great ad slogan. Or a haiku. The only real limit, if it can even be considered one, is the prompt and we all know those can produce big bangs as opposed to limits.

I got the idea from Nancy Ellis, who was head of Wordstock marketing and is now the Director of the Festival. She had this Twitter contest last year. The winner would get published on paraphernalia and get free admission and T-shirts and all kinds of shit.

The prompt, which was also the theme of the entire festival, was "My American Story." So within that parameter, so much can happen. A good one was "I'm Bringing Paper Back."

I had such a blast participating, I thought it would be fun to do it in Flash Me! Talk about Flash. Slogan are the ultimate. And the ultimate, ultimate flash, I think, is a one-word juggernaut.

So, Rebecca, think small. But really, now EVERY word has to count.

Michael,

Yes the handle does reduce it. The nature of the beast unless I am doing it wrong, which is highly likely.

Okay, for those not familiar with the concept, you can look back through my tweets on my profile. I generally only tweet slogans and sentences I like or have created as "Pop-Flash".

Again, think ADVERTISING and PROPAGANDA. Not story. Some examples:

Bacon is talented™

volutold®

lipzipper®

tweet me write® twitterati ™ twitterature™ prize for brevity®

Dreadlocks™

everything is meant to happen®

I like stuff that means stuff™

Cravery®

stealing art is art if you know how to launder the loot®

Scarface™

The Ovary Office™

good bad judgement®

chainsaw showers™

Hollywood Faux-caine™

Art New Foe®

L’art nu vaux®

popaganda™

rigor mortis is our specialty®

our jewels won’t make you a star but they’ll make you look like one™

*Mostly stolen from my good friends and if not stolen, inspired by them.

Martin; you have a free pass to do whatever the fathermucking hell you want. Woo me. But make me cum prematurely. Or give me multiples.

Jess: This is soooo you, you quippy juggernaut.

Michael: Yes. Exactly. I want bam.