Jeff sensed their empathy as he recalled the loss of physical sensation and the absence of fear.
Feedback from the invisible audience strengthened as he remembered his awareness of others, the unheard words understood.
A surge of shared understanding reached him along with the sound of the Crematorium oven closing.
Jim has been a member of a Writing Circle for just over a year. He initially wrote this story as a 250-word story before adapting it to the 50-word format.
His hands touched me in ways you are not imagining but in ways I cannot forget.
Those hands were the first to touch my tiny, ten-fingered, ten-toed body; the same hands that punched a hole in the bathroom mirror, leaving only his anger and his absence to remember him by.
Madison is a MFA graduate student studying Fiction at Chatham University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She spends her time writing, reading, and watching too many movies, if there is such a thing.
Sneakers, loafers, toes of steel?
Slippers, flip-flops, high-tops, heels?
Choose your footwear
Choose your road
Beauty-wear
Or heavy loads?
This new year, where will you walk?
Fly alone? Join the flock?
It’s your call
You’re in control
Tie your laces
Check your soles
Will you wear new shoes
Or old?
Have a blessed, happy New Year!
The caveman watched his son with pity. The boy sat cross legged, smiling vacantly at the night sky. He should have drowned him. Theirs was no life for the weak.
The boy glanced at his father with pity. How could he begin to comprehend the infinite totality of their existence?
Chris Redfern likes writing and wronging. Follow his adventures at aatwatchtower.com.
How do I get out of this?
Stuck in a sinkhole. Middle of the desert, broken leg, no water.
Great, I’m screwed.
Thirty-six hours and I’ve screamed myself hoarse.
Come on. You said you liked puzzles. Solve this one!
…A flash-flood has me treading water. For six hours.
I’m saved?
Born in Dublin, Ireland, Kerry spent most of his life in the UK, and now lives in Brittany with his long-suffering wife of thirty-six years. He has three children, three grandchildren, and no pets. Kerry has recently released The DCI Jones Casebook: Ellis Flynn, available on Kindle from Amazon US or Amazon UK. A paperback will be available soon.
As we head into a new year of 50WS, I’m exploring some different options for ways to improve the site. For a long time we’ve been sharing one story per day, every weekday, but I’m open to other arrangements. We spent a few weeks posting two stories every weekday, and that seemed to go over well. There are other options, too.
I’d love to hear what you, as readers, would prefer. Please vote on the poll below, and leave comments to tell me what you think!
[poll id=”3″]
Thanks for an awesome 2013, everyone, and here’s to an even better 2014!
Pesca slithered onto the mud and gasped for breath. He was the first. He foresaw it all.
His children and descendents would become Reptiles, mammals, primates, and hominids. Civilization, weapons, and war would follow, and then nuclear annihilation.
Pesca slithered back into the water. He would be the last amphibian.
Harry Demarest has retired after careers encompassing scientific research, teaching at a university, software development, web application development, and voter database compilation and distribution. He is now spending his time with his grandchildren and writing memoirs and short stories.
Being vertically challenged, the Stegosaurus always received jealous, icy stares whenever limbo music played. The anger was immediate from the other gangly dinosaurs. Any prehistoric disco dance became a cauldron for sweaty ego and unresolved envy.
Often conflict would ensue until the Diplodocus enacted its customary diplomacy. Disco demanded dignity.
Linda Nathaniel is a teacher and playwright who has had poems published in both Hemispheres.
He said he hadn’t drunk too much
Said he drove better with a few
We needn’t be worried about such ‘n’ such
At Christmas, he said, he always came through.
Now we never hear him joke
But we remember those words he spoke
And we always miss him at Christmas
Connell Wayne Regner wrote the first draft of this story as a dismayed reaction to the Christmas “toll” on the roads in his neck of the woods. Tim helped to polish the poem into its current form. From both, have a safe and happy Christmas and New Year.
Connell has requested that this story not be rated, out of respect for its message.
Last year, his annual business trip left him exhausted.
“You’re overweight,” said his wife, and the little ones nodded.
“No pain, no gain,” he resolved.
This Christmas Eve, after a strict twelve month diet, a slimmer, faster Santa will whiz round the world to deliver his gifts in record time.
John B Sinclair is a much-travelled Scot who has now returned to Scotland, where he enjoys freelance writing on a variety of subjects.