Tag: writing challenge (Page 1 of 4)

Moon Girls

April 5, 2022 / fionagreywrites

“What’s a California?” Izz idly asked her ship’s AI. She spun a disc in her hands before running a finger over the purple label.

“A defunct state in North America on Earth, now underwater after the earthquake of 3142. Its former location will pass under the viewport in seven hours, two minutes.” Greave’s voice was comfortingly robotic. Enough to pass for non-sentient when they encountered the next port inspection team.

Izz tossed the ancient tech into the pile of potential funds and moved onto a bookshelf next to a dirty porthole. “So a California girl is just someone who lived there.”

“The holodisc may display stereotypical images if you can find a player under all this dust.”

“Ooo, an old respirator, nice. And yeah, this base is filthy, but it’s got some great artifacts buried under all the mess. Anyway, can’t you do it? Play the vid?”

“I suppose,” Greaves answered with obvious reluctance. And let out a distinctly unrobotic sneeze.

***

A snippet inspired by Leigh Kimmel’s challenge. My prompt went to nother Mike, who walked on the wild side. Join the fun at MOTE!

Famous Last Words

December 15, 2021 / fionagreywrites

It wouldn’t have escalated if they hadn’t gone after my cat.

You know how it is when things start to get out of hand. One minute, all’s well, and the next, well, you’re standing in your yard screaming you don’t give a damn so loud you don’t recognize your own voice.

Let me start over.

It all began with a gift from my mother-in-law. See, Mom used to work at this doll factory, where they hand painted the faces. And frankly, I find those soulless bright blue eyes pretty creepy. Even toured the factory once when we visited. Identical faces, no matter which way you look, whether it’s a moose or a mouse. But that’s how we wound up with Satan’s souvenirs. You wouldn’t believe how fast I packed those things up as soon as we got home.

But it was Christmas, and it’s once a year, and my husband likes them, and what the hell. It was a gift. I could take it for a few weeks. We so rarely decorate, and this year was kind of a bummer to start with. If it made him happy, that was all that mattered. I’d just tuck those little suckers in the corner.

So there went Rudolph, minus the red nose. The black fuzzy ball was falling off anyway, dangling by a thread, and I couldn’t wait for the cat to eat it. I tried to rename the little guy Blitzen, but my true thoughts came through when I called him Blitzkrieg instead.

And in front of Rudolph, drunken dancing Santa balanced on one curved leg, hand waving a cane, dressed in motheaten purple velvet and with a floppy top hat covering most of that terrible unblinking face. The nearby tree counted as a distraction, since it had LED lights so bright you could see them from space. You could barely watch the TV over the glow, although that might be because the tree was all of eighteen inches tall and wrapped in lights so thick the branches were obliterated.

Anyway. It slowed down for a few days, and I was able to mostly forget those bizarre toys were there. The tree got knocked over a few times, but that’s what cats do. Until I came down one morning and stared. After a minute, I got some coffee, then crept closer, steaming cup in hand, still gazing at the scene in front of me.

See, Santa was riding Rudolph, right in front of the dark and silent television, and my husband swore it wasn’t him. The cat was all poofy-tailed and hid most of the day, and it’s not like she had the manual dexterity to do it. Or the sense of humor, frankly. Kitty’s intense about her belly rubs, thank you.

So I shook my finger at them, tucked them back in their corner, and thought nothing more of it. Until, of course, the next morning.

“You’re sure this isn’t a variation of elf on a shelf?” I couldn’t stop asking, even though I could see my husband’s face twisting in annoyance after the third time. But what else was I supposed to think? Santa and Generic Reindeer had been in our usual seats, and the TV was tuned to the Hallmark Channel.

“I’m warning you guys.” I put the Duo of Doom back into their corner and pushed them closer toward the wall, behind the chair. “It’s not funny.”

The next morning, I tripped coming out of the bedroom and nearly fell down the stairs. Wrenched my shoulder grabbing the bannister at the last minute, and the rug burn and bruises aren’t a ton of fun, either. But mostly I remember screaming when I found myself facing two laughing, vacant, blue-eyed terrors.

My husband rolled his eyes and pointed out the cat had been known to carry things to our doorstep before. “An early Christmas present.”

“Sure,” I muttered, but I didn’t believe it. These wireframe nightmares were as big as she was. Besides, Kitty was still haunting the basement, low to the ground and stalking when she had to come upstairs for food. I dropped a dish that day, and she bolted out of the kitchen so fast she was a furry feline meteorite.

Breakfast was aspirin and coffee that morning, and then I chucked those painted demons into the corner. Rudolph and Santa landed in a tangled heap, and I didn’t care if I never saw them again. The smack they made was satisfying, let me tell you.

I made my husband leave the bedroom first the next morning, just in case. He opened the door, and even cleared the stairs for me. He’s a good one. But he didn’t notice they weren’t in the living room where Santa’s confused and drunken reign of terror should have been, probably because they were supposed to be properly hidden.

Which meant I was the one who found Father Frakking Christmas and the Reindeer from Hell on the stove. With the gas burner flaming merrily blue, a marshmallow toasting on Santa-the-drum-major’s half-melted plastic mace, as if they weren’t made of felt and highly flammable.

This time, I growled. And then I hid them in the oven, where they couldn’t escape.

I probably looked like a crazy person. I know I felt like one, especially trying to explain it when the muffins suddenly didn’t fit on the oven rack. Hubby sent me for a massage, poured me a glass of wine – I told you he was a good one – and suggested I go to bed early.

And all that stress came slamming back with nightmares of those damn blue eyes, off key bells mixed with yodeling so loud Switzerland would have given up its vaunted neutrality to make the affront to good taste and hearing stop. Until I woke up and realized the yowling of my dreams was very, very real.

And my poor black tabby was wearing Deer Jerky’s jingle bell bridle.

Well. I don’t quite remember what happened next, upon the advice of my lawyer. I can tell you that it all seemed quite reasonable at the time, and that everyone in the family made it out of the house safely before it blew. Even the cat.

Sometimes, it takes a ridiculous amount of effort to solve a problem, but it’s like vacuuming for a few minutes after you suck up the spider, just to make sure it’s dead. But as counsel mentioned, I’m sure that’s an unrelated tangent.

This time, it wasn’t so hard to say goodbye to the house, or to move onto the next chapter of my life. I hope my future doesn’t include jail. But whatever happens, I have a few last words.

Next year, we’re skipping Christmas.

***

I don’t think that’s what Leigh Kimmel expected when this week’s prompt was supposed to be inspired by Billy Joel’s “Famous Last Words” song…my prompt went to Cedar Sanderson: “The belladonna tasted like bitter blueberry and regret.”

Join the fun over at More Odds Than Ends!

Hidden Journeys

November 24, 2021 / fionagreywrites

Leila clenched the steering wheel with cramped fingers, wondering when the stabbing pain between her shoulderblades would stop. Not until she got a massage, probably, as if she had that kind of time or money. A hot bath would have to do, and even that an unaffordable indulgence. Not with half her life packed into the back of an SUV she’d just barely paid off before getting the news.

Position made redundant. Blah, blah, legalese. Stay a month and get severance. Agree to transfer south and take a pay cut, and keep being employed by an unreliable company teetering on failure every week. But she’d jumped at the chance to get closer to family, a lower cost of living, especially when she was the most mobile of her branch.

Being single had some benefits, she supposed.

“Focus,” she muttered out loud. A snort came from the passenger seat, then the thump of a tail wag before easing back into peaceful sleep. Glen had conked out hours ago, when daylight made the drive a pleasure and the potential of something new floated tangibly, excited sparks dancing in the air.

She’d blame the spots on a migraine aura now, given the pulsing between her temples. But who’d have known the light rain predicted would turn into such a disaster as soon as it grew dark? The rain had brought fog, and not a gentle rising mist, but great swirling puffy cotton-ball clouds of it, so thick Leila could almost feel them against her skin.

It would have been just as dangerous to pull off the road, even if there’d been a place to do it. She could barely tell where the lines of faded paint were, and followed truckers at reckless speed on the assumption they had better situational awareness than her failing sight could permit. Exits flashed by with no warning, popping out of fog too late to change direction.

Cold came sweeping next. Freezing rain, and that’s when the tension in her neck started. It’d taken an hour to roll down to her shoulderblades, the stabbing so strong now that she wouldn’t have been surprised to see wings sprout in the rearview mirror.

If she could take her eyes off the road that long, that was. The last of the truckers’ taillights had faded into the midnight hours ages ago, and even her poor mutt had abandoned her.

A whine from the seat next to her brought a pang of guilt. “Sorry, Glen. I know you’re still here.” She’d normally scratch his silky ears, but didn’t want to take her hand off the wheel. “Guess the south has more snow that we expected.”

It had floated down, silent after torrential rain and frozen drops of percussive peril that had slammed with disconcerting alacrity against her windshield. Huge crystal flakes, shining merrily in the few streetlights this highway maintained, piling up on the hood in quantities sufficient to strain her abused windshield wipers.

Glen whined again. “Sorry, boy. I have to go, too. Hang on a couple more minutes, ‘kay?”

GPS said there was a rest stop coming up. Leila squinted at the road and yawned. It didn’t matter. She needed sleep soon whether or not she had a safe place to pull over. “Unless zombies attack us, we’re almost there.”

He barked at the word zombies, and she grinned. She’d used an app to convince herself to run more, and one of them had a zombie chase mode for incentive. They’d both lost weight running from the apocalyptic horde.

A bump, and they crested onto a gentle upward curve. A bridge, the edges of the metal already covered in inches of snow, barely visible. There was only darkness below, but she assumed the lake was frozen.

“Almost there,” Leila said again. She was trying to convince herself the bridge wasn’t slick beneath the SUV’s original tires. “Just keep going straight.”

The steering wheel was slick with sweat beneath her palms by the time they made it into the parking lot. Business taken care of for dog and human, Leila crashed in her car and hoped the snow would insulate rather than trap her inside.

Bells woke her the next morning, and Glen barking. “M’up.” Maybe she could get coffee inside the rest stop. Hot coffee, that would take the chill away. Cold coffee would be reserved for whomever was making that dastardly noise, too early.

Leila squinted against the sun’s glare as she got out of the SUV and let the dog do his business nearby. Her jaw dropped.

Gone was the rest stop. In its place, a town square in early Colonial style, with women in long skirts and hand-woven knits, carrying the day’s shopping in wicker baskets. Men were in hats without fail, most dressed formally in long coats. There were no cars in the square, but plenty of bells upon a magnificent sleigh that belonged in a museum, and an ingenious farm cart with wheels locked onto runners, sliding over the new-fallen snow.

No one seemed surprised by horse-drawn vehicles.

There was not a cell phone, a power line, or a transmission tower to be seen.

And Leila had never heard such quiet.

She spun around, looking for the bridge she’d crossed, only to be greeted with a bustling pier bursting with red-faced fishermen.

The urge to be sick overcame her, and she fought it off with dizziness. Glen barked and leaned against her legs, pushing her back against the car. “Goobo,” she mumbled, and tried again. “Good boy.”

Leila struggled to pull in deep breaths. Smoke from cooking fires wafted through the air, burning unaccustomed lungs. And some odors she’d rather not think about much until she really needed the restroom she’d been dreading this morning.

Or the privy, as she suspected this crowd might call it…

***

This week’s prompt was from Leigh Kimmel: As you drive down the highway, the snow becomes steadily heavier. When it clears, everything looks different and you realize you’re now far from anything familiar.

Mine went to Cedar Sanderson: The proof was in the taser.

Join More Odds Than Ends! It’s both free and welcoming.

The Last Normal Day

June 7, 2021 / fionagreywrites

The morning after the messenger’s dramatic arrival and collapse dawned chill and gloomy. Ralph was overdue to return to the Great Library, but it wasn’t clear whether Miranda would let him leave. For a over a decade now, he’d brought her books on the histories and folklore, without a clue that she was the missing aetheling who’d fought in the wars.

And in a single moment of just a few minutes, she’d broken her cover in front of the one person who she’d permitted to transit her territory. A person with an insatiable quest knowledge combined with the appetite to talk. She had no idea whether he even had the ability to keep secrets. Bookwyrms certainly weren’t known for their locked snouts, even to protect their knowledge hordes.

Movement from the open kitchen window meant she was out of time. Ralph was awake.

A thump, and she bit off a quiet curse from the training ring’s soft ground. Greystone had gotten a good blow in while she’d been distracted. She blinked up at the sky and gestured toward her home. “He’s up.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Greystone replied. “You and I know there are few reasons why a Royal Messenger would arrive here exhausted. And you made sure he’d be asleep until at least noon.”

He reached a hand covered in silky grey fur down to her. His humanoid form had some limitations, but she’d always loved the fact that he got to keep his claws. She put her hand in his and let him help her back to her feet.

“It’s hard not to be distracted.” She blew out a huge breath that pushed him back a step. It would have been surprisingly large – especially given the hint of smoke that came with it – had she been human rather than a shapeshifted dragon.

“Once the messenger wakes, everything changes.” His words were quiet. “You know that. Today is the most normal day of the rest of your life.”

She squared her shoulders and raised her hands to the guard position. The black and white speckled snout now poked from the window, inquisitive nostrils quivering, and she ignored it or the unanswered questions. “Then what are we waiting for?”

***

I forgot to submit a writing prompt last week, so I snagged a spare. This one was “Today is the most normal day of the rest of your life.” That said, several ideas sparked with other spares, too. I like the challenge of an assigned prompt, but might have to to pay more deliberate attention in the future.

Interested in playing along? Check out Odd Prompts for more!

Engineers!

December 28, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Nigel sat on the concrete floor and studied the mess of broken machinery in front of him. Gears, cogs, sprockets, and unidentifiable doohickeys were scattered in piles between his legs.

“There’s clearly some sort of order to where you put the parts,” Elise said. She leaned down and pushed her ponytail back over her shoulder, trying not to get grease smeared onto her leather jacket. “I can’t tell what it is, though.”

“Blocking my light,” he mumbled, then looked up, blinking. “Oh. Sorry. Rude?”

She straightened and stepped to the left, trying not to roll her eyes. She took a deep breath of the damp air and suppressed a sigh. “Yes, rude.”

“Have to get it working again,” he said, hands fidgeting over the parts. Stubby fingers flickered faster than she would have believed possible. Each movement he made was deliberate and precise. “Each pile goes into its own section. Here, hold this for me.”

She snorted and moved back to lean against the wall. She propped a foot against it for balance, concrete rough and cool under her fingertips. “I most certainly will not. That – thing – is what got us in the dungeon in the first place.”

He propped a long metal rod against his ankle instead. “Not a dungeon.”

“It’s a locked, windowless room in the basement. And we’re stuck here until the other bots outside go away, lose interest, or calls for more of those things to come help. I’m just glad we control the deadbolt. It’s close enough to a dungeon to count.”

“Horseshoes.” Nigel’s brow furrowed, his eyes darkening. He spilled the piles of gadgetry from their towers of precarious balance with a sweep of an arm. His nose nearly touched the ground as he chose new parts. “Bad design.”

Elise sighed. She had to draw an engineer as her partner. Every single time, it seemed like. “It was a reasonable argument that close counts in horseshoes, hand grenades, and dungeons. Just give me that one, would you? And what’s this about bad design?”

She crossed her fingers and made a wish, as if she were seven again and arguing with her younger brother. Iftheir backup didn’t show up soon, Nigel would want to stay here until he fixed that thing.

“I improved it. Much more efficient this way.” He grinned at her, the spark back in his eyes. A squat finger hovered over a red button.

She pushed her foot against the wall and lunged for him. A beep halfway there told her she was too late. He’d started the blasted thing up again. She turned her lunge into a painful somersault and rolled onto her feet. Drawing her knives, she faced the machine that had chased them inside the room.

“It works!” he crowed. He scooted away from its treads, alarm flickering over his face.

Her shoulder throbbed. She wondered if a good stomp of her combat boot would do the trick? Was she fast enough to get past the whirring saw blades? “You know, you could have considered not fixing the tiny death machine, right?”

“Improving.” Nigel sniffed, and wedged himself into the corner.

***

This prompt has stymied me for far too long! I work with a LOT of engineers, and reality kept intruding. B. Durbin challenged me nearly a year ago with the following:

“According to Milton, the road to Heaven is rocky and narrow. The road to Hell is broad and well-paved. Therefore, we know which way all the engineers go.” (Professor Michael Bonin to engineering student Ron Palmer, attribution not part of the prompt.)

TE Kinsey’s latest cozy reminded me that engineers love to share information, even when they shouldn’t…and they also like to fix things. Even when they really, really shouldn’t.

Exhaustion

December 22, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Kerri slammed open the wooden door with a bang, tumbled through, and settled into a boneless heap on the stone floor. Her mate found her there an hour later, eyes closed and a wisp of smoke escaping her left nostril with every snore he’d never dare admit she made.

Not if he wanted to stay mated, anyway.

“Baby.” Mike nudged her with a gentle claw. “Baby, come to the nest at least. I brought you a whole cow, and the sand is the perfect toasty temperature you like if you want to get cleaned up.” He devoutly hoped she’d want the sand bath. Her blue-green scales were covered in irregular smudges of soot.

“M’exhausted,” she mumbled. A single eye blinked at him several times, exposing a gold and green streaked iris. The eyelid slid ninety percent closed. “M’up.”

He suppressed a grin, not that she would notice right now. “I can see the first one. Come on, upsidaisy. I got you.” He folded his wings back and shoved his foreleg under her feeble wiggle.

She yawned, fangs pearlescent even in the dim light. Her tongue flickered out, her eyes still half-closed and head swaying. “Food?”

“Food,” Mike said in a soothing tone. “A whole cow, just for you. You have to keep up your energy.”

“Sleep,” Kerri slurred. “Need sleep.” She curled her long neck against his, then nuzzled her snout against his. He could feel her weight leaning heavier against his side and twitched his wing back further.

“Food, then sleep,” Mike reassured her. “After all, you have to teach flame control again tomorrow. For about the next six weeks. And then they start flying not long after that. You’ve got to keep your strength up.”

Well, that woke her. Kerri’s roar must have been heard a block away. He had wanted to stay mated, hadn’t he?

Of course he did. That’s why he shoved a terrified, bleating heifer in the direction of the snarls and ran out the door.

***

This weeks’ Odd Prompt came from nother Mike: “It was always a proud day when another young dragon first blew flame across the room, but it did make teaching elementary school classes for young dragons hard on teachers.”

Mine went to Becky Jones, “I got him!” She waved her prize in the air and wiggled her hips, grinning at her mentor. He gave her a wistful smile, wishing they were as safe as she clearly believed. “I’m afraid they hunt in packs.”

Meteorite

December 16, 2020 / fionagreywrites

The metal candleholder quickly lost its warmth as she left the temple’s tended fires. Lady Elsa headed down the wide stone stairs and headed for the garden. Her free hand chilled where air met her exposed hand, sheltering the emerging yellow flame. It flickered with each rapid step, evening dew soaking into her slippers as she deviated off the pebbled gravel path.

Each novice went alone for their attempt, but they knew the way. She could feel the eyes upon her with each hasty step. Adrenaline spiked her pace still faster, her breathing ragged.

Her feet were soggy and cold by the time Elsa reached her goal. She paused at the arch before entering and set the candle in the empty holder before kicking off her shoes. A deep breath and a hitch of wet skirt away from her ankle, and she plunged through the ivy into darkness.

And entered for the first time, into light. Floating sparkles traced colorful paths across the sky, while glowing flowers spun purple and green bioluminescence into the shadows. A drop of ivy dripped a trail of water, and starlight sparkled as it shattered onto the ground like diamonds.

She stared upward, enraptured by pale grey streaks of moonlight, which broke through the spaces between the darkened leaves. Strands of gold dust swirled around her raised hands, and she broke into a delighted laugh.

Floating with joy, Elsa turned and bowed to an alcove where a figure was obscured among the shimmer, hidden along the wall amidst leaf and bough. “Lady of Star and Shadow.”

The statue remained still and cold, but a bright light echoed from behind the statue’s head. A blackened figure towered over the temple maiden. Elsa crumpled to her knees in a collapsed curtsy of wet skirts and bare feet. She had nearly forgotten. “Forgive me, Lady of the Moon.”

She reached into her beltpurse and drew out the multicolored rock that served as her offering. “I bring you your child of fire and blazing glory, returning to you the lost children of the stars.”

***

I think this one might go further, sometime, but the world isn’t quite clear yet. I don’t think Lady Elsa is the main character, at least not as a novice. Thanks to Leigh Kimmel for this week’s Odd Prompt: “Enchanted garden where moon casts shadow of object or ghost invisible to the human eye.” My suggestion went to Cedar Sanderson, that an infestation of baby dragons was not as desirable as one might imagine…

Sharp and Prickly

November 18, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Fred whistled to himself, only half-paying attention to the green and brown surroundings. Oh, his mother had always warned him to pay attention on the forest path, but he was always alone amongst feathery pines and dead and dormant branches.

No muggers lurked here, far from the city lights and shining asphalt. Here the path was cold dirt and barely discernable under a soft carpet of dead leaves and rusty dropped needles years in the making. It was the way home, and he knew it well, and he did not need to see.

And yet – there was something over there. A red glow, but not the glow of fire. And there, a flicker of green, perhaps a glimpse of yellow. How had a traffic light managed to wander into the forest, this far from a real road and into the woods?

His feet drew nearer, and Fred realized the lights were on all at once. And within the glow, shadowed movement.

He watched, bewildered, as a shaggy, smooth-needled Eastern pine shrugged its limbs and shucked a mixture of Christmas lights from its boughs.

“That’s better,” a low voice grumbled. The limbs sloughed away the holiday trappings with a final shake and shuddered, as if the ornamentation had itched.

“Ah, hullo,” Fred ventured to the plant man. The pine stiffened, and turned around.

It was not a face, per se, but shadows that emulated a face. Fred was sure the tree-man was glaring at him.

“It’s too early for this nonsense.” The plant’s voice rumbled. A branch swiped at the pile of lights and knocked the pile under a bush.

Fred nodded, uncertain what else to do.

“You’d not believe the audacity of some people.” The great needles rose and fell with a sigh of shrubbery. The pine turned and lumbered into the forest, shallow roots easily torn from the earth with each step. “Not even Thanksgiving yet.”

If you’re ever in Pennsylvania, Eat’n’Park is rather a cult classic diner. And in the 80s, had this wonderful commercial that inspired the story when I wasn’t quite sure what to do with Nother Mike’s prompt.

It was a long one for Odd Prompts inspiration this week: “Prompt: Walking along the darkened path, he noticed there was something glowing behind the bushes beside the walkway. He leaned over, and saw a red and green glowing something, apparently tied with bright yellow ropes, just as it struggled free… (inspired by a game commercial … feel free to make the critter in the ropes anything you want!).”

Forged

October 27, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Darkness never bothered me. Why would it? Darkness is what lets me see the color of the metal, white-orange hot and ready for tempering, molding, shaping to my will. The forge is my life, and I live in the shadows.

Darkness is what lets the light shine bright and sweet, upon the face of a woman or a child. I have brought plenty of shadows to this world already. The look they give me is the same as when they face the darkness, and fear the shadows.

Sweat drips down my face as I strike the mallet against a bar, branding hot, flakes and chips shattering into the forge with each strike. Sweat means heat, means life, and each flex of tendon and muscle in my wrists guarantees an existence. I will never freeze again in this heated environ; no snowy, stiffened days where I can barely move my hands to grasp a hammer. No longer am I desperate for a bowl of soup or a scrap of bread stolen from a windowsill. No longer am I driven to desperation and the darkness.

The irony does not escape me. I learned a trade and left the shadows, only to live within the shadows. I remain on the edges of the world, dusted with soot and charcoal. I would not trade it for the limelight, or even for the sunshine. I know where I, and everyone else, is comfortable where I remain.

Looking respectable increases the irony. The past was always destiny-bound to arrive on booted feet, spurs jangling with each step, swirling darkness in his cloak. It’s why I told that woman to stop pushing her wiles on me. She doesn’t want the chill of shadows. She imagined strength, when I saw only prey. I was once and always quick to anger, quick to the fight, quick to the draw.

I survived, and you know what that means. Just because I learned self-restraint doesn’t mean I lost the instinct.

I hear each deliberate thud and know it’s time. It doesn’t matter who’s here to call me to account at last. It’s not in me to give up a fight, as if a gunfight at midnight is a disadvantage. If I win, if I lose – either way the darkness reclaims me, as it was always bound to do.

***

Leigh Kimmel and I traded Odd Prompts this week. She provided the weirdest music video I’ve ever seen as inspiration. After blacksmithing this past weekend, which option could I choose but the smith preparing for a gunfight? I challenged her to write about a joyous feeling she (or her character) would never want to experience again.

Memory Puzzles

October 25, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Lynn grinned as she dug through the trash. Oh, it smelled terrible, that was for certain. Why a farmer’s wife hadn’t composted and separated the dry trash rather than tossing everything in a single midden pile was beyond her capacity to fathom. But she’d already found quite a few treasures.

Whether or not others would think her new ceramic chicken was a treasure was irrelevant. For her, it was worth the work. She glanced up at her friend. Arti looked less pleased about their current adventure. “We have to do this for how long?”

“Until we find the promised mason jars,” Lynn said. She tried to be less obvious about her glee in the face of Arti’s pitiful gaze and failed. “Those antique blue ones are selling like hotcakes. Even if it’s broken, we can turn it into one of those mosaic garden tables.”

Arti rolled her eyes and held up what looked like a dented bowl in one gloved hand. She dangled it from a single finger, and made a face before tossing it aside. “Only you would be this excited about garbage.”

Lynn shrugged and rubbed an itch on her chin with one shoulder, since her hands were covered in muck. “It’s repurposing. And only you would be bored enough to help me. Plus, we might get a few coins out of it.”

“Maybe a lot of coins.” Arti went still, except for the breeze blowing her shoulder-length dark hair.

She sniffed and regretted it instantly. Dried late autumn grasses surrounding the midden were not enough to overwhelm the scent of rot. “Not if you don’t keep moving.”

“Did these people kill off a goose?”

Lynn stopped this time and stared at her partner in refuse. “Huh?”

“Look.” Lynn got off her knees, the wet denim clinging to her legs unpleasantly. She squished her way over in wellie boots kept for this and catching frogs. It would be a sad day when she grew up enough to hate catching frogs.

And a sad day when she didn’t recognize the value in something completely unexpected. “Golden eggs. You’re putting me on.”

Arti shook her head and picked one out of the pile. “A whole nest. You see the engravings? The dirt highlights them.”

Frowning, Lynn leaned over. “Those aren’t – no. These are puzzle eggs!”

“What’s a puzzle egg?”

“Like those boxes that you can’t open unless you move pieces in the right way.” She’d been hiding secrets from her annoying brothers for years in puzzle boxes. Anything she didn’t want destroyed, anyway. “C’mon, let’s grab these and go get cleaned up. Mrs. Murphy said we can come back anytime. I want to see what’s inside.”

“Shouldn’t we see if Mrs. Murphy wants them?” Arti frowned, hesitant. “Surely she wouldn’t consider these trash.”

“She left,” Lynn said, impatient. “She went into town. We can ask her when she gets back. After we solve the puzzle.”

Arti got to her feet and brushed off her jeans. She’d been fastidious about keeping clean, more so than Lynn. “Fine. But we’re coming back after to make sure.”

Lynn heaved a big sigh at her friend. “Let’s go already. Tuck them in the bag and we’ll bike back to my place.”

***

An hour later, both girls had damp hair and fresh clothing. Lynn’s mother hadn’t cared a whit for golden eggs, but she certainly didn’t want rotting garbage tromped all over her clean floors. Lynn herself wouldn’t admit it out loud, but she knew darn well she smelled better.

“I think I’ve got it,” Arti said, bare knees askew from where she leaned against the bed frame. She’d scattered the eggs across the floor, but Lynn had captured one that felt right to her and taken it into the bed to work on.

“Me, too.” She wrinkled her forehead. “Mine doesn’t have anything inside. Just this button.” She held it out to Arti.

“Mine, too.” Arti set hers down and propped herself up on her knees. “I’ll press yours if you press mine. Maybe it’s part of the puzzle.”

Lynn held out the egg in both hands. Arti reached out a finger with chipped grey polish and pressed the button.

Nothing happened.

And then –

“Do you see this?” Lynn murmured. Her bedroom, filled with the hearts and unicorns of a young girl whose parents thought she would enjoy appropriately girlish items, was gone. In its place was a garden, overflowing with spring abundance in flowers and fruit. Young girls dressed in A-line frocks and gloves milled around, some holding plates or cups.

“Cake!” Arti started to move toward the punch bowl.

“Stop it!” Lynn held her friend back. “We aren’t dressed for this.”

“Well, I want to get back. And if I can’t get back, cake sounds like a good option.”

Biting her lip, Lynn thought her friend was probably right. “Fine. But you answer questions about who we are.”

She wasn’t sure whether she was relieved or disappointed to find that in this world, the girls were shadows. Arti’s hand passed right through the cake, the table, and the punch bowl. She’d needed to be restrained from doing it to the girls. “It’s rude,” she hissed, keeping her voice low.

“It’s fun,” Arti corrected, swinging around with an arm out. A girl shivered at her touch. “Hey, you see the lady in the green dress?”

“I know her!” Lynn yelped. “I’ve seen her in a picture. Recently, too.”

Arti went pale, and stopped struggling to dance her way through the garden party. “We both did. That’s Mrs. Murphy.”

Laughing, Lynn shook her head. “Must be her granddaughter or something.”

An adult woman entered the backyard from a sliding door, followed by a number of boys about the same age as the girls. The girls began cooing, clustering in groups. The boys stood their ground, but looked exceedingly uncomfortable.

“I think that one’s going to run,” Arti whispered. The groups began mingling, mostly huddled around the food table.

“That’s not…no. Can’t be.” Lynn frowned.

The adult woman was joined by several others for a few minutes before she broke away. “Jean,” she said as the woman approached the girl in the green dress. “I’d like you to meet Elliot.”

The garden’s edges blurred into a multicolored swirl. Lynn’s bedroom appeared. “I’m all stiff, like we were there for too long,” she muttered, and swung her legs over the side of the bed.

“Well, my knees hurt from kneeling here,” Arti retorted. Neither of them looked at each other for a long, silent moment. “Did you -?”

“Yeah.” Lynn kicked her legs. “Jean and Elliot are Mr. and Mrs. Murphy. I heard Mom call them that once.”

Arti’s voice was hoarse, and her hand shook slightly. “Where do you think the rest of the eggs lead?”

“When, you mean.” Lynn leaned down and picked up Arti’s puzzle egg. “You hold it, and I’ll push the button.”

***

A late response to last week’s More Odds Than Ends prompt from Sanford Begley: “Rooting through the old farm midden heap, looking for antique jars, you find a nest of golden colored eggs.”

My challenge to be inspired by an unusual color and holiday combination went to Cedar Sanderson, who did not disappoint!