Archives for May 2014

Timing is Everything

Fellowes, carrying orders for the 3rd Division, stood in the sandy track, clutching the dispatch case against his side like a talisman. Across the field, smoke rose from a distant blue tree-line.

Small groups of men moved about the field. Fellowes started toward one group. All around him, dark shapes lay in the stubble. He avoided looking at them. He couldn’t avoid smelling them.

His way was blocked by a silent tangle of men and horses. At his feet was a kepi with a sky-blue clover leaf on its top.

Fellowes let out his breath.

He’d found the 3rd Division.

I wrote this story for the 100 Word Challenge #380 at Velvet Verbosity.

The Tiny Shop of Hope

By Jim Anderson

She was a writer, working on a book about antique furniture restoration. Her research was a collection of disparate facts.

No theme, no center. Would it ever come together? Would anyone care if it did not? Aside from her publisher, of course, whose deadlines were scratched in granite.

She went on searching. It’s what you did. You went on. Today, she found herself in a two-light town west of the city, alone, standing at the threshold of a shop on a musty side street, her hand trembling as she reached for the knob, her heart full of something like hope.

I wrote this story for the 100 Word Challenge #379 at Velvet Verbosity.

Ranson’s Beard

By Jim Anderson

Ranson’s beard was older than his daughter, the corporate attorney who’d moved to Oregon to get as far from him as North America allowed.

He wasn’t shaving without due consideration. He’d grown it the summer of Lillian’s pregnancy. He was teaching philosophy in Ohio, and working on his book. One day he stopped at a produce stand, and the be-whiskered farmer who sold him sweet corn provided the inspiration. Lillian never liked facial hair. Their divorce was as much about that as anything.

Ranson kept the beard all through his marriage to Samantha.

Now it was time for the razor.

I wrote this story for the 100 Word Challenge #378 at Velvet Verbosity.