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A quote: “Sometimes if you want to see a change for the better, you have to take things into your own hands.” ~~ Clint Eastwood
I’ll start with a story …
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Tiny, well built, and surprisingly hard to spot.
“Thanks pop-pop” she whispered entering the beach “shack”. The paranoid old coot was hardcore prepper, but she grew up adoring every story he told, every secret plan he shared. Just in case.
The place was untouched, well stocked and she would pause here a few days. She opened the last closet and stood stunned. She knew how much he disapproved of her passion and yet. His last wish for her.
She reached out and touched her surfboard. Yes, one last ride from an empty beach on golden waves. Then she’d move on.
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Now, it’s your turn.
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. featured image, cropped, Adobe stock standard license
GWB says: Very nice story, Darleen. Made me smile.
That picture, though, immediately brought to mind one of the ads posted in last night’s Overnight Thread on Ace of Spades. The kids ditch school – a long sequence of all the tropes: changing clothes, tossing the map out the window, loving looks, the dude playing guitar… – and go to this fenced-off beach where they crawl through a hole in the chain link fence and run out onto the sand, hand-in-hand… and get blown to smithereens. It ends by pulling back to the sign on the fence stating it was an explosives test area, then a tagline to “Stay in school” – presumably so you can learn to read basic English and not die.
Though you’re expecting something bad to happen (it’s a PSA), the first explosion is startling, the next is sad, the third is expected and you shake your head. The fourth (after you can read the sign on the fence) is just I-told-you-so.
There’s some great ads in last night’s ONT. Maybe inspiration for further Friday 100 word stories. 😉
Cameron says: I like the fact I’m not the only one who remembered that ad. It was hilarious.
Darleen Click says: Ooo… I’ll have to go back and check the ONT.
Cameron says: It’s a gorgeous morning and I make it quickly down to the shore with my paddleboard. The locals don’t bother me; they know the work I do here.
The sun is starting to warm the sky and I enjoy the chill on my body. I reach to my side and pull out the small jar. The creature stares at me curiously as I open the lid.
“Harm no human who brings you no harm,” I command. “And I shall release thee.”
The baby siren nods in agreement and I turn it loose in the ocean. Good start to the day.
GWB says: Nice.
Darleen Click says: Yes, very nice!
Cameron says: Thanks, guys. I really enjoy the Friday Fiction.
Dupin says: Me, too, even if it took me a while this week.
This was supposed to be a get-together with some old friends of mine from our college days, back when it still meant something. Except things didn’t go quite as planned. Sandy got sick and had to bow out, and Vicky’s granddaughter was getting an award at school, and, well, you get the picture. Pretty soon I was the only one who didn’t have some other place she had to be.
So here I am on the beach by myself, remembering the old days. None of us had a car back then, but we’d always manage to find someone who could give us a ride. Mostly people from various clubs we were in, but sometimes a boyfriend, especially one who liked to surf.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I’m glad to see things haven’t decayed as much here as some places. The beach house we used to pool our money to rent is still here, although it’s gotten a bit more dilapidated than I’d prefer, so I’m staying at a nearby hotel. And I brought my own chair instead of renting one from the little store that also ran a miniature golf course and a pinball arcade that was just beginning to include video games.
Tomorrow I head back home. I wish we could’ve all gotten together like in the old days, but maybe it’s just as well not to try to recreate the times we remember through rose-tinted glasses.
Navig8r says: Some writers claim to be not temperamental. Sadly, I do not enjoy that luxury. I went to the beach looking for inspiration to get past a writer’s block. There she was. If Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys hadn’t done Surfer Girl, she would have been my inspiration to write it and my block would have been solved. Instead, I am left with an even bigger multi-sensory mind worm of a block that will be almost impossible to clear. Guess I’ll have to go somewhere else. Desert is out. Sand would just remind me of the beach. Maybe the mountains . . .
Cameron says: Muses are jerks sometimes. -:-)
Dupin says: I remember one author who said that sometimes her muse wore stiletto heels and fishnet stockings.
Dupin says: A day without surfing is a wasted day, and I didn’t waste this one. The waves weren’t great, but they were cathartic. Surfing season’s over, but my Peruvian vacation’s been extended…indefinitely. Fishing comes next, but more for sustenance than relaxation.
I provide fish while others provide other foodstuffs. It was luck coming to this backwater place. They’re largely self-sufficient here. I’m doing my best to fit in since I’ll probably be here for the long haul…even have a cutie to share my bed.
Yellowstone blew its top. The northern hemisphere is hosed while we’re only getting some spillover here.
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