The exercise:
It's been a long time since I made use of the list prompt, so let's give that one another whirl, shall we? Use each of the following words in your poetry or prose today: play, follow, tumble, melody.
An evening of rain brought everyone into the house for dinner and a game of Pictionary. Hoping it lets up before tomorrow morning so we can get our market harvest done.
Mine:
He shares his gift with us, sitting at the piano and letting his fingers play with the ebony and ivory keys. The room of watchers is attentive, silent, captivated. We follow his every movement with curious eyes.
Some of us, I'm sure, wonder what it must take, what sacrifices were made, to be this good. I imagine a few go so far as to curse their parents for a childhood devoid of piano lessons - as if they had any interest in such training at that age.
At the back of the room a waiter stumbles over an extended leg and a wine glass tumbles to the floor. Without a blink our maestro incorporates the crash of glass into his melody. Not long after that another glass shatters on the tiles, but this one is no accident.
In a matter of minutes every glass in the house is in pieces on the floor and a new song has been born.
2 comments:
Pictionary is fun! Even for people like me who really can't draw very well :) Are those words from Max's blocks again? They're a harmonious selection this time.
Nicely constructed piece with a really neat conceit at the heart of it. I really enjoyed that, and am glad that I have to neither clean that place up afterwards nor foot the bill for replacing the glassware! I bet the waiter got sacked....
play follow tumble melody
Mine
"It's your son I need to speak to." The shadowed man still didn't move from the doorway, but now that Deborah knew that he had some kind of weapon she was less keen on seeing his face. Who knew what he might decide to do if he thought she knew who he was.
"He's not here," she said. She wanted to add obviously to the end but she didn't have the courage. She picked the pizza up from the counter and pulled the oven door roughly open, almost flinging the innocent food inside. She let the door slam and twisted the timer for twenty minutes.
"Well hell, little lady," he said, his voice unchanging, "I sure can see that. That might be why I'm asking you to tell me where he is. Nicely, I might point out. Because you can play games all night but I'm going to keep on asking."
"I've got all night," said Deborah with a confidence she didn't feel. "He's a good boy, he looks after his mother." She looked at the clock on the oven, and the man in the doorway followed her eyes.
"So he's expected home this evening," he said. "Huh, I figured that pizza was all for you."
She looked at him; no, she stared at him, a deer-in-the-headlights look. Her mind went blank, and all she could think was that she'd just done something really stupid. Her son would give her that roll of his eyes, that look....
Outside there was a sudden tuneful melody that she recognised as her son's favourite ringtone, and then a thump as though something had tumbled to the floor. She turned towards the sound, which was the back door, but the man in the doorway stepped backwards and there was a sudden scuffle. Then there was a gasp and the heavy thud of someone being thrown bodily through the doorway and sliding across the carpet.
Greg - oh, none of us playing could draw very well and it was still lots of fun :)
Not from the blocks this time, though now that you've reminded me I'm likely to give that prompt another go.
I am enjoying watching this scene play out, and I am impressed with how easily you incorporated all the list words into this portion.
And you've left things at quite the cliffhanger as well!
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