Wednesday November 4th, 2015

The exercise:

Write about something that is: divine.

The Colony will have to wait until tomorrow. Not feeling up to it tonight.

Spent some time this afternoon organizing Max's corner of the living room. It's amazing how much more space there is in here now. Very much worth making the time to finally take care of that.

Now all we have to do is get Max to agree that this is how it should always look after he's done playing with his toys or reading his books...

Mine:

"We're in serious trouble this time," Kelly whispered to her little brother. They were standing in the living room of their home, less than an hour before their parents were due to return from seeing a movie.

"I think it will be okay." Kevin replied with a quick shrug.

"That depends on what you mean by it," Kelly hissed back. "Is it being grounded for the rest of our teenage years? The pain of having our favorite toys taken away forever? The looks Mom and Dad will give us every day until we die? That one that says We are so very, very disappointed in the both of you?"

"Nah, none of that dramatic junk is gonna happen."

The look Kelly gave her brother was the dictionary definition of incredulous.

"Come on, have some faith sis."

"I don't think prayer is going to save us from Mom and Dad's wrath. Nor is it going to magically fix all of these broken vases and picture frames and chairs and shelves and televisions..."

"I ain't talking about prayer, sis. I'm talking about our explanation for what happened while they were out."

"Which would be...?"

"Divine intervention."

"... I wish you the very best of luck with that one. I'm going upstairs to pack my suitcase."

3 comments:

Greg said...

The best way to get Max to do that is to point out the good example you're setting by always tidying your stuff away as well, surely? That doesn't work in the slightest with dogs, who are completely convinced that you're the unpaid help whose job it is to tidy up and provide food and warmth, so you're definitely better off than me in that regard!
Hmm, Kelly definitely seems brighter than her brother... but I like his optimism better and think he'd be one of those great friends that you try not be around when the adults start approaching :) I kind of wish we'd seen the idea he had that caused all the damage in the first place though!

Divine
"What did she say her name was?" hissed Magrethe. She and the other assistant librarian were standing side-by-side behind the Sixticton library desk forming a tiny human wall. In front of them, holding a pale, pudgy hand out for a membership card was a large woman in a purple dress that was clearly too small for her. The fabric stretched across her frame, shiny where it was under the greatest tension, squeezing rolls of fat and ripples of cellulite until they oozed from cuffs and collar.
"Divine," whispered back Connie.
"Well she's spelled it De-vein!"
"Maybe she can't spell; she clearly has no idea how to pick her clothes out."
"Miaow!" whispered Magrethe, though in truth she'd been wondering if the purple outfit was a dress or just opaque cling-film. "Well, I guess we can't stop her joining because she looks like that, or because she's got a name like something you do to shrimp."
"We can't?"
"We let him join." She gestured at Sixticton's skinny thug, who was sitting at a table with the tip of his tongue poking pinkly between his lips as he tried to do the crossword in the local newspaper. He was wearing an outsized leather jacket that wasn't zipped up enough and revealed a hairless chest with too-prominent ribs, leather wrist bands, a white cotton sweatband round his unwashed hair and ripped jeans that kept reminding patrons that he'd gone commando. "He's about two steps up from a murder-hobo."
"Have we still got one of those living in the dumpsters out back?"
"Two. Sybil thinks they might be breeding."
"Fine, give her the card."
"Thank-you," said Devein, her voice scratchy like a vinyl record bought at a yard sale. "Is this library vegetarian?"
Magrethe looked at Connie and Connie looked at Magrethe.
"I did find a rasher of bacon used as a bookmark a couple of weeks ago," said Connie. She frowned. "It wasn't the first time."

morganna said...

Sudden
Blasphemy and
A bolt of lightning comes
Swiftly down from the sky, it's hard to find
An atheist around here but there's lots
Of choices for gods to believe
In, and temples in all
Colors, shapes, and
Sizes.

Marc said...

Greg - me too. Problem was I couldn't decide on their exact age, so I then couldn't decide on what sort of trouble they'd gotten into. House party for the ages seems like a good guess though.

Oh my. Sixticton continues to come to life. Not sure that's a good thing, but you do it so well that it's hard to complain :P

Morganna - quite like this take on the prompt. Was half expecting an acrostic when I first saw the format, but as it turned out an acrostic wasn't needed to make this one work. So... nicely done!