Wednesday October 18th, 2017

The exercise:

Write about something that is: viscous.

What? Just making sure you guys are paying attention...

Windy, chilly day here. Had the boys in town with me for a bit this morning before deciding to head indoors to catch the end of StrongStart. It was pretty busy but with only about half an hour to be there it was manageable.

Hung out with them at Kat's parents house after lunch so that she could have a session with one of her clients. Kat is driving Max to Learning Centre tomorrow and spending the day helping out there, so I'll be with Miles.

We shall see what sort of shenanigans we can get up to here in town.

Mine:

"That looks... oh man. I just ate, okay? Please don't stick your fingers in... oh man."

"You going to be okay?"

"That looks nasty. How are you not wearing gloves right now?"

"I think you're overreacting."

"Over...?"

"Jeez, look how thick this stuff is. Gonna need the special soap tonight to get this off."

"I'm going to be sick."

"Oh, pull yourself together man! We're professionals and we have a job to do."

"I didn't sign up for... this."

"Oh, relax. At least this stuff didn't come out of your nose."

3 comments:

Greg said...

Haha, my first thought wasn't "was that yesterday's prompt?" sadly, it was, "what on earth has Marc being doing that that's a prompt?" And reading through the story I'm suspicious that you've been spending too much time with the children... :-P Sounds like you're quickly getting used to not having to prepare for six-a.m. starts four days a week! I thought you wanted to help out at the school though -- how come Kat is?
Well, I'm going to steal the first few lines of yours so you can see where I thought you were taking things... but I really liked the ending for yours and am really hoping that the characters here are the those military officers you bring up from time to time :)

Viscous
"That looks... oh man. I just ate, okay? Please don't stick your fingers in... oh man."

"You going to be okay?"

"That looks nasty. How are you not wearing gloves right now?"

"I think you're overreacting. I'll wash my hands after we're finished. There's no chance of cross-contamination here, and gloves aren't cheap you know."

"...how expensive are they then?"

"You sound -- oh, did you double-glove?" Max's head sank for a moment and while he didn't sigh, the absence of a sigh was eloquent enough. "I guess it's a good job I'm not wearing gloves then."

"Sorry." Miles continued watching for a moment, and then he shuddered again and rubbed across his stomach with his hand. "I had a full English for breakfast, man."

Max snorted. "I think I told you when you started the course that an empty stomach was the way to go."

"You said that being hungry in one way would nurture the hunger in other ways too!"

"And that is true." Max pulled upwards and something stringy stretched taut, quivered, and snapped. "Just as it's true that a man with an empty stomach doesn't vomit over the evidence."

"Evidence is one thing," said Miles. "I want to be a forensic pathologist. But...."

"But?"

"But preparing pot-luck from the left-over evidence wasn't what I was expecting!"

"Page 14 of the syllabus," said Max with a faint smile. "Just before the Scrimshaw elective module. Which I strongly recommend by the way. Professor Rubin is an actual genius. He won the Turner prize two years ago for what he did with a murderer's teeth."

morganna said...

Marmalade
Thick, gooey, it slides
Like preserved sunshine 'til you
Bite the bitter rind.

Marc said...

Greg - hah, fair enough.

And Kat's helping out this time, I've got next. She wanted to have a chance to do it so I'll wait my turn.

I'm not sure I'd want this scene to play out in real life, but I do appreciate the way you've captured the relationship between the two here :)

Morganna - ah, marmalade. I think you've summed it up perfectly :)