Wednesday December 10th, 2014

The exercise:

Write about: the message in a bottle.

Feels weird writing about something other than secret agent shenanigans. I suppose leaving mine open to possible continuations means that I don't necessarily have to leave my character behind. We'll see if or when he returns.

There is a Christmas tree up at Kat's parents place but it hasn't been put up yet. I'm pretty sure Max is going to lose his mind once it's put in place.

And then lose it all over again when it's time to decorate it.

Mine:

Kelsey was a lonely child.

Her parents both toiled at jobs that occupied more of their time than she considered to be reasonable. A lawyer for a mother, a surgeon for a father. It left few opportunities for family bonding.

Their work did at least pay for a very beautiful house, on a very large property. Her friends would have loved exploring all the hallways and rooms and fancy staircases. In the summer they would have played endlessly on the rolling green lawn, picked flowers from the gardens.

If she'd had any friends, that is.

There was a small pond at the rear of the estate that Kelsey liked to visit almost every day. At first she just sat in the grass and read her books. Later, she practiced singing songs she heard on the radio. She had a lovely voice, and no one to tell her so.

One day, for no reason she could explain, she brought an empty bottle to the pond's edge. She placed a folded piece of paper inside, with only the words Is anyone out there? written on it, and tossed it into the water. She stood there watching it bob up and down for almost an hour, then returned to the house.

The next day she fished the bottle out of the pond using the pool cleaner's net. She checked inside, found her letter and her words, put it back in the bottle, and lobbed it back in again. She repeated this process every day for nearly a year.

Then came a rainy, misty morning in November. Kelsey made her way to the water's edge once more, her rubber boots making squelching sounds as each step escaped the mud. She retrieved the bottle, checked the note as usual. Same words as every time before. Except the handwriting was not hers.

Kelsey was a frightened child.