Saturday Stuff

Don’t Fool with Mother Nature

Karen

“Mother never had a sense of humor.” He sat a moment staring at his hands before continuing. “Like the time I bought a can of fake snow and sprayed down her precious orange tree just outside our kitchen window.”

“What happened when she saw the tree?”

He smiled. “She nearly had a heart attack. Her expression was priceless. I couldn’t sit down for two days after that stunt but by God, it was worth it,” he sputtered out a maniacal laugh.

“Times up, Mr. Holden,” the prison guard addressed him.

Holden watched his client leave and swallowed back his distaste.

.

.

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Write up to 100 words, fact or fiction….

This is a themed writing meme hosted by Jenny Matlock. The goal is to write something that does not exceed 100 words (not including said prompt). The prompt is the picture above.

17 thoughts on “Don’t Fool with Mother Nature”

  5. I bet he tortured little kitty cats and puppy dogs too! Bad man! Bad, bad man!

    Thank you for the clever read. I so love this weekly centus because I adore seeing all the different takes on the same prompt. This was a wonderful write. I echo everything Anna said above.

  10. Norrkoping, Sweden,
    Sunday, January 9th, 2011

    Dear Karen,
    Wow. So far you are the first and only one to write a text that does not assume that the snow in the photo is real snow. When I first looked at that photo, the possibility that it could be fake snow did strike me. But I went with the idea that it was real snow, being as it is that we have had so much snow here, right now. (I just have to look out my window!)

    The second thing I would like to say is how cleverly you lead the reader into a conversation without letting on as to what the real situation was until the very last line.

    Great work!

    What more is there to say? Good character-study. We find out in the end that the speaker is an inmate, but you let us first know how cruel he is by letting us hear his little story about his prank with the fake snow. His glee at his mother’s near-heart-attack shows us his lack of feeling for others. The first line is so innocent: “Mother never had a sense of humor.” sets the reader up to be caught off guard.

    We learn in the last line that this text is from the perspctive of an attorney who is visiting his client in prison.

    Excellent SC-text!
    I’m impressed.

    You took a detective-story approach, but resisted the temptation to be vulgar, violent, crude, gorey or use bad language in any way. You got your point across in a charmingly suble way. And still the reader feels uneasy about this guy, and perhaps relieved that he is behind bars and not out and around.

    (I see something about the writer Dean Kootz on your sidebar. You must read alot of suspense-literature to have learned so much about writing it. I have also read several of his novels. But not this latest one.)

    I hope to read more of what you have written.

    Best wishes,
    Anna
    Anna’s SC#36

  13. Well done. And I like the twist at the end with him being in prison speaking to is attorney. (I was expecting a therapist or something along that line…)

    I have a feeling he’s a really bad guy.

    =)

  14. This was really, really well done! Very creative take on the prompt. I love the completeness of this. Bravo! Kat

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