Subject short story competition

[Danik 2016]

On LitNet there are some poetry contests threads but not a single short story competition, except the official one which had a last edition last year.
On this site there are a lot of people that write very good English prose. There sometimes are interesting short story contributions but they somehow remain isolated getting little attention from fellow Litnetters.
The idea is to stimulate the production and submission of short stories not only of those that already write them and would like them commented, but also from them who never wrote a story.
I think I need not ask you to follow the publishing rules of the site. I also want to emphasize that, they are short timed contests and like in the subject poetry contest and the minimalist poetry contest the winner doesn´t get a price. As the winner he determines the next subject, the submission deadline and evaluates the incoming contributions.
And our first theme is "Family", deadline August, 1st.
Let´s see how it goes!

[Danik 2016]

Well, as I suppose you are all very busy working on the short stories for the contest ;), I want to remind you, that there are still about twenty days to go.

If any one of you has concrete informations about on line publishing laws it would be very kind if he published that information or the correponding link here.

[heartwing]

And our first theme is "Family", deadline August, 1st.
Let´s see how it goes!




If any one of you has concrete informations about on line publishing laws it would be very kind if he published that information or the correponding link here.

I think perhaps it may also be helpful to have a word limit. Visually, you can sometimes see almost a whole poem on the screen and sometimes several which is why, I would imagine, the poetry threads hold a lot of appeal. If we thought of stories within 250, 500, and 1000 word limits we would hit that same sweet spot. If you go to a short story slam or submit to a journal publishing on the shortest end of this spectrum, limits like this are often used, though when publishing sometimes like 1250 is also used. This is just an idea. But it selfishly doesn't necessarily suit my purposes right now. I've got a work about family that is much longer, but is considered a short story. Still it may be more than forum readers may want to read in a sitting. And also, something - like this piece of mine - which is not published yet can give one pause if one does want to publish something.

Which brings me to my next point, about "laws." I'm not sure I'm interpreting this correctly and I don't want to be the absolute authority, but are you talking about copyright? Generally, what I've been told is that once work is published anywhere in the public domain with your name and a date attached somehow, it is considered yours, you own it, whether you are publishing your work through a journal, a public forum post, a blog. So the problem writers run into sometimes are journals and magazines who don't want to publish reprints and that is often qualified as work that has made a public appearance anywhere - ie, even blogs, etc. However, there are magazines and journals who accept reprints. Since this is a public forum I'm assuming the audience is pretty big and that can have an effect on editorial decisions.

I think what needs to be embraced is that this is one form of publishing. It can be quite fun. If participants want to dive headlong it may help prime the pump for both more experienced and newbie writers alike and that seems to be the spirit of what you're talking about, Danik 2016.

[YesNo]

I'm trying to think of something to submit for this thread, but prose is hard for me to write except maybe very short prose.

I agree that one should be aware that posting something here would probably mean it could not be submitted to some journal publishers who would want to be the first one to make the work available. That would be another reason to make it short.

[Danik 2016]

I think perhaps it may also be helpful to have a word limit. Visually, you can sometimes see almost a whole poem on the screen and sometimes several which is why, I would imagine, the poetry threads hold a lot of appeal. If we thought of stories within 250, 500, and 1000 word limits we would hit that same sweet spot. If you go to a short story slam or submit to a journal publishing on the shortest end of this spectrum, limits like this are often used, though when publishing sometimes like 1250 is also used. This is just an idea. But it selfishly doesn't necessarily suit my purposes right now. I've got a work about family that is much longer, but is considered a short story. Still it may be more than forum readers may want to read in a sitting. And also, something - like this piece of mine - which is not published yet can give one pause if one does want to publish something.

Which brings me to my next point, about "laws." I'm not sure I'm interpreting this correctly and I don't want to be the absolute authority, but are you talking about copyright? Generally, what I've been told is that once work is published anywhere in the public domain with your name and a date attached somehow, it is considered yours, you own it, whether you are publishing your work through a journal, a public forum post, a blog. So the problem writers run into sometimes are journals and magazines who don't want to publish reprints and that is often qualified as work that has made a public appearance anywhere - ie, even blogs, etc. However, there are magazines and journals who accept reprints. Since this is a public forum I'm assuming the audience is pretty big and that can have an effect on editorial decisions.

I think what needs to be embraced is that this is one form of publishing. It can be quite fun. If participants want to dive headlong it may help prime the pump for both more experienced and newbie writers alike and that seems to be the spirit of what you're talking about, Danik 2016.
I quite agree with you about the limit of words. I thought about it, but confess that I am a bit at a loss about what limit to name.
Let´s say until 1000 words just as a reference, nobody is actually going to count the words. It can be a micro short story or a short story.
Answering your second question, yes I mean copyright,HW. I have noticed people participating in poetry contests, but they seem a bit fearful of participating of short story contests, maybe because of copyright matters. That´s why it would be very important to clear that point up before starting the contest.

[Danik 2016]

I'm trying to think of something to submit for this thread, but prose is hard for me to write except maybe very short prose.

I agree that one should be aware that posting something here would probably mean it could not be submitted to some journal publishers who would want to be the first one to make the work available. That would be another reason to make it short.

From what I have seen of your prose on line Y/N you have a natural gift of observation, of describing, narrating and summing up situations and, more specifically, that you have an unique sense of humour and parody superior to the humour you yourself seem to prefer. I think if you started with some kind of family comedy situation that could make a good story, no matter if short or very short.

[YesNo]

From what I have seen of your prose on line Y/N you have a natural gift of observation, of describing, narrating and summing up situations and, more specifically, that you have an unique sense of humour and parody superior to the humour you yourself seem to prefer. I think if you started with some kind of family comedy situation that could make a good story, no matter if short or very short.

Thanks, Danik! Here it is. Just a recollection of a hiking trip.

--------------------------------

Walking the Incline

It goes up a mile toward Pikes Peak and runs straight while the Barr Trail leading all the way to Pikes Peak winds about to the left. Taking the Incline reduces the linear length of the Barr Trail by three miles at the expense of more exhaustion since you are going straight up a rough stairs made out of railroad ties. If you know what you are looking for you can see the Incline as you enter Manitou Springs. It looks like a straight line of clear-cut going down the mountain. There’s a T-shirt “survivors” can buy in a store that reads “Never Again!” and there is a warning at the base that this is an extreme trail, which it is. People have died trying to reach the top, but people have died trying to do a lot of things. Someone experienced and trying to beat a clock could do it in 30 minutes or so as a couple of hikers mentioned who easily passed me by. It took me an hour and a half. At least I finished and I resisted taking the “Bail Out”, a short connecting trail joining the Barr Trail offering a way down about two-thirds of the way up.

There are people who really shouldn’t be on this trail. I doubt I will ever do it again.

I went up with some experienced family members. They gave reasonable warnings about taking enough water. The most experienced on the trail thought to check the soles of my walking shoes at the base of the incline where it was really too late to do anything about them. “Are they adequate?” “No.”

Others gave me advice on not trying to walk too fast followed by not taking too long of a break because otherwise we would never get to the top. I understood. I have met these family members before. They are looking for something or someone new to meet besides me. Some feel responsible for me like a baby sitter who would rather be texting her boyfriend. Besides, they had to keep an eye on me since this was my first time.

It made me realize there is a benefit to walking alone, except for the potential cardiac arrest. You can stop, check to see if the view is worth the disk space on your phone to simulate the experience of it, and if you really want human communication there are many on this trail just as exhausted as you are and needing a break who wouldn’t mind exchanging a smile or a few words. That is all that it takes and the body feels rejuvenated. There is more to using the heart than overworking a machine.

Impatience is a kill-joy. It would take an eternity to meet all that is worth meeting in the present, but we move on.

The downward trail takes about the same amount of time. Some hikers run down this trail. They miss the scenery of trees, shrubbery, boulders and fence railings by focusing on the uneven dirt path below them. They have better things to do when they get to the bottom like starting the climb all over again. In my case, I’m not going to make this climb ever again and there is some doubt if I will even see some of these family members again, but if I were younger and more sure of my footing I would run down as well. There is nothing like teasing gravity to give one the sensation that we are all falling together.

[Danik 2016]

Thanks, Yes/No. I liked it very much. Maybe one definition of good prose is the art to make every subject
look interesting.
I hope your contribution stimulates other posters.

[heartwing]

Answering your second question, yes I mean copyright,HW. I have noticed people participating in poetry contests, but they seem a bit fearful of participating of short story contests, maybe because of copyright matters. That´s why it would be very important to clear that point up before starting the contest.

If there is fear because one is worried about someone ripping off a piece, maybe there is not the knowledge that once a piece is published by someone anywhere, that person owns that copyright. This very rarely happens: Getting ripped off. I have observed a wariness in some writers too but in a contest like this or sharing materials, one has to decide one is just going to enter into the spirit and not worry about what could be, which could strike a writer about once in 500,000 times or greater.

The worst that could happen is that one will be copied without a poster's permission in which case the original author is within their legal rights and has proof of the original date of publication - they are within their rights to take action.

If one knows one's rights and is convinced that having one's work usurped surreptitiously is a comfortable enough rarity so that entering into a contest is enjoyable, then hey, why not go for it. It's a contest, it's a game, it's for fun, yay!

One still may hesitate because of publishing work which one could not be published again. And that's another thing to get comfortable with: This may happen. I think it is far more likely in paying markets. But I know because I've published in nonpaying markets that it is possible to find that publication and editor who is open to reprints, the writer just has to be forthcoming with this information. (And this may happen with some paying markets too. I'm just speaking about what I know the most about personally. Every time I look into a paying market, they make this stipulation: They want submissions that are not reprints.)

But if you just want to have fun, this is the place for you, people. Let's show those poets who's boss. ha ha.

[heartwing]

I may post several. Yeah, why not. What do you think, Danik? I will keep them as compact as possible but all revolving on this theme of family. I don't know if I will generate more than one but it could be an interesting exercise if this is acceptable to post more than one and who knows, maybe that would encourage others too. Trying to be too perfect also blocks up one's creativity and I know this happens to me, and perhaps others. If each writer felt they had more than one chance to submit something maybe there wouldn't be the fear that whatever they put forward would have to be "the one." I will also look out for short stories that have been posted elsewhere and invite others to participate. I am still pretty new to the forum so I am still getting used to the way things work.

[Danik 2016]

Thanks for your entusiasm HW! As this thread is still on an experimental basis I want to ask all of you to post only one story pro person. Those who have written more than one text, will have the chance to post all, for if everything goes well, the contest will continue with the winner from the first contest, who in his turn, will hand it over to the next winner. The idea is to make it continuous, so any one will have several chances to post his stories.
Important: Even if you have already posted your story, you can work on it until the deadline date, if you want to change or improve it.

[heartwing]

Thanks for your entusiasm HW! As this thread is still on an experimental basis I want to ask all of you to post only one story pro person. Those who have written more than one text, will have the chance to post all, for if everything goes well, the contest will continue with the winner from the first contest, who in his turn, will hand it over to the next winner. The idea is to make it continuous, so any one will have several chances to post his stories.

I gotcha, Danik! No problem! Thanks for the help and I am already looking to see how I might correct a story in progress and post it.

[Danik 2016]

I am looking forward to it, HW! :)

[heartwing]

When Frank and Aida, my adopted parents, drove me up to Mama’s house in Fort Worth, I told them not to follow me in. I had just discovered from papers I found that they were not my biological parents. Now I was not calling them Mom and Dad anymore but “Frank and Aida.” For thirteen years they had lied. They told me I was theirs. No wonder I never saw fat pictures of Aida preggers with me. On my birth certificate I read my biological mama’s reason for giving up her rights: “Abandonment” like I was some unwanted kid left at a fire house station.

“Take me to my real Mama,” I said to them when they saw what I had found. And from then on, I called them by their first names Frank and Aida. And from then on, every day, I insisted they make the trek from Abilene to Fort Worth to see Mama. Every time I said that name “Mama” I watched Aida’s eyes wince up like she’d sucked on a lemon peel. When they didn’t take me and Aida kept boo hooing, I said: “Either take me to my real Mama’s or I am going to tell those people at the church and country club I've been kidnapped, I've been livin’ with liars.” And because this was halfway true on account of the lying, they drove me to Mama’s house.

When we arrived, I slammed the car door shut and slung my guitar over my back. I used to wear it all the time in those days like it was a knapsack or a rifle. I rapped on the car window and watched them start. I was making them jumpy and I liked that.

I motioned to Aida to roll down the window. I told them to stay outside. They seemed so much smaller compared to the time before, when I didn’t know anything. They couldn’t tell me anything anymore.

Mama’s lawn was all scraggly with a few bushes around the base of the house that looked like the life was getting choked out of them. Her house was a fake adobe, faded peach. I pressed the cracked doorbell. When no one answered, I used a plastic card to jimmy the lock. And there she was – Mama - sitting in her living room with a dark skinned guy, like the Native American who cries when he sees litter on the highway. He was dressed in feathers and smoking a pipe.

Mama’s teeth were white and straight, her hair long and blond. She looked like Cheryl Tiegs. She wore a low cut tunic which had a neckline that showed her tan breastbone. Frank and Aida had told me her name was Kathy, but I asked her anyway.

“So what’s your name?” I said, hoping I looked like Jodie Foster.

“Well what do you want to call me?”

“What about Cheryl?”

“Cheryl it is, then. And this is Joe. Sit down,” she said, patting a floor pillow. I sat with my legs crossed, the guitar resting on my thigh.

“Play us a tune,” said Cheryl.

I played and sang a John Denver song about walking in the rain.

When I was finished, Cheryl said “So what brought you here, coon tail?” She picked up the ends of a rope belt I wore. The ends were made of an animal pelt.

I didn’t know how to answer the question. Joe’s lips were like blue black tanned leatherwith a slit where the pipe stem entered.

“Aida and Frank tell me I’m your mother.”

Smoke rose before Joe’s black eyes. I thought of the inky substance in my Magic 8 Ball. Will Todd Jenkins kiss me? Better not tell you now. Will I marry Shaun Cassidy? Don’t count on it. Will I be rich and famous? Concentrate and ask again.

“No daughter of mine goes around wearing a rat,” said Mama. She handed me the pipe. She showed me how to smoke it. I tried it and got sick. She dressed me in a peasant blouse and faded jeans and cleaned my face. I smoked again with Joe and he pierced my ears with a taper he kept in a leather satchel.

“You’ve got a nice little body,” Mama said and looked at me long.

I felt strange, like a feeling I shouldn’t have with my mother in the room. Joe’s thighs rested on the carpet. There was a dark space between his skin and leather skirt. His chest was as smooth as chocolate.

“When the offering plate gets passed this Easter, stick your paw in and grab a bill, like this,” she said. She pulled the front of her tunic lower and picked up a bowl next to her. She leaned into Joe as she passed it, pressing her breast on his arm. “While he’s looking at what he can’t resist, you ooch out a fiver or a Hamilton or a C-note.”

She gave me a stamped envelope with a P.O. Box address printed on it. “Send me the money and if you don’t get it, you’re no daughter of mine.”

When I sent her the envelope with money in it, she wrote back and said “OK you little *****. I'm coming for a visit.” It was hard for me to imagine Cheryl Tiegs using the word “*****.”

I did it for her though, even when I had lied before, about actually doing it. I just stole from Frank and Aida.

On the Sunday Mama sat beside me in church, Jesus hanging on the cross watching, I unhooked a button while my mark sang “Eternal Father Strong to Save.” His voice caught on who bidst the mighty ocean deep its own appointed limits keep. He adjusted his tie. The heat radiating from him could have fueled a room.

We moved onto bigger marks. And Frank and Aida always thought we were just hanging out. They said they had decided spending time with my mother was important to the formation of my identity.


© Meg Sefton

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

[Danik 2016]

A very good story, HW! I suppose you must have a blog or some other means of publication somewhere. This is a contribution of a experienced writer.

[heartwing]

A very good story, HW! I suppose you must have a blog or some other means of publication somewhere. This is a contribution of a experienced writer. Thank you, Danik. I have a blog, yes - several under various names - which mostly house reprints of what has appeared elsewhere, as part of an online or print publication. But this is not on any site right now. I wanted to use something I've been working on and see if I could push it a little further in the process of adding it to the pot. I will consider this "published" as of a couple of days ago.

I have been writing a long time, about twenty five years.

[Pompey Bum]

It was disturbing and made me a little angry. That makes it an effective story where I live. Damn good.

[heartwing]

It was disturbing and made me a little angry. That makes it an effective story where I live. Damn good. Thanks, PB. Because the story has the potential to be a bit incendiary, I've decided to attach a disclaimer. Also, I was trying to remain anonymous on the site but this is not necessarily a reality when posting original work.

[YesNo]

Nice story, heartwing!

[heartwing]

Nice story, heartwing! Thank you, YesNo! I hope you and I will have started something and there'll be more takers! Or should I say: Givers. ha.

[Danik 2016]

What regards me, you will remain anonymous HW. I am from another country and I don´t know your real name.
But thanks to you both Y/N and HW for the high level of your contributions. I feel we had a good start.

[heartwing]

What regards me, you will remain anonymous HW. I am from another country and I don´t know your real name.
But thank you both Y/N and HW for the high level of your contributions. I feel we had a good start. I am not known here by anyone either. Definitely how I like it, actually, but that works against you when you're about to come out with a collection or two and you are thinking ahead toward a readership. I hope this will be happening for me in the next year or so. I also hope more people will contribute to the thread. That would be fabu.

[Danik 2016]

Just one comprehension doubt, HW, I see you are on line. Who is the singing "my mark" in the paragraph before last. Joe?

[heartwing]

Just one comprehension doubt, HW, I see you are on line. Who is the singing "my mark" in the paragraph before last. Joe? Thank you, Danik. I added the phrase "in church" to see if that clears things up but I didn't want the mark to be Joe. He already knows about their short con. But I definitely don't want it to be confusing. I am open to suggestions.

The mark is just supposed to be some random innocent guy who is being distracting from singing hymns while the narrator steals from the offering plate. The offering plate goes around at one point during the church service and money gets tossed in. I envisioned the mother being there with the narrator to witness the con. I didn't necessarily envision Joe being there but I don't know if it matters, but yeah, suddenly he's not mentioned so...

This is really the beauty of posting in a public forum like this. I've seen my own stuff so much I don't always see what may be missing. Something doesn't always have to be missing, but sometimes this is the case and it helps to know.

Maybe I need to revisit the last couple of paragraphs.

[Danik 2016]

Thanks, HW. My interpretation of the final paragraphs was wrong, but now, with your explanation, everything is fitting nicely. I don´t think there is any need to change the last part for comprehension reasons.

[heartwing]

Ok. Well I started to realize too I may be assuming too much about people knowing what goes on in church, or for the most part at least a typical protestant church. I wonder if I shouldn't add just a bit much just to clarify that just a bit. The piece is going to need to stand alone and I do care about it very much. I've actually worked on it a while. I don't know why I care about it. So many unlikable characters. ha. But what happens to the narrator, as tough as she believes she is in the beginning, is something I care about so I want it all to stand alone. Thanks for your feedback, Danik. I really appreciate it. If you have any more for the piece, you can post it here or message me or if anyone else wants to give me constructive feedback, I am open to it through a message or here. I know how to handle such feedback so no worries about being honest. And it's likely this piece will remain fluid for a while. I may pursue publication as a reprint. But not for a bit.

[Danik 2016]

In that matter of con, catholic churches are very similar, they have the plate too, and I shouldn´t wonder if nowadays there might occur thefts. Thiefs are stealing more incredible things like bronze plates and statues from the cemeteries.
I shall love to talk to you about the story, per post or PM as you prefer as soon as the contest is over. As usual with the poetry contexts, I'm also going to make a short comment on each of the stories that come in.

[Danik 2016]

Just a reminder. For those writing stories for the subject short story contest, there is still a week to go.
Deadline: August, 1st

[Danik 2016]

For those writing stories for the subject short story contest, there are still some days to go!

[Danik 2016]

There are still two days to go.
We are waiting for your submissions!:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

[Danik 2016]

Short Story Contest
Deadline 1st August

[Danik 2016]

24 hours for posting your stories for the short story contest!

[Danik 2016]

Thank you both again Yes/No and heartwing for the high quality of your contributions.
Yes/No
Walking the Incline-
Yes/No, I enjoyed your text very much. It´s great merit is to recount a personal recollection in an interesting manner.
It´s a visual narrative, the reader follows you as if he was watching a film. You start with an accurate description of the Incline and the information that it is a dangerous walk. This immediately catches the interest of the reader.
Well, after putting your readers on guard about the danger, there comes a piece of typical Yes/ No humor: “People have died trying to reach the top, but people have died trying to do a lot of things.” And again there is a change of tone as you show, that even if you reached the summit alive, it wasn´t so easy after all.
The adventure in itself produces some family conflict, as certain of its younger members found it their duty to look after you. Anyway, the presence of different people on the same trail makes you reflect on how age influences this kind of walk.
The last sentence puzzled me a bit. Somehow I visualized a plastic gyrating globe, with small humans on its surface toppling over each other.
Anyway, I think that mathers most of all is the good prose which deserves to be cultivated.
Heartwing
Texas Twist, 1978
I enjoyed this story about education in a reversed sense.
It highlights a significant change in the life of a girl, told by herself but from an older perspective.
Having discovered at 13 that she is not the biological daughter of the couple that raised her, but an adopted child she seeks out her biological mother and does everything she can to get closer to her.
The theme for the quest of biological parents it not so unusual (I don´t know in US, but in Brazil it is a recurrent issue in the soap operas). What is new and interesting is the ironic treatment of it. In the soap operas, the biological parents are usually better, more loving and richer than the adoptive ones, preferably all this together. If they prove inadequate, they usually disapear from scene very quickly.
In Texas Twist, the development of the story is fuelled by the tensions between lines: the tension between the girl and her foster parents, mostly referred to as “Frank and Aida”; the tension between the girl and Kathy.
There is an implicit contrast between the foster parents and Kathy and Joe.It seems that the narrator never felt much at home with the couple that adopted her, or the discovery of a lie, even on an important issue as this, wouldn’t lead to an almost complete estrangement. To her “Frank and Aida” represent the conventions which include the keeping up of appearances at all costs. While they are portrayed together (the one individualizing feature of Aida is her showing disconfort when the biological mother is called "Mama"). "Mama" and Joe, on the other hand, are shown as good looking and attractive. And "mama's" casual treament of herself contrasts favorably with the cringing hypocrisy of the foster parents.
Whether moved by loneliness or adolescent rebelliousness or maybe both, the girl is only too ready to accept as “mama” anyone different enough from “Frank and Aida”. And Kathy, the biological mother, who lives in the ethnical and socially incendiary city of Fort Worth is disposed to teach her everything that her adopted parents will disapprove of.
But she imposes conditions, using the magical formula “a daughter of mine”. And the girl, who wants so desperately to belong, answers with her guitar “I'll do anything to keep you satisfied”.
I wonder where this will lead up to if this forceful tale where much more is implied than told is extended.
*****


And the oficial winner is heartwing, Congrats!In fact, congrats to both!
I feel we all must talk about mantaining or not this context. The first result was surprising by the quality of the posts, but it remains to see if and how we'll go on with the thread.

[YesNo]

Congratulations, heartwing!. I assume heartwing will come up with another theme for the next round?

Thanks for the comments, Danik! The last sentence puzzles me as well now.

[Danik 2016]

Before we get on to the next round, let´s think if its necessary to make any changes. For example is one month too much time?
I would love suggestions for improvement.

[YesNo]

I'd like it every two weeks, but we would need enough participants. Also setting the deadline on the first and 15th of each month would resolve the deadline.

[Danik 2016]

Good suggestions, Yes/No.

[Danik 2016]

As heartwing couldn´t take over the contest, the next edition will be comanded by Yes/No.

[YesNo]

I hope everything is OK with heartwing.

Here is the prompt for the next short story contest: Write a story about a flood.

The story doesn't have to be long. Just long enough.

Deadline in one week (next Wednesday) provided there are at least two entries. Otherwise I will extend it for another week.

[Danik 2016]

.........

[Danik 2016]

:cryin::cryin::cryin::cryin::cryin:

[YesNo]

I missed your story, Danik. Could you repost it?

[Danik 2016]

Noah 2016

The thin water trail seeping slowly in under the door like a snake, was the sign. They hastily grabbed the food left on the kitchen sink and went up.

Everything had been done to protect the house. The entrance door had been raised high above the ground. The fridge, the stove and all the kitchen movables had been duly surrounded by floats. On the upper floor the wooden bedsteads had given way to cement niches up high in the walls.

They fingered their cell phones frantically. No connection!

The baby started to cry. They cleaned and changed him as well as they could and comforted him with the cold bottle.

Then they sat down in the weird sleeping room among bulks of wrapped up furniture and huge plastic bags hanging from the ceiling, eating cheese sandwiches and drinking cola. Food had the effect to calm them.

Again they looked out of the windows. The water now covered the whole door. They bolted the windows carefully and ascended in an Indian row to the flat roof of the house followed by the two yelping puppies.

The roof with its grilling corner was mostly used for birthday celebrations and weekend parties. But now, with the rain pouring down it was an inhospitable place.

They bedded the baby on the grill plate, the only sheltered place up there. They wrapped themselves from head to feet in plastic sacks. They finished the last coke and entertained themselves playing football with the empty dose. Then it went overboard toppling into the muddy sauce below.

Three pairs of eyes followed it as it swam out of sight. The dirty pool was still rising. They could see four or five insulated cars halfway under water in the middle of the street, a desperate arm waiving out of one of them. A sofa went floating by, a swimming dog, a plastic bottle, lots of garbage... The rubber boats of the fire brigade went to and fro, taking in people.

They tried the dead cell phones again and again.

Two blocks down they spotted a half stranded bus, the passengers on the roof making wild signs, trying to attract the notice of the buzzing helicopters.

Of course, the helicopters! They were their only hope. One of them took off his soaked red T-shirt and waived it as a flag. But it was much too small to attract any attention.

Meanwhile the pilot of the biggest helicopter looked at his watch and yawned. Fifteen minutes yet to go. He longed to go home to his family. It had been a busy afternoon, flying over the flooded areas, spotting insulated people, giving support to the reportages. His wife had phoned twice. She would have phoned more often, but the district they crossed just now was on black out.

Suddenly, the cameraman sitting beside him pointed down.

Something rare was going on, on the roof of one of the flood belted houses. He brought the plane as close as he could. He blinked. Then he distinguished the three kids standing in the downpour, wrapped from head to feet in plastic bags and holding an open football club flag between them. Minutes later the image was on all TV screens.

After what seemed an age, the fire brigade arrived with saving equipment. The whole country watched and held its breath. First they took in the girl clinging to the baby and the baby bag. Then they went for the boys. When the rescue basket made one more voyage, bringing in the two soaked puppies, the oldest boy sighed gratefully and leaned back on his seat.

Far below them the brown lake advanced covering everything.

[YesNo]

Nice eerie effect. I had not thought that in such situations many of the people who needed rescue might not be seen by those in the helicopters who are getting tired and becoming even more unable to help. Good title.

[Danik 2016]

Thanks for your comments, Yes/No. This is only a very very light version of what happens here in some quarters of my city during the summer floods. The story was inspired in a TV scene showing the rescue of a family with its two pets by the fire brigade.
The reality is usually far more desorganized as in the story, but I wanted it to have a happy end

[YesNo]

We had some large flooding in Louisiana recently that your story reminded me of. I think you captured well the fear involved under such circumstances as well as the different perspectives of the people involved. I assumed it wasn't a happy ending for everyone. I wonder if those people on the bus got to safety.

My only suggestion for improving it is to add blank lines between the paragraphs since indenting isn't easy to do on these pages. That would make the format easier to read.

[Danik 2016]

That must habe been terrible too. What makes it worse here, is that the houses in some districts are very precarious. They are usually badly build and badly distributed on the hillsides and very often they slide down, producing hundreds of homeless people. The people on the top of the buses use to be saved. But people die when the houses slide down or because they are carried by the flood.

[Danik 2016]

Done. It really looks better now. I am glad the English doesn´t sound too foreign.

I am going to propose a new theme, let´s see if anything happens.
Write a narrative of maximal 1000 words about a personal recollection or a short story related to religion.

PS-Remember that all faiths are represented in this community.

[YesNo]

Yes, it is easier to read. I'll try to come up with something by this weekend on the new theme.

[Danik 2016]

Great, Yes/No. I´m looking forward to it.

[YesNo]

That morning when Matthew went to the kitchen of the old farm house to make breakfast, he saw Aunt Joan on the other side of the room, his scary aunt, the one who took care of him for a year while he was in second grade because she lived in town so he could walk to school giving his parents time to sort out what parents needed to sort out. Even at that young age he could tell his aunt didn’t really want him interrupting her life although his younger brother told him years later that it was Aunt Joan who suggested the arrangement.

The last he heard, which wasn’t recently, Aunt Joan was living in Phoenix where the weather was hot and the dry, desert air was better for her. He was in Maine and this late Autumn morning was cold. By evening there would be an accumulation of snow that would stay until Spring.

His aunt and his parents had fought over something years ago, but no one told Matthew what it was about. He just knew they stopped meeting at her home for parties almost a decade ago and a few years later she moved to Arizona. His younger brother who paid more attention to technical adult affairs as he grew up, because he was the one who asked more questions, thought it had to do with an inheritance matter and he even had ideas about who was at fault. Matthew didn’t care. Now in his twenties he only remembered being glad when his parents were able to take him back.

Matthew didn’t know what to do with Aunt Joan. She looked unhappy, but all that he could imagine that would make her unhappy happened very long ago and now that he was more or less an adult, he understood her side better. He wouldn’t want to take care of an eight year old either. All he could think of saying was, “It’s OK.” She looked happier after hearing that or maybe he wanted her to be happier after he said that. She came a long way and she didn’t have to. If nothing else, he wanted her to know, since he just realized it, that he was thankful it was her who took care of him that strange year.

Later that morning Matthew’s mother called. “Your Aunt Joan died in Phoenix early this morning.”

“Yes. She said she was sorry.”

[Danik 2016]

I enjoyed your story very much, specially in the subtle way it linked the themes "family" and "religion". Indeed it is about "understanding and forgiving", ideas that are superior to particular religions. You also are very much at home in reproducing that complex atmosphere of family feelings with its secrets and its silences.And Aunt Joan is an interesting character.
That said, here are some edditing suggestions that might improve the story.
In the first paragraph the appearance of "Aunt Joan", the climax of the story (even if the reader doesn´t know it yet) could be more emphasised.
My suggestion:
I would leave out the first long sentence and start with something like:
" That morning when Matthew went to the kitchen of the old farm house to make breakfast, he saw...."

I would finish the story with the dialogue lines, without any explanation:
“Yes. She said she was sorry.”

And I didn´t quite understand why the title is in the plural form. For me there is one important message.

Anyway, please don´t get angry at my suggestions. The aim is to better what´s already good.

[YesNo]

I liked your suggestions and made the changes. I also make a note in my Google Doc of this story noting your contribution. I was trying to include the notion of coming to a "conclusion", but it was strained.

I've told this story before since I am still trying to make sense out of my aunt's appearance. There are two messages. One was my message to her that "It's OK" and the other was her message, probably not for me as much as for my parents, about her being sorry. Of course, I thought it was all about me, but I realized in writing this that other people were involved and I may have failed in my task to deliver her message to the intended recipients.

Most the story is true except for the last sentence. I did not actually tell my parents what she said. My excuse was I did not, at the time, think the message was for them and I did not want them to think negatively of my aunt.

Thanks for reading and for the suggestions!

[Danik 2016]

Thanks, Yes/No. That´s an amazing story! I had the impression it might be based on a true experience. It´s much easier to understand now.What perhaps might become clearer in the story is the message of your aunt. In the story she doesn´t say anything, but just looks sad.

On rereading the story, a last suggestion: I would reproduce Aunt Joan saying the words "I am sorry" and finish with the words of Mattheu's mother. It´s more effective, because only then your reader will know that that the student had seen the spirit of his aunt.

[YesNo]

I suppose the two messages should be made clearer. I am coming up with another version that I will post separately tomorrow. The aunt needs to say something as you suggest.

I am also hoping to see another story by you or anyone else who wants to add a story.

[Danik 2016]

It´s much clearer than it was before. You usually write very clearly, but as Aunt Joan is the product of a personal experience, maybe she was a bit jumbled in with emotional issues.

If I can think of a story I´ll write it.

[YesNo]

Thanks. If this thread does nothing else it will give both of us stories we can use later.

I am planning to enclose the story within a slightly larger story.

[Danik 2016]

That would be quite more than I iniatially expected from it. Take all the time you need Yes/Noto shape your story there is no deadline.

[Danik 2016]

I have been thinking of transforming this thread in a kind of laboratory for posting and editing short fiction but I found out that I can´t edit the title or the first post any more.

[Pompey Bum]

I have been thinking of transforming this thread in a kind of laboratory for posting and editing short fiction but I found out that I can´t edit the title or the first post any more.

You could always start a new thread.

[YesNo]

You could start a new thread. Threads come and go. I see them as opportunities to post something that I have stored on Google drive.