Four Years...A Short Story

The Weekly Writing Prompt

I missed last week's writing prompt. I was a little busy, but this week I'm back. In honor of this week's announcement that many of these little story gems are going to be released in e-book form on May 10, 2013, I decided to write about a writer. Of course, the picture lends itself to just such a subject perfectly. It is a great picture--so many possibilities for stories.

Here are the rules, if you're not familiar with them:

1) Use the photo and the 5 words provided in your story
2) Keep your word count 500 words or less.
3) You have until next Tuesday, May 7th, 2013, to link up your post.
4) Click on one of these links: Nicole, Carrie, Tena or Leanne, submit your story in the inLinkz link.
5) Have fun, don’t stress, let those creative juices flow!

This week's randomly generated mandatory words are:

Mole

Napkin

Poison

Concert

Neck

And so, here's what I came up with...

 Four Years

Yesterday marked exactly four years since I sold my last manuscript, my procrastination being a fact my agent, editor, and mother take every opportunity possible to remind me of on a daily--sometimes, hourly--basis. Not all the nagging from the collective pains in the neck is bad, however. At least I know if I died, three people would need to adopt a new hobby.

I don't know why I wandered into the bookstore yesterday. The place is like poison to my writing, kryptonite to my creativity. But I looked on-line and the city was dead...an independent film festival? No thanks--too many emo, mid-twenty, faux-intellectuals trying to out-combo their friends with their Starbucks concoctions. A concert? Nuh-uh--too loud and full of basically the same people except they are not intellectual enough to know they should be acting pretentious at an independent film festival.

Instead I went for a walk and ended up at the bookstore, the same bookstore where I did my first book signing what feels like a lifetime ago, but was really only a decade. How much has changed since then... I remember that humid summer night when I nervously set out copies my first written work (the book I still can't believe ever got published..) on the card table the management was kind enough to set up for me beforehand. I couldn't believe that night. My fear of having no one show up quickly vanished as lines of people with the book I wrote in hand shoved it in front of me. I remember that sense of elation as I autographed everything put in front of me...books, shirts, a napkin--it didn't matter. The feeling was intoxicating. 

That was years ago and something changed since that night. I don't know when it happened but over time my outgoing personality devolved leaving only the social mole I am today. Many, including my mom, believe this journey into reclusiveness caused my writing discontinuance. What do I think? I think they're probably right.

The halls of the bookstore haunted me as I walked past the rows books filled with history, fiction, self-help, and almost everything else. Children ran unsupervised throughout the store and I felt something breathe in me, a feeling I hadn't felt in four years. 

After I left, I walked home, booted up the MacBook Pro and began writing. I'm 7950 words in on my latest WIP and I have no idea how this will turn out.

Word Count:  413