Write...Edit...Publish JUNE challenge -- BRIDGES. My flash fiction, A Bridge too Far.

Here is my flash fiction for the WEP BRIDGES challenge for June. Open to all creatives who wish to join us. I've literally re-vamped a previously-published story to fit the challenge.

It's Shakespeare time again in my teaching schedule. Othello and A Merchant of Venice are on the menu. If you're a fan of The Bard you'll probably recognise some references. I've chosen names from random Shakespearean plays, but of course, Macbeth is always my favorite.

A Bridge too Far

‘Take me with you, Dad.’

‘Sorry, sweetheart. If there was any other way, we wouldn’t leave you here.’

Here was the International School of Exchange, one of the best Norweyan schools—big, ostentatious, gothic. 

‘Listen, sweetie, look at our separation as just another bridge to cross on your journey towards world domination. And, uh, it’ll be good for you to mix with humans for a change, to see them in another light.’

Dad so got it wrong. 

Bellona is loitering at the top of the stairway with her group of besties looking for all the afterworld like a row of creepy gargoyle statues. I have to pass these weird sisters to get to my next class. But, hey, they can’t put the fear of God into me. Bellona I can handle, but flanked by Portia and Nerissa, she looks scary indeed, even without a beard. I will need all my craft to survive.

‘Something bothering you, Emilia?’ Bellona’s voice wafts down the stairs like fog and filthy air. ‘I was just telling the sistas that something wicked this way comes. You look like you’re going to puke. Come along up. Wouldn’t want you to choke.’

I massage the banister knob with my left hand, feeling the silkiness of the aged wood smooth under my magnificent marble skin. I could glide up the stairs and float right through the lot of them, bitch slapping them while I pass, but my cred would be shot if I took that route. 

Maybe this is a place where I can belong, but there's a bridge to cross before that happens. 

Bellona. 

In my Adolescence That Never Ends, I’ve discovered every school has its ghoul!

‘Come on up, you swine,' she says. 'New girls have to pass the test.’

‘What test?’ Why didn’t I keep my big mouth shut? Now she can't wait to get her long claws into me.

‘The test to see if you belong.’

Why do they suspect I don't belong?

Hmm. I shouldn’t have deliberately stepped on her shiny black Doc Martens when I cut her off at the classroom door. But that was pretty tame considering the way she’d baited me all the way through the Shakespeare class, jealous little warhorse. Not my fault I knew all the answers to Lady Macbeth’s questions (well, Ms Opine acted like Lady Macbeth in her sleepwalking stage, floating about the room in her long skirt, stroking her long red tresses, curling her dark red lips in disdain at the students’ stumbling answers to questions about Macbeth’s motivations). To tell you the truth, all she was missing was the candle in her hands.  

'Hey, Ms Opine,' I imagined myself saying. 'I knew old William personally, dig that? We used to chat after the shows in the Globe. I even suggested a few characters in history he might use for his next play. Where do you think he got the idea for Macbeth and King Duncan, hmm?'

Yep. I know every one of the Bard’s plays by heart, Ms Opine, in ye Olde English, not the modern crap you let students read these days. Like which sounds better--'Killing pigs' or 'Killing swine'? No contest.

‘Get off my boot, you weirdo,’ had been Bellona’s reaction to my little stomp attack after ckass. ‘Take that!’ She’d swung her long blonde mane (yes, she was very horsey. I thought it unusual in a Norweyan public school) and delivered a stunning blow to my solar plexus.

‘Ouch!’ I’d yelled, surprised at the power in her dainty little fight move. 

She gave me a strange look. 

Did she feel my flesh as hard and bony as her elbow? Is that what gave me away? Still, I couldn’t resist another stomp on her boots, grinding my rubber soles as hard as I could without breaking her foot. 

If you’ve ever tried to hurt someone by stomping on their Docs, you’d know it takes a lot of girl power. Those babies have pretty good toe protection. I put as much oomph as I dared behind that stomp/kick/grind. Bellona’s face turned as white as mine and her jagged breath concerned me for a minute as I wondered if I’d gone too far. The tears in her big baby blues were a bonus, looking quite dramatic hovering on her smoky fake eyelashes. But she was a tough chick for a human, or kinda human. 

Now, she’d rustled up reinforcements. I was facing a Birnam Wood Comes to Dunsinane moment.

Oh, great! An army gathered against me. I have to think fast or my first day will be my last day here. If I use too much power, I’m out. Too little, and these weird sisters and their cronies will make my life a misery just like the hags did to poor old Macbeth.

Was it worth taking the ‘test’, or should I refuse to listen to them, get back on my metaphorical charger and gallop away?

As Bellona and I played at outstaring each other, I thought of another school, another Bellona. Turned out that chick was a vamp like me. She didn’t want any competition. There could only be one Queen Lilith, so she demanded I take the test. I’d refused, but lived to regret it. I could have beaten that wispy vamp in a heartbeat, um, well. Well, I don’t have much choice this time, do I? I can't always run away. I’m here forever. If I’d passed the last test I would have been Head Girl at Cawdor by now. Hmm.

Avaunt! I race up the stairs, two at a time, holding my ridiculously long serge skirt like I'm some simpering Regency heroine. Those weird sisters step back as if they’ve seen a ghost. Well, you have, stupidos. Bet they’ve never bullied a ghost before.

Soon I’ll be Head Girl of the International School of Exchange. Pretty cool.

Hey, Dad, sometimes we’ve just got to decide which bridge to cross and which bridge to burn.  

WORDS: 995

FCA

I hope you like my story for the WEP BRIDGES challenge. Anything goes, as you can see. You have until June 21 to post - flash fiction, non fiction, poetry, artwork...The entry that catches the eye of the judges wins a $10 Amazon Gift Card.

Please click on the names in my right sidebar with DL (Direct Link) next to the name, or go to the WEP website limked in previous paragraph.

Write...Edit...Publish flash fiction - TAKING CHANCES - Macbeth fan fiction

 Hi everyone!

Today I'm having a little fun with the WEP challenge. I've been teaching Macbeth for years--and here we go again--I'll be teaching it for the next few months. I wrote this flash at writing group, but it is barely recognisable. I've Macbeth-ed it up.

If you'd like to have a little flash fiction fun, or non-fiction fun, you're welcome to add your name to the list in my sidebar and post a story by Friday.

Taking Chances

Alicia was waiting with her group of besties, blocking the top of the stairway outside homeroom. I had to pass these weird sisters to get to my next class. Not that I was overly afraid--Alicia I could handle--but flanked by Natalie and Phoebe, she looked scary indeed, even without a beard. I would need to be crafty to survive.

‘Something bothering you, Michelle?’ Alicia’s voice wafted down the stairs like a bad smell. ‘I was just saying to the girls that something wicked this way comes. You look like you’re going to puke. Come along. Puke on my boots if you dare.’

I massaged the banister knob with my left hand, feeling the silkiness of the aged wood smooth underneath my skin. I liked this place, even though it was a school. I could glide up the stairs and float right through the lot of them, bitch slapping them while I passed, but my cred would be shot if I took that route. I’d finally found a school where I wanted to belong. Or so I’d thought. That was before I met Alicia. Every school has its ghoul!

‘Come on up, girlfriend. We’re waiting. New girls have to pass the test.’

‘What test?’ Oh, why didn’t I keep my big mouth shut? She couldn’t wait to get her long claws into me.

‘The test to see if you belong.’

Did they all suspect I didn’t belong? I shouldn’t have deliberately stepped on her shiny black Doc Martens when I cut her off at the classroom door. But that was pretty tame considering the way she’d baited me all the way through the Shakespeare class, jealous little cow. Not my fault I knew all the answers to Lady Macbeth’s questions. Well, Ms Opine acted like Lady Macbeth in her sleepwalking stage, floating about the room in her long skirt, stroking her long red tresses, curling her dark red lips in distain at the students’ stumbling answers to her questions about Macbeth’s motivations. To tell you the truth, all she was missing was the candle in her hands. She was one of the most frightening sights I’ve seen in awhile, and I’ve been around a looong time. Bet she’d faint if she knew that I’d met old William personally. Used to chat after the show; helped him clean up the mess. I even suggested a few characters in history he might use for his next play. That’s where he got the idea for Macbeth and King Duncan. Yep. I know every one of the Bard’s plays by heart, in ye Olde English, not the modern stuff they read these days.

‘Get off my boot, you weirdo,’ had been Alicia’s reaction to my little stomp attack. ‘Take that!’ She’d swung her long blond mane (yes, she was very horsey, not unusual in an English public school) and delivered a stunning blow to my solar plexus.

‘Ouch!’ I yelled, surprised at the power in her dainty little fight move. She gave me a strange look. Did she feel my flesh was as hard and bony as her elbow? Is that what gave me away? Still, I couldn’t resist another stomp on her boots, grinding my rubber soles as hard as I could without breaking her foot. If you’ve ever tried to hurt someone by stomping on their Docs, you’d know it takes a lot of girl power. Those babies have pretty good toe protection. I put as much power as I dared behind that stomp/kick/grind move. Alicia’s face turned as white as mine and her jagged breath concerned me for a minute as I wondered if I’d gone too far. The tears in her big baby blues were a bonus. But she was a tough chick for a human, or kind of human. The tears stayed where they hovered on her smoky fake eyelashes. The fire in her blue eyes was enough to set the door alight. Now, she’d brought the reinforcements.

Oh, great! They were gathered against me, to destroy me. I have to think fast or my first day will be my last day here. If I use too much power, I’m out. Too little, and these weird sisters will make my life a misery just like the hags did to Macbeth.

Was it worth taking the ‘test’, or should I refuse to listen to them, get back on my horse and gallop away?

As Alicia and I played at outstaring each other, I thought of another school, another Alicia. Turned out that chick was a vamp just like me. She didn’t want any competition, so she demanded I take the test. I’d refused, but lived to regret it. Well, I don’t have much choice, do I? I’m here forever. If I’d passed the ‘test’ I would have been Head Girl at Willoughby by now. There was once a chance I didn’t take…hmm.

*Avaunt! I raced up the stairs, two at a time, nearly tripping on my ridiculously long serge skirt which weighed a ton. What was it about my face that had the weird sisters stepping back as if they’d seen a ghost? Bet they’d never bullied a girl like me before. Bring it on!

I’m taking a chance today.

Soon I’ll be Head Girl of Dunsinane.

                                             

Thanks for reading my story. No critique necessary. I just wrote this for some YA enjoyment and for WEP. You can tell me if you enjoyed it though!

And don't forget to check out the blogfests in my sidebar. Deniz Bevan has a few more in her current post.

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March Murder Madness with a touch of Macbeth - Driven to Murder - RFW flash fiction

Hello there!  It's great to try our hands at a different genre. Welcome to my first attempt at a murder story for the RFW March murder challenge. My story has two 'inspirations' -- reading the real-life accounts of rogue ex-soldiers who are so damaged after their tours in Iraq or Afghanistan, they lash out and kill. I'm currently teaching Macbeth to my Year 12 students -- so I couldn't pass up a few well-placed (I hope) references. 

MURDER MOST FOUL

I wasn’t at home when my wife was murdered—but Detective Macduff doesn’t believe me. It’s always the husbands, isn’t it?

“Where were you tonight?” His icy blue gaze unnerves me...just a little...but who does he think he is? I'm Lieutenant General Duncan, (retired), four year tour Afghanistan. I'm not taking any of his shit.

“Where I always am on Friday night—at the Scots Men’s Club.”

“Can anyone vouch for that?”

“Only the 50 or so gentlemen in clan tartans enjoying their Friday night haggis and whisky.”

“Why should they remember you?”

“I rather stand out in the crowd, don’t I?”

Detective Macduff shifts in his seat--my black leather recliner. He averts his charcoal eyes, which is just how I like it. Eyes haunt me these days--Afghani civilian terrified eyes--Billy’s 'innocent' blues--Delilah’s big-green-surprised-panicked-oh-so-guilty eyes.

My eyes keep going back to the bloodstains on the floor which have seeped through the flotaki rug and the white chalk outline. Who would have thought Delilah had so much blood in her? Bizarre. Ghoulish. Macabre.

I crane my neck to see past the detective and am amused when he draws back, shakes his untidy locks. Does he think he's next on my murderous rampage?

I settle back in my seat—the silly frilly little orange English genoa lounge chair my wife always sat in to watch the crime shows every Friday night when I'm out at the club. She was addicted. Even had me watching Polanski’s Macbeth earlier this week. Plenty of blood in that one!

Delilah was good at solving the things—it’s all in the motive, she’d gurgle. Motive, I’d ask? Yes…motive. Passion! Ambition! Greed! Envy! Revenge! Don’t you get it, Lucifer dear? 
Add boredom to the list. I’d yawn and go to bed.

Clever Macduff says that Delilah was sitting in a chair near the door when she was murdered.  He said she was probably napping when the deed was done. Beckett’s Dry Cleaners will never be able to remove that blood, oh no. The detectives have the chair and the hairy rug bundled up in evidence bags along with a pile of other shit like wine glasses and the knife they’d pulled from her chest.

“Where have you taken my wife?”

Charcoal eyes try to stare me down.  “Her body’s been taken to the morgue.”

Why did he insist on staring at me? He wants to see my reaction. Wants to confuse me. Wants to eyeball me into confessing. Suspicion rages through this righteous man, but he doesn’t arrest me. He’s searching for a motive, otherwise he's  got nothing, nada...

“There’ll be an autopsy.” He looks at me keenly. I try to feign disinterest. “We’ll have to cut her up. Always do when there’s a suspicious death.” Thinks I’ll get queasy with his language use. Queasy nothing. Try a tour of Afghanistan, loser.

“It’s not a suspicious death,” I say. “She was murdered.”

“How do you know? She might have stabbed herself. Might have been depressed with...the...er...way things turned out...”

 “You’re a bleeding idiot. Don't sit here and play games! My wife has been murdered.”

“Allegedly.”

Macduff jumps a little when a loud knock, knock, knock sounds at the door. A pretty blond ladylike creature in a fetching uniform walks over and touches his shoulder. Ah. So that’s how it is. She leans down and whispers in his ear.

They turn to me, eyes alight with renewed hope. Detective Macduff snaps his notebook shut and slips it into his suit pocket. “Lieutenant General Lucifer Duncan. We’re asking you to accompany us to the station...to answer a few questions.”

“I’m a person of interest then.”

“That you are, General Duncan Sir. That you are.”

***

The interrogation went on into the night. I invented interrogation…I knew all the tactics. How hard they tried to break me. Everything but the water board, hahahahahah.

Where was my motive? I loved my wife, allegedly. I was rich, that's for sure. I had no need of fulsome insurance policies to ease my remaining days. I had no mistress demanding I divorce Delilah, more’s the pity. What use had I for a mistress? 

***

Three in the morning. I roll into an hotel--my home was taped up--a murder scene under investigation.

I can’t sleep...I'm exhilarated.

I'm going to get away with it. I try to clap my hands and nearly fall off the bed. 

I run through the steps in my head again—it is a dagger I see before me, but its handle doesn’t point to me…

Once the detectives do their tests I know exactly what they’ll find.

***

Billy from the Scot’s Club--guilty.

Motive!

They’ll discover his affair with Delilah.

No one knows I know, so that couldn’t be my motive, could it?

The wineglass I’d swopped at the club, then planted on the rug, will have the bastard's DNA all over it.

The serrated knife I’d got him to cut my haggis with will be covered in his fingerprints.

The semen they found in her can’t be mine, can it?

While they’d caroused on the flotaki rug, I'd gone clubbing.

Captain Billy Banquo left shortly before I got home, but he was doomed.

I’d committed murder most foul. 

***

Going to war was a bitch. 
The God of War had been unleased on that unfortunate land for its entire history. I’d seen enough murder and mayhem in Afghanistan to last me a lifetime. The bomb that sent me home was a godsend in the long run.

I saw Delilah and Billy fornicating when I peeped through the window while Private Thane got my bags out of the van.

They weren’t expecting me as I rolled inside in my wheelchair weighed down with gold stars, right sleeve flapping emptily by my side,  medals rattling in the box on my knee like toy soldiers.

They looked so innocent then. So...‘Billy’s just here to set the fire for us.’ Set a fire for you, you lying bitch! At least straighten your skirt!

Sometimes only having one arm is a bonus.

You can get away with murder.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

WORD COUNT: 996
FCA

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