Feb. 17 - written by Christopher Rohan

Week 11

2-11-22 - Prompt: Rich

Nob and Bramble quickly learned how much attention carrying a treasure chest can be. They were only a week from the discovery of a lifetime and had carried it between their two dwarfen bodies on two sturdy poles through field and forest, gorge and gully. These were simple hiking with a burden, but then they passed through towns and villages. Folks and passersby began to ask questions and were getting a little too curious. Then there were some that spoke to them as if they had some right to the lot themselves. Then came the sleepless nights watching for thieves.

“It’s not been a week, and already the moochers and thieves are relentless,” Nob said in exasperation at the end of another long hike between towns.

“Yeah,” chimed Bramble, “we have another month of traveling and at least ten more towns.”

“What if we hide it?” considered Nob creatively. “Dig a hole and bury it, then come back for it?”

“That would only delay the trouble of it,” returned Bramble practically.

“What if we disguised it? It’s in a shiny and bejeweled box, why not put it in another box, one of simple wood?”

“That could work, but it’d still be conspicuously heavy.”

“We could buy a cart and load it with many other goods to distract from the prize?” and with that Nob and Bramble had thier plan.

At the next town, before any had seen them, they opened the treasure chest, gathered some more common coins, then hid the chest outside the town at the edge of the forest, well away from road.

The town was bustling as it was about the fourth hour and they were directed to the market. After asking around a bit they found a tall cartman. The man said he’d have the cart ready in a few days so the two dwarves found a lovely inn near the edge of town they had entered. They’d start their shopping spree the next day. It was the best bath and bed they’d had in months, and the next day they were smiling and laughing like the simple, poor dwarves they used to be.

It all came together rather well. The cart was finished and the goods were delivered to the inn, and in the next hour they carried a small box to the forest edge to grab the treasure chest.

2-14-22 - Prompt: Plethora

That was it. The last truck was loaded and about to set out on the long journey to the millers. The trucker gave his horn a long pull to signal his departure and eighteen wheels began to churn the the muck left behind. Rick surveyed the job site. He had about a day’s work loading the remaining equipment, and they’d be off. Off to strip bare another landscape of another forest. 

He turned around. For miles, all was stump, stubble, mud and marring. Devastation was the only word for it and this time Rick felt it. He’d begun with a love for the outdoors and a desire to help moderate tree growth. Forests can thrive when properly thinned and harvested. For many, the logic didn’t follow, but Rick knew that the undergrowth can thrive when some of the bigger trees are removed. Nature was a battle for survival. Even the trees tried to take as much sunlight as possible at the expense of others. To remove some, was to open up opportunity for others. He’d seen the large trees as they fell and his mind saw a noble sacrifice of the old and strong for the young and weak. That was a long time ago, and the man wondered where his conscience had gone.

The land was laid bare before him. “I’m just middle management,” he said aloud, attempting to make his defense to the accusations he heard inside. “I have to follow what I’m told. They’d replace me as soon as breathe and then they’d find someone worse.”

“And what could be worse?” said a thundering reasonace behind him.

He turned cautiously, anxious to find the voice’s origin yet afraid of what he’d find. There, planted resolute, was a massive oak tree, and he knew his condemnation was just.

2-15-22 - Prompt: Erase

Graphite scraped across bleached and dried pulp. A long smooth arch. Janie paused looking at the line wondering what it might become. She loved this exercise. The goal was to take a random shape and create a much more dynamic image. Everything was shapes. She’d begun to see them everywhere. Faces were ovals or circles encasing rectangles. Noses were triangles. She’d take the city bus to school and look out the windows at all the square-stacked civilization around her.

The line could be almost anything. She’d learned that the shapes acted to kickstart her imagination, they did not determine. For a long time she’d struggled to see anything but what she’d always done, but the discipline of the exercise had helped her to see the limits in the scope of her imagination.

The line wanted to be something. It was all potential. She’d heard somewhere that some writers don’t know the story they’re going to tell until they start writing. She knew the feeling. She also knew that sometimes an image wouldn’t leave her mind until she tried to scratch it out on paper. Those never turned out the way she imagined, and they were always more difficult. She wondered if other artists experienced something similar. Did the musician or the writer pine and ponder, scribbling this or that only to grab the eraser and blot out the incoherencies? They must.

The line had limitations. It was long and arching. That was its nature. It could be a hill. It could not be a plain. It could be a rise and could not be a drop in the horizon. Yes it could be the rise that accentuates the fall, but it could only then be a perspective to the focal point. 

The line was important. She began to think of how people prefer the most intriguing things, the beautiful, the strong, the intricate. Those had their moments, but she began to imagine the things that get overlooked. Then she saw it. The line was the perfect shape of the toe of her dad’s work boots. As she began to sketch, her heart was glad for all the things she’d never noticed.

2-16-22 - Prompt: Timbuktu

Sand swirled in a chaotic wind and swept up into Fatima’s face. Her eyes burned at the torment. She tried to cover her face with her arm, but fine desert powder found its way passed every blockade. She turned away and the wind pulled at the many long fabrics that fashioned what remained of her modesty. 

She looked down at the little bundle she held in one arm and wrapped around her body using the fabric she’d worn to cover her head and her long black hair blew freely. Even in the lonesome desert she felt shame, but the shame was undone by the joy set before her of getting this child to safety. The wind continued blowing. It was like a wall keeping her from the promise of safety. She pressed on, taking steps backward into the wind. She felt an increase, like a great battle of wills.

The great unseen force pressed at her back and pulled at her garments. Wind pulled at the fabric she’d wrapped around the child. Then a rock grabbed at her foot and she fell to her back. The child stirred.

“Where are you going?” came a voice, fierce and soft.

She felt a daze grip her mind and she thought she saw the shape of a man walking toward her out of the wind. Fear and shame smote her and she scrambled away, but there was no man there.

“Where are you going?” the voice said again.

2-17-22 - Prompt: Ticket

Lance had once again fallen asleep on the job. Doctors could not explain it. His parents had him tested multiple times, but there was no real medical reason for it. Lance knew, however, that it was nothing more than years of training. Growing up, it seemed there was always some work to be done around the house. The only respite was if one of the kids were sick or extremely fatigued, then their mother would coddle them. He was the youngest of three, and he had the birthright of learning from the mistakes of his older siblings. The only way that he saw to get out of the constant work was to fain fatigue. So he did, and did it often. He’d created another problem for himself, however, as his mother’s doting never left him alone and he learned to sleep no matter if he was tired.

It continued for years. His siblings hated him for it, but as soon as he’d grow up and gone into the real world as they call it, he saw the error of his ways. He went from job to job, never able to hold one down as, generally speaking, employers don’t want to pay someone for napping. It would happen too often and he would get fired and move on to the next job. “But not this time,” he’d told himself, “I’ll work a job that is too demanding to let me sleep.” So he got a job loading trains.

He awoke to that beautifully monotonous clickety-clack of the train riding over its iron rails. As he scanned the darkness of the car, the fog of sleep hung about and he could not make out where he was. He’d gotten used to the disassociation that comes from waking in a strange place so he stood up and began to mill about.

One step and immediately he knocked his shin on a wooden crate. Then he remembered. He was told to straighten the baggage car as all the bags were rather haphazardly thrown in and while he’d done most of the work, a lovely, soft bag beckoned and he immediately tucked in for a snooze.

He realized he had a problem, not only an immediate problem to solve, but also a seeming addiction to sleep. He wondered how it took him so long to realize. Then, he decided it wasn’t the most important thing to worry about, and he rubbed his shin to ease the pain and made his way to where he knew the front of the car to be.

The door opened with a bit of a screech. It was the middle of the night. Only shadows of the surrounding wood could be seen as the train made its way. The cool air blew away the remaining drowse and he was wide awake. He looked at the coupling, it was the first time he’d need to stride across the powerful metal at speed. It made his heart drop a bit, but with one big step he was across. He laughed as he looked back at the coupling, and as he turned to face the door a man in uniform filled the illuminated way.

“Ticket, please.”