Flash Fiction Challenge: A Title And Two Lines

You have given us titles.

You have given us opening lines.

You have given us closing lines.

Now it’s time to pick a batch and write some stories.

The job is easy enough: choose (randomly if you like) a title, an opening line, a closing line, and then write a story with… well, do I need to explain it? Use the title, the opening line, the closing line. C’MON PEOPLE JEEZ.

Length is — well, flash fiction is usually ~1000 words, but let’s forego any kind of length here and say, “Just write the damn story.”

Post at your online space, give us a link.

Due by next Friday, September 8th, noon EST.

Title

We Never Heard Them Coming
I Held Your Heart Once
How To Run While Falling
Once Hidden, Three Times Found
Neptune’s Rain Cuts Like Diamonds
The Empire Of All-Knowing Eyes
Electric Boy Meets Conductor Girl
When They Called Her Home
The Limits Of Our Imperfection
The Rest Are Your Problem

Opening Line

“Listen to the goat,” Valerie said, “it will change your life.”
The pale pink rabbit, some child’s lost toy, blinked at him from the kitchen chair.
“I told you this was a bad idea!” he shouted.
Three days without sleep was the least of my worries.
Some people don’t follow direction very well.
Martin spread the folders out on the table, “These two.”
The odd man remained silent, forcing a small, copper box into my hands.
The bodies were bobbing on the sea, and a raft drifted behind.
Deep inside the twisting wood, there is a house, in a gully.
No one had ever bothered to tell her about this part.

Closing Line

Silence blanketed the meadow.
We huddled low in the arroyo as wind wailed across the weeping sands.
She spread her wings and stepped off the cliff.
They would never know what she had done.
And that, my son, is how I learned to wrestle alligators.
And though the light was still blinking in the distance, never again could it harm her.
She plucked a hair from the severed head, and threaded her needle.
The children formed a circle, lifted their heads, and watched as the body disappeared into the sky.
The smoke was blue and grey and smelled like a promise.
I watched the butterfly escape the spiderweb and I laughed.