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Week 42 (May 10th-17th Stories----Topic: Running DONE!!
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Tittle: RushWord count: 797
Candy took a deep breath and sheathed her knife. She took the quilt on the bed and covered her victim with it. The senator had been quite troublesome, not only for her employer but for her too. He had been working hard and gotten too close to learning the truth.
She heard footsteps outside the door. “Daddy,” a voice asked as its owner opened the door.
Candy was shrouded in the shade of the room, leaving her face indiscernible. She spun on her heel and fled to one of the large windows.
“Who are you?”
She propped the window open and jumped out of it. She quietly landed on the cement and winced as a shock of pain traveled up her legs. A boy’s cry sounded from the building, forcing her to run, which meant anyone who was out would see her. If anyone were asked about something suspicious they would surely mention her. For that reason, she wanted to walk but she knew that she had to get as far from the senator’s home as she could.
Her heart pounded in her ears. Adrenaline pumped through her body. Her eyes were open wide and sweat poured down her neck. Candy stopped running and bent down, hands on her knees.
Police sirens screamed through the streets as they rushed past Candy. A cold hand of fear gripped her heart and she began to run again. Her car was in sight and she fumbled with the key to unlock it. The key fell into a puddle at her feet and Candy cursed as she tried to find it. It took, what seemed to be, a lifetime before she found it. She struggled to turn it correctly but was finally able to open the car door.
The car’s engine started smoothly and Candy started to regulate her breathing once she put several miles of road behind her. She felt more comfortable and relaxed a little in her seat. A telephone booth lay ahead and Candy parked the car a few feet from it.
She got out of the car and walked towards the phone booth. She fished for a quarter in her pocket. After finding one, she paid the fee to use the phone and dialed her employer’s number.
“I told you not to call me until the job was done,” a bored voice answered.
“It is. I need you to fly me out of here.”
“Sounds like something went wrong.”
“The senator’s son came into the room.”
“Did he see your face?”
“No. Get me a flight out of here,” Candy plead. She heard him typing on his computer and waited until it was silent on his side of the line.
“Done. Give the receptionist my name then yours. She’ll give you your ticket.”
Candy hung up and glanced outside of the booth. A police car made its way down the street. She observed its speed and deducted that the driver planned on stopping. She pushed the booth’s door open and walked towards her car, keeping her head down. Too late, the officer had already parked; she would have to talk to him now.
“Ma’am, may I ask you a few questions?”
“Actually, my flight will be leaving soon.”
“It’ll only take a minute,” the policeman firmly assured.
Candy sighed, “Okay.”
“Do you know where Senator Burkens lives?”
“No. Who’s Senator Burkens?”
The officer squinted. “You don’t know who he is?”
“I’m sorry, sir, I’m a foreigner here.” Candy shrugged to try and enforce the air of obliviousness.
He licked his lips. “Would you mind coming down town?”
“Why?”
“Just a finger print test. You’re a foreigner so I’d rather just clear all suspicion.”
Candy nodded her consent and walked slightly behind the officer as he led her to his car. She stopped then started to backtrack. She spun around and raced for her car.
“Hey!”
The officer ran after her, but Candy had already turned her car on and was speeding away. She took every short cut she had memorized from the maps she had seen of the surrounding area. Sweat made the palms of her hands slippery causing her to almost hit a flagpole. The airport was insight but she could hear the police sirens echoing throughout the streets.
Before she had fully stopped the car, Candy was running towards the receptionist.
“David Clarks. Candy Leon.”
The receptionist nodded and got her ticket. Candy snatched it out of her hands and rushed for her flight. The flight attendants were in the plane’s door, but Candy argued her way onto the plane. She took a deep breath and sat down in the only empty seat. The plane lurched, and was in the air within the minute. She calmly looked out the window- her heart beat finally slowing.
Title: Finders KeepersWord Count: 1,130
Author: Xeni
Clarisse loved running. Feeling her ponytail swish against the back of her neck with every stride. Feeling the ache in her calves as she ran up a steep hill. Feeling her lungs expand and contract with every deep breath. Running replenished her life force. It made her feel whole again, in one piece.
Every evening, after collage courses, after working her afternoon internship shift at the local clinic, Clarisse would pull on her jogging shoes and go out. She would run whether rain or snow, boiling sunshine or dense fog. The weather didn’t matter to her; so long as she got her “fix”.
She knew people must be finding it strange that she still bothered to run. After all, wasn’t it only fat people that ran in order to burn off fat? Or else they must all stick her in the other category: those anorexic girls who only see fat in the mirror. Strange, Clarisse thought, how people always simplify things into categories. The thing was, she didn’t run because she felt compelled to. Clarisse found release in running; a release other people might find it alcohol, or drugs, or abusing someone, or being sick all the time. Yes, it was an addiction by now. She’d been doing it for years, ever since she was 8, and allowed out of the house by herself without an older sibling to watch over her.
This evening she was running in half dusk. The sky was that wonderful shade of pale pink, bordering on an impossible shade of blue. Unlike a paint palette, the sky would not show her purple; at least not this time of year. As Clarisse was staring at the sky, revelling in the beauty found in nature, she didn’t notice an apartment door opening in front of her, and an older man coming out, boxes stacked in his arms. Only at the last second did she sense something wrong, and glanced down from the sky. A small startled squeak burst itself from her throat before she quelled it, and then she ran right into the man, his boxes flying everywhere.
It was like a scene from a badly made movie: magazines and pens and candy and all sorts of odds and ends and knick-knacks were lying all over the sidewalk and well into the street.
“Oh my gosh! I am so sorry! I was watching the colors in the sky and I wasn’t paying attention! I would have moved aside but like I said I wasn’t paying attention,” Clarisse attempted to catch her breath while apologizing, words a mile-a-minute.
The man had knelt down and was picking up his things. He was placidly gathering everything together again, not looking up at Clarisse or anywhere else.
“Don’t worry; I’ll help you pick everything up again! I am really very sorry about this!” Clarissa didn’t seem notice that he wasn’t answering yet. She started to gather items from under a parked car and put them down in a box. She found a framed photograph; one of those old ones with a wrought iron frame. In it was a young, beautiful woman that looked a bit like her. “Oh!” came her startled gasp of recognition. “Excuse me?” Clarisse attempted to ask the stranger who the young woman was, but as she looked up again she realized that the man had taken his boxes, as well as any items in the near vicinity, and disappeared. Since the door was closed, she supposed he lived in that apartment.
Clarisse stared at the door for a moment and then decided the rest of her run could wait. She gathered up the rest of the times, piling them in her sweater so they wouldn’t get any more damaged, and rang the doorbell. She waited a few minutes, but when she heard no answer she tried knocking on the door. Still no answer.
I can’t exactly leave these items here, Clarisse thought to herself. But if he is going to be a stubborn old man maybe I should. Her feet started taking her back to her apartment, so she knew that she was taking his items home. She carefully tied a knot in her sweater, then slowly jogged the way back to her own apartment.
Once home, she couldn’t contain her curiosity any longer and poured out the contents on her bed. There was an old necklace, it looked like real pearls strung on a gold chain. The mysterious photograph, an antique brooch in the shape of a hummingbird, one of those old fashioned fountain pens that used real ink, a newspaper clipping and a dried violet made up the rest of the items. Clarisse fingered them all carefully, feeling a familiarity with the objects, an almost ghostlike aura around them that told her she should know these things, even if she had never seen them before.
She went to her closet and took down an old hatbox from the top shelf. She opened it on her bed and took out an old photo album. Leafing through the pages, Clarisse stopped near the middle of the book, this page more worn than all the others. The page was titled “Mother” in a child’s handwriting and a beautiful, young woman sat in a lawn chair holding a new born baby in her arms. She wasn’t smiling, although the weather was fair and they were both wearing expensive dresses with ruffles and lace.
With a shaking hand, Clarisse picked up the picture frame the old man had dropped, and compared the two women. They were exactly the same person. She wasn’t smiling in either picture, but she was wearing an elegant gown. Clarisse knew she had to find the old man and demand the truth from him.
The next evening, instead of pulling on her running shoes, Clarisse dressed in normal clothes and took all the items back to the same apartment. This time she was determined to enter the house and if necessary wring the truth out of the man.
Eventually, a much younger man answered the door. “May I help you?” was the polite inquiry.
“Yes, I accidentally ran into a man leaving this house yesterday. He dropped these items,” she held them out.
The man looked stricken, “Oh yes, he mentioned you. That was my father. I’m sorry, but he isn’t here today. You see, we buried my mother yesterday…” he trailed off.
Clarissa couldn’t believe it. “This may come as a shock to you, but I knew that woman,” she began. “Here,” she dug in a pocket, producing the photo from her album, “this is her 24 years ago, holding me. May I come in?”
He looked at her strangely for a moment, then, with noticeable effort he answered, “Alright, let me hear your story.”
Ah well, I'll just use this one then :P Thanks for posting the rule!
title: Thinkingword count: 359
My ears went deaf at their words. I’m adopted. How had they kept this from me? Why didn’t they tell me earlier? What had they been thinking? Who were my real parents? I ran. I got up from the table and dashed to the door. I could have been moving at lightning speed and it wouldn’t have been fast enough. I felt slow, sluggish, I wasn’t moving fast enough. I had to run. I had to get away from my parents. No, not my parents, that was a lie. I had to get away from them just for a while. I couldn’t look at them. I loved them, but they weren’t mine. I didn’t belong to them. Did I? No. Yes. They had raised me since my first memory. They were all I had ever known. They taught me to ride a bike, how to swim, and how to tie my shoe. I looked down, my feet still weren’t moving. They didn’t work. I was frozen, I was scared and I had too many questions, thoughts, accusations running through my head. Running. I had to run, just for a while; I had to run off everything that was happening. If I could just make my feet move I could leave, but I didn’t want to leave. How could I leave them? No matter what I thought they were still my family, they were the people I had grown up with. I thought of my little sister, Jessica. She was theirs, biologically. But she was mine to, wasn’t she? I had grown up with her, I was her older sister. Did she know? No, she would have told me. When would they tell her? No I couldn’t think about that. I looked back at my feet, still not moving fast enough. Then the world came back into focus. The chair I was on had been toppled over, I was standing next to it. I could hear them finishing their sentence, telling me I was adopted. It had been seconds. I hadn’t run at all, I had just wanted to. I stared them in the face and asked them my questions.
this is my first entry :)
Pretty good, Kimathy. May I make a suggestion? Try seperating it into paragraphs. And you said, "But she was mine to, wasn’t she?" Instead of "to" it should be "too".
Well, done Xeni!You said, "Her feet started talking her back to her apartment" fix talking to taking and there are a few other grammatical errors other than that, great job!
Thank you Stephanie. I guess thats a point of "even three editors can miss something" since no one else I had proofread it saw that! :D
Lol. I'm sure I missed some but those were just things that popped out on me. If I really actually sat down and editted it then there might be more. I didn't see much though...it was a great story though.
oops.. forgot to do the contest... ill make one now...
thanks Stephanie, am i allowed to change the error?
this really sucks... also really shortTitle: Runner
by Esther
Word Count: 402
"Cassidy? Come here little Cassidy. Be a good girl now." He walked around whistling and clicking his tounge. What an idiot. Did he really think I was that stupid? I stiffled a chuckle from behind the bush. He stopped when he heard rustling. "There you are." I felt his shadow come on top of me. I had to move, fast. So, I did what I ususally do, I ran. I ran from that bush up a tree. I watched as he parted the leaves of the bush and frowned. "You can't run away Cass! Ah, you remember the good times we had together? Why don't we make them again, huh Cass?"
I couldn't restrain myself, "You little bastard! You think you can just play with my heart and get away with it Damon!" I yelled down at him.
He was smiling his little smirk, "I've got you now..." He pulled up this gun and aimed. I ran down the tree laughing.
"You have to be faster than tha-" Then I saw a hand. Then darkness.
When I woke up I was tied to a chair. Damon was looking over me with a smile, "Hey Cassidy, nice of you to drop by."
"What do you want?"
"Oh nothing, don't worry. If you cooperate then you can live. Or have a good chance of it at least. I just need to take your powers 'tis all."
"You aren't getting anything from me basterd!"
"Is that your new nickname for me? I must say, I rather liked Day-Day." I glared. Then I noticed that me legs weren't tied. Idiot. I kicked him, fast. It was like I was running on air, and his face. When I stopped he fell and I lifted the rest of the chair up with me and ran. It wasn't as fast as I wanted to be, but it was faster than a normal human. I almost missed a pair of scissors that were handily on a table in the hallway. I slowed and grabbed them. I cut off the ropes as fast as I could and I was off again. When I was outside I laughed at the wind in my face. It felt so good. Just a little faster. Faster... I closed my eyes. Faster, my last thought before... BAM!! Gunshot. I weakly opened my eyes to see a man with a gun and a wicked grin. "Goodbye Cassidy."
Oh wow Esther! That was a really interesting plot! I like how you left a lot of things "unsolved". (I. E. Didn't explain what was meant by powers or why she could run faster than humans). Leaves a lot for the reader to think about. At the same time it wasn't too unclear either. I also enjoyed the characters, they definitly had feeling. Essentially, dunno why you said it sucked because I liked it!
hahaha it was because i could have writen it in like five minutes if it wasn't for the breaks i had and it could have been a lot longer but i really didn't feel like using my brain that much ;)
A Shadow in SunlightWord Count: 454
All I remember is running. Running away from... something. It was following me, like a lost puppy, or a shadow in sunlight. Yes, like a shadow in sunlight. This thing behind me was large, and a deep, dark ebony. It was chasing me, though I don’t know why. It wanted something from me.
I turned a corner, then, and ran into the market place-I knew I would be safe there, with witnesses to whatever might happen. But, the market was empty. Bits of paper rolled along the hard, brick walkway. And then I remembered.
It was Sunday. Everyone was at church, being good girls and boys, sitting with their parents, and I was here. Alone, tired, dirty, with a monster behind me. I fell to my knees and felt the dirt on my face. It was over, I thought. I knew it for sure when a shrill laugh came from behind me. I didn’t dare turn around-to let it see the fear in me.
What was more scarier than the thing itself, was its voice. No, I wouldn’t call it a voice. It was more of a scratchy whisper. It was neither male or female, just a sound. And, along with it’s whisper, came a wind. The wind blew around the market place.
“You can’t run.” It screeched silently. It was right, I realized then. I couldn’t run, but I could fight. If only I knew how. My father taught me how to fight an attacker; how to protect myself. But he hadn’t taught me how to deal with this.
“We’ve been waiting for you.” It whispered. No, it couldn’t have. “Welcome home,” It continued. I blinked. Did it just say what I thought it said? No, no, no!
“Come with me.”
I pushed myself up off the ground and turned to face it. “I’d rather die!” I spat at it.
I ran full speed past it, towards the east, where the sun was battling to rise. I could still hear it behind me, but it’s silent approach turned to heavy footsteps. I dared a glance behind me to see a girl, chasing after me. Her bright, blue eyes bored into mine.
With a start, I woke up, drenched in sweat, still in my bed. I rolled over onto my stomach to look at my alarm clock. It beeped at me, telling me to wake up now. I hit the button to shut it off.
I climbed out of bed and walked to the bathroom. I stared at my reflection in the mirror, memorizing my face. High cheekbones, flushed cheeks, bright, blue eyes. It was then that I realized I wasn’t running away from a monster.
I was running away from me.
kimathy wrote: Amazing Lydia! :) Stephanie wrote: Interesting turn at the end.
Thanks guys! ;D
ohhhhhhhh that's why i couldn't vote... kay i vote 2morrow
Esther wrote: i luv the ending! Thank you!
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Can I post both stories here? Or is it one of those one-entry-per-person things?