Note pinned to the blouse of a dead woman surrounded by broken glass on the sidewalk outside a twenty-story hotel:
“For the love of God, my children are being held hostage in room 1828.
This was the only way I could get help. They said they would shoot me if I tried anything.”
Ty Johnston has been writing speculative fiction for almost 20 years. Most recently he has been working on a fantasy trilogy. Find out more at tyjohnston.blogspot.com.
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18 Comments »
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great work…if it was three words less it would qualify as “Dribble” I have a 50 word dibble piece in boston Lit soon….i storngly suggest you submit something like this to them, it’s great
Very powerful and uncomfortable. Makes you mentally write your own backstory. BostonLit is a good idea.
Cheers
Mark
Wow. Concise and poignant.
That was a kick in the gut. Good work.
Oh, I love this - excellent work.
LOL!
Wow…so ittty-bitty but very clever!!!Thanks Ty.
are you serious? i did not like that at all…sorry i don’t mean to be harsh….it is mothers day tomorrow.
only in your country….mothers day is ages away for people like us brits
It is about a mother making a sacrifice for her children. I thought it was appropriate, but I can see how people might have thought it was jarring.
Wow, I told myself I was too tired to read a story tonight, but you gave me a great one in 3 lines. Now I can go to bed thinking about it.
Thanks, Ty.
I liked this! Scary, touching and very well done in so little space.
Well that brings the day to a halt!
Not only have you successfully written a fun little exercise in conciseness, Ty, you’ve managed to become EDF’s highest paid author yet! You’re making more there at $.0189/word then I can pay you at Flashing Swords!
Nice job.
Ty:
I can only think of one shorter story with this kind of killer kick - Gary Cadwaller’s brilliant two word drabble entitled “Splat!”
The body?
“Sorry, Tinkerbell”
yours was darn near as good. Excellent!
Chaz
Thanks everyone for your comments. I have to give credit, though, to the folks at EDF who suggested a couple of small changes that made this little tale stronger and even a few words shorter.
It’s a neat idea but I don’t see how killing herself helped her kids. Having jumped out of the hotel room her kids were being held in the first thing they’re going to do is try to move a bunch of distraught children. May even make more sense to cut their losses and finish off the witnesses before making their escape. I don’t buy that a mother would see LEAVING her children as an option.
How would attaching the note to something else and throwing it through the window have been any worse. If she got shot it has to be better than falling to your death.
Also, have you seen the glass in most hotels? You would need to be determined to get through it.
[...] The Note [...]
Really neat story. Way to pack a punch into just a few words. Great job.