Drabbles, Dribbles & Even Shorter Stories by Owen Townend

I have a new morning habit these days: writing microfiction. I take an unused title from my typically daft repertoire and use it as a prompt to generate a flash fiction.

Some titles easily inspire stories and a premise quickly forms in my mind, no matter how surprising that may turn out to be. Some titles just lead to creative false starts and dead-ends. But that's the daily discipline of writing for you.

What I do find invigorating is how I've been able to create interesting plots and characters within 300 words or fewer. Being someone who submits to competitions and submission callouts, it helps to have at least one option for every conceivable word limitation.

I have a half dozen serviceable drabbles (100 words exactly), a couple of decent dribbles (50 words exactly) and even the occasional 10-word or 6-word tale. Mind you, I do think these latter types are too short to work as self-contained narratives and even verge on poetry, but that's just my judgement.

Anyway, here are a couple of examples of how these storytelling challenges work. If you're inspired to have a go at one yourself, please feel free to share it in the comments below.

A Drabble (100 Words) - Breakables in a Briefcase

She waited for the salesman to sleep, then dashed off the train at Stockport.

            The salesman’s briefcase was surprisingly heavy but slid through the automatic doors easily enough.

            However, as her feet hit the platform, she heard several things shift, rattle, snap and thud inside the case.

            Arriving at an alcove, she opened the carry-on and looked inside. Shards of glass phone screens and fine China dust filled the cracks of a framed photo of a chipped marble statue. Everything was broken. Any worth was gone.

            Chucking the evidence in some bushes, she was finally confronted by the word ‘FRAGILE’.

A Dribble (50 Words) - Distended West End

I went to the London Theatre and saw everything.

            Plays from Ayckbourn to Zola, absurd to topical.

            Then came the musicals, toe tappers to ear-splitters.

            I even took in the ballet: mesmerised by Mendelssohn, bored with Brecht.

            Now I’m queasy from all that spinning, singing and sinning.

            A bloated stage.

10-Word Flash Fiction - The 1:40 Watch

The time is 1:40am. Expectations have been met. Not mine.

6-Word Flash Fiction - A Bookish Dustman

 

He retrieves, he cleans, he reads.

Red Letter Days - Part 1 by Chris Lloyd

Robert Kitchener, aged 48, was tossing and turning in his bed. He was striving to hang on to his dream but she was slowly disappearing once again.

He awoke with a start, banged his head on the headboard and cursed loudly. He was also acutely aware that his bladder was full so he leaped out of bed, trod on an empty vodka bottle as he did, fell over and pissed himself. His alarm clock was in full voice so he threw it at the half open bedroom door and it landed on the top step of his stairs and proceeded to bumpily but somewhat tunefully, make its way to the front door from where it kept up its tune for a further five minutes, ending with a weak squawk.

Robert sat in his wet pyjamas and wept floods of tears much like other days but this day was the worst for two weeks. How could this be happening? What had happened to his life? Of course, as he told himself every day, he knew full well what had happened to his life. In just three years of forced retirement, he had become a shadow of his former self. He had lost almost everything and everyone when he gave in to alcohol and self-pity; he was right and everyone else was wrong. He looked around, closed his eyes and remembered those heady days of a successful career in high end asset finance. London, Paris, Washington, Bonn. The houses, cars. Then, out of the blue, the hammer crashed down and he was “retired”. That’s what they called it, the bastards. After all he had done for them; he made the company what it is to this day. Something had to give and for once Robert Kitchener resolved to at least restore his dignity.

He stood up, shook his wet pyjamas off, stepped into the shower and stood for twenty minutes simply letting the water cascade over his large frame. He felt less horrible than he did twenty minutes earlier when he stepped out of the marble clad cubicle. He needed a makeover, a purpose but, he needed revenge more than anything. But despite the revenge dream that kept him alive it had never transformed further than a dream.

They had locked him out of the IT system, immediately he became ‘persona non grata’ but little did the Firm know that he had been given all the login details of the top men, by the head of IT, Antonio Rossi, before he had left the Firm and given that almost certainly some of the logins were still live because Antonio made sure at the time, he hatched his plan. He would have to enlist a techie in order to collaborate with Antonio, as the Italian was still employed and the very man he needed was recently “retired” from that idiot American’s messaging platform. This time he was determined to carry his plan through or at least give it his best shot.

He felt somewhat clearer in his mind and was musing over this plan as he cut some bread which he dropped into the toaster, just as he heard the plop of mail landing on the floor. He decided that his toast was more enticing than some double glazing “mega offer”, which was the most regular mail that he usually found when he could be bothered pick it up. He walked slowly around his kitchen as he alternately sipped tea and crunched his toast and a plan of action started to form in his head. As he was still thinking, he heard another plop of mail, sounding much heavier than the first. His curiosity got the better of him and as he entered his hallway he saw a large plain envelope with his initials written by hand in red felt tip. He bent as if to pick it up but took a step backwards. He could not understand why he did. He tried again, same result. His mouth was dry yet he was sweating. He backed further away, supported himself on the banister and stared at the envelope.

……..

Susie Campbell sighed as she folded the letter and the accompanying list of demands and slipped the lot in a large manila envelope, sealed the envelope and wrote his initials in red with a felt tipped pen. She had no wish to do this but he had not responded to any of the twenty five other letters she had pushed through his letter box previously. Therefore she decided to take a more demanding stance before she instructed her solicitor.

She was still in love him and his decision to ignore her was unfathomable. She had to assume that he had not read any of the other letters so she had no other course of action than to deliver the lot in one package. In her head she left three more days to let him read her latest letter and if there was no response, she would go legal.

She thought back to their early days; they were the couple everyone loved to be with. Since he suddenly fell off the face of the earth, or that was what it seemed to Susie and others, he had not been seen. She had considered hiring a private investigator but decided that he did not want to be found so she’d left him to it, hoping one day he would surface. She knew that he had lost his job and that was strange in itself because he was very good at it. There must have been a falling out but he had insisted there was no reason for him to be dismissed as he was a key deal maker.

All this was churning around in her head as she pushed the envelope through the letter box. She listened for it to fall to the floor. She heard nothing. She called his name – no reply. She called him again but the same outcome. In fact, just behind the door, he was he was clutching one of her bras and desperately trying not to alert her by crying out and asking her for forgiveness but he had been warned to make no contact with her on pain of death by her father.

Susie decided to walk around the perimeter of the house to ascertain if there was anyone inside. She knew every inch of the exterior as well as interior for it was her who had designed them both. As she slowly walked and looked around, she could see nothing out of place and no sign of him but was convinced he was inside so she decided to call a colleague who had a knack of opening doors. She made several attempts to do so but left a message. She made to walk away when she heard a telephone ring and it was picked up straight away. She made her way slowly towards the large door through which she had posted the envelope. Drapes were drawn so she risked moving nearer. As she neared, she could hear his voice but could not clearly hear was being said. It sounded like a Spanish or Italian accent, certainly European. She was about move closer when she heard what sounded like a telephone being thrown to the tiled floor, followed by a rant about the EU.

She waited until it stopped and walked boldly to the door and shouted his name and banged on the glass with a stone from the rockery. The curtain remained drawn. She shouted him again, pleading him to open the door.

                “Robbie, please open. I can help you. I still love you, please let me in, please.”

She stayed still and calm and waited. It seemed like an hour but after five minutes had elapsed, Robert opened the door. She was trying not to look totally shocked as he came through the door, instead she made herself smile and she embraced him as she always had, lovingly with no apologies.

“Oh, Robbie, it’s wonderful to see you after such a long time." 

“Well thank you for that. I appreciate that I do not deserve to be talking to you in any shape or form, let alone embracing you. You must notice that I am just a little less, shall we say, less together, since we last met.”

“We’ve all changed, Robbie but inside we still have the same thoughts, same personalities whatever what we’ve done or not done. You and me, we are the same people as we were when we married.”

“Don’t give me that, Susie, it may be your life but it sure isn’t mine you only have to look at us. I’m just a washed up loser who drinks himself into a stupor every night and pisses it out in the next morning and not always in the toilet. There’s no saving me, Susie; I’m too far gone.”

“I don’t believe you, Robbie. I think you’re not telling me something; what is it? I want us to be a team again, you can do it. 'Back in the day' was only a short time ago. What do you say?"

“You’d better ask your old man why he warned me off before you get too excited."

“What do you mean? He thinks highly of you…..”

“As I said, Susie, you better ask him. Ask him about the Italians while you’re at it too. Not that he will tell you anything but if you want to really want to piss him off, say this to him: ‘It's all about the money’. He will know for sure you’ve been talking to me.”

“You are talking in riddles, what’s going on Robbie? Did something happen between you?”

“Ha ha, you could say that, yes. Before we get any ideas about starting again, you really must speak to him. I’ll leave it like that. And I’m sorry Susie but you need to go now before one of his goons sees you here."

“What are you talking about, ‘goons?’ it’s like listening to a gangster.”

“Exactly, but I am not the gangster. You have go now. Please, Suze. Here’s my secure number, it’s safe. Go.”

He turned toward the door and without looking back shouted “I love you Suze. Be careful.” He did not hear her reply if there was one. The door banged as he kicked it shut.