Ooh, this seems a goodly! Is this going to be a drabble-sharing from you?
edited 6th Dec '10 9:58:45 PM by QQQQQ
Why yes it is!
First Stroke
Robert knows that Carina's calligraphy is an elevated form of writing, the way singing is to speaking or dancing to walking. While grinding the inkstone with the smell of cut grass wafting gently into the air, she has tried to explain it to him many times. That, like dancing and singing, it is more about the process than about the finished product.
"You think too much in terms of gratification," she tells him while loading her brush with the ink. "And when I started learning I did too; but if you aren't going to pick up a brush and do this with me, know that I have no patience for explaining this to someone who won't get it. So please, fuck off."
Miffed, Rob crosses his arms and sulks in a corner as brush finally touches paper. If Rich was there, Rich would say that Carina is just reacting to the intrusion of her personal space and relaxation time like any woman would for any man, and didn't mean to come off so prickly (but Rob should probably get out of the way, like now, in case she changes her mind). She has a point about him not getting it anyway.
He doesn't think he ever will see what is so interesting about brushing black ink across paper, but like clockwork Carina does it every night after dinner whether work has gone well or nearly killed them, at his house or hers. And when work has evened out to "muddling along", when her house has shifted into "theirs", when Rich has finally stopped giving advice in order to make fun of them instead, Rob finds himself watching Carina every night after dinner. She smiles at him, the first time, as she puts everything away.
"You're getting it."
edited 4th Jan '11 9:18:32 PM by Slan
I remember that's how I first felt when I would see an artist painting a magnificent portrait, or an author in the midst of going at it on the typewriter. I would at first feel confused, and awed at how someone could make imagination flow like that. Course, years had passed since, and here I am, eager to pump stories out.
She smiles at him the first time, as she puts everything away.Might want to nudge a "for" in there.
Our Foibles and Frivolities
"You're sorry?"
She looks ready to throw this bowl of soup at him, too.
Stephen can run. He can knock it out of her hands, duck, or simply brace himself for the searing pain and hope she's too distracted to hit below the waist. Again. But before he can do anything, she thunks the bowl down onto a table out of sight, just to the left of the doorway, and closes the door behind her as she steps outside onto the path. Next to Stephen.
But she keeps going down the walkway and turns off to stand in a clearing behind a tall bush, barely big enough to keep walking room free around a stone bench. It looks as old as the tiny whitewashed cottage behind them. The near-theft victim—his near-theft victim—waves at it, saying, "If you mean it, and I doubt you do, sit down and stay there until I come back."
Stephen plunks down on the very end of it, clutches his elbows, and wonders if he made a mistake coming back. Even if it was to apologize.
edited 4th Jan '11 9:19:10 PM by Slan
Diamond District
The royal weather mage has assured no rain on the day of the switch. In the early autumn clothes of a commoner, third princess Oline Balisay fidgets. She would have preferred a hooded cape and long, thick dress—at least it would have compensated for the makeup she had been strictly forbidden to apply.
After stealing a glance at the youth and three women in finely made traveling clothes—her siblings' clothes—Oline catches sight of another, small and dark and slight in her most somber dark blue dress, as if there had been a mirror hung there. No, she remembers; those are not her brothers and sisters. She turns around to see Jocelyn, looking so at home in the ill-fitting dress that she is near-unrecognizable as the second eldest princess. Her husband and two children are clustered tightly around her.
Jocelyn has never been one to let fear or anger take over the cheerful serenity that has composed her personality for as long as Oline can remember. She gestures to the decoys with a smile and asks, "Is this not the strangest sight, Oline?"
"It is," Oline replies. But this is the last time she will be with her family for a long time, and she cannot smile back.
edited 1st Jan '11 1:21:39 PM by Slan
Two Hours and Sixteen-Ish Minutes In Heaven
"This sucks."
Henry makes no reply to the obvious, obvious statement of his friend. Instead, he twists into a corner of the closet and longs for enough arm room to plug his ears. George is a predictable person when stressed, and like clockwork a variation of the same rant Henry had been listening to for the past half an hour begins.
"Man, I think we're going to die in here."
"Someone will notice we're missing," Henry drones automatically. Then, just to make it feel less insincere he adds, "Closing time isn't till seven, right? Jean will figure it out."
The crack of light at their feet is testament to the first one, and a nice reminder that there is no danger of suffocating to death.
"Wait." When hope springs forth in George's voice, Henry doesn't know whether to join him or expect the worst from someone who's been breathing in the scent of cleaning chemicals strong for a floor that gets tramped upon by thousands of intellectual strangers. "This is a magic museum! There's got to be a telepath around here somewhere!"
Actually that is pretty likely. Except for the fact that: "We don't know how to talk to telepaths that aren't trained for talking to average guys."
"Just think really hard."
The doorknob rattles not a second after George finishes and before they know it the door is wrenched open. When Henry's eyes stop clouding over with green and purple spots there is a dark-skinned father with his son standing in front of them, arms crossed.
"Oh thank god, I thought we'd never get out of there!" George bowls out and runs down the hall to the gallery where their class had been last.
Henry says "Thanks, sir" before stepping out, but gets stopped before he gets a few feet away.
"Now do you see why wandering alone in a place with arcane relics of mystical power is a bad idea?"
"Um. Yes?"
The man grins and tilts his head slightly in the direction of his son, now wide-eyed and clinging to a forearm. "Go on and make sure your friend doesn't get stuck in another closet."
Zzzzzzzzzz
Your muse pukes up some pretty interesting stuff, Slan.
...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.
Why thank you. Most of these are too unique to fit into an overarching plot, which is why they're so interesting. xD
^^^ — I feel plenty Ho Yay here. 
La Resistance
You were a shadow in the doorway with your back to the sun. I laid out the odds for you, how everything we had was broken or empty or both, and even if they weren't no one could stand against that many. I wanted us to surrender so we would get away with our lives. But you turned. You walked out bleeding with two, maybe three hours of sleep behind you and said you would hold them off. There was no convincing you, and that was probably why you didn't think to persuade me.
When the others came to rescue me against all the odds I had a long, long time alone to think. I thought that if the odds had spared me then maybe you were still out there, too. But the years spun on and I didn't hear a thing. Nothing in the news. No word on our networks. (Strange, how for a lot of people you were just a glorified cheerleader who happened to be good with guns. How in the end you were really only important to me.) So I put thoughts of what might be away in the furthest corner of my mind. I surrendered to the statistics.
I should have gone with you.
Close Enough
In the dugouts, cigarettes are safe from the water or fire or air-based attacks that usually pummel them. The kid's lighting up first, as always, ducking into the shelter with a feverish look and shaky hands. Eos doesn't grudge him, but if he hasn't checked the cows before this everyone will be pissed off. Mostly because the smell of nicotine will be a painful reminder of the hobby that can only be maintained by a similarly addicted puppeteer most of the time, and Eos is too busy running him ragged to spare him much.
A recent memory, not hers, flicks across her eyes.
The grimy rows of oxygen tanks, standing up straight as the soldiers they get carried by, are checked and filled at the same time. Then a cloth polishes the centermost one. A buzzed, boyish face appears on the gray metal, like water slowly drained out of a mirrored tub. He smirks and thumbs up with both hands while the cloth starts on the next cow. "Knew you'd get on me if I didn't do this first, Colonel Hag."
"Pre-emptive strike," Eos remarks as the memory fades. "Classy."
A smidgen of pride peeks out from the kid's immature scowl before he crosses his arms tight and slouches against the wall. The flap of one pocket lifts to allow his lighter and a precious cigarette out. It flicks open, one end dabs at the flame, and finally the other one pokes into the corner of his mouth. Eos whaps him on the shoulder, with only enough force to slam a door. "Ow! Bitch! What was that for?"
"For showing off."
In the dugouts, cigarettes are safe from the water or fire or air-based attacks that usually pummel them. The kid's lighting up first, as always, ducking into the shelter with a feverish look and shaky hands. Eos doesn't grudge him, but if he hasn't checked the cows before this everyone will be pissed off. Mostly because the smell of nicotine will be a painful reminder of the hobby that can only be maintained by a similarly addicted puppeteer most of the time, and Eos is too busy running him ragged to spare him much.I like the atmosphere you've set-up. It seems like there is a war going on.
The grimy rows of oxygen tanks, standing up straight as the soldiers they get carried by, are checked and filled at the same time. Then a cloth polishes the centermost one. A buzzed, boyish face appears on the gray metal, like water slowly drained out of a mirrored tub. He smirks and thumbs up with both hands while the cloth starts on the next cow. "Knew you'd get on me if I didn't do this first, Colonel Hag."The highlighted sentence I find awkward. Try "The grimy rows of oxygen tanks, which stand up as straight as the soldiers they're carried by, get checked and filled at the same time."
The rest I find is good. Has a snapshot-picture quality to it.
Thanks for the critique, and I am glad you think there is a war going on because (SHOCKER) there is—at the time this short was taking place at least.
Also known as "Story Dump, by Leradny"—but the first one caught your eye better!
Like everyone else I have decided to make a writing corner for those ideas I can't possibly fit into my current novel. Because I am a freak about organization, this post functions as a Table of Contents, for easy access to pieces you might be more interested in than others. NSFW pieces are completely spoilered.
These are my attempts at drabbles, so I try to keep the word count below 700. Feedback is appreciated, constructive criticism as well.
I will likely change the titles and order as each piece is published.
Beware the wordplay.
edited 12th Feb '11 10:08:01 PM by Slan