We all face a point in our writing careers when we feel the heavy weight of writer’s block crushing our muse. We all have moments where we want to write but can’t because nothing comes to mind. Well, nothing that we consider worthwhile that is.
Photo by Send me adrift. (Creative Commons)
When you think about it, about the moments you were stuck behind your writer’s desk with the page reading blank, you had plenty of thoughts on what to write. I know I always do. The thing that stops us from writing down those thoughts varies depending on the writer.
How to Break Your Writer's Block
I could go all Dr. Phil on you and talk about how we tend to build our writer’s blocks ourselves mainly due to self-confidence issues, but I would rather offer some solutions instead. No, I am not going to tell you to record the phrase “you are a bestselling writer” and play it back to yourself when you are sleeping.
I am going to talk to you about how to break through whatever is stopping you from writing by using creative writing prompts.
Creative writing prompts can be a single word or phrase that you write down. Either way, you try to make a full story from them. They always work wonders for me, since they are easy to start and always end up helping me with character, plot and world creation.
Five Fun Writing Prompts
Here are five fun writing prompts for you so that you can see how creative you can get with them.
- He cut the car’s engine with a bloody, trembling hand and stopped his breath to listen for pursuers, but his pounding heart left him deaf to anything else that could be lurking in the night.
- She smelled roses as soon as she walked into the candle lit room and saw him lying on the bed naked except for a single rose he wore on his genitals.
- “Not all men are dogs,” he grinned, “but in my case, woof.”
- They were too late.
- She held the aluminum bat like a torch with her head held high as she made her way toward the office parking lot. She could feel her coworkers’ eyes staring down at her from their 9-to-5 prison cells. She smiled to more than just herself, but to the realization that she was no longer like them. She had broken free and now she was going to break something else. She just hoped it was the only thing that made her ex-boss happy and that it was parked in its usual spot.
The wonderful thing about creative writing prompts is that they can be simplistic or very descriptive. They can be part of the narrative or dialogue. You don’t even have to name any characters in them.
The point is that they make you write about something that has the potential to be a story by getting your creative writing juices flowing when your curiosity about the prompt forces you to think about the actual story behind the prompt. This leads to character, plot and world creation.
For example, look at the first creative writing prompt. Suspenseful, right? I hope so. When you write a prompt this way, it really helps you create a story because it makes you curious about the story behind the prompt. One of the first things it forces me to wonder is how did the character get into this situation. Then come more questions like who is he and who is out there in the dark? This writing prompt, like the rest of them, keep my mind focused on building the story for each question that the prompt makes me ask.
Write Your Own Prompts
So let’s fast forward a little and say that you used a writing prompt to start a story. You are pages into it and then become stuck again. It happens so don’t fret. You can use writing prompts like jumper cables to bring life back into your story. You can take elements from your story, such as characters and settings, and create new writing prompts from them, which will lead to more scenes that you can tie into your story.
You may even be surprised by stumbling across a great subplot, adding more complexity to your story. What reader wouldn’t like that?
Give this exercise a try and let me know how it helps you.
What do you do to break through writer's block?
PRACTICE
Choose a prompt above and write for fifteen minutes. When you're finished, post your practice in the comments section. And if you post, be sure to leave feedback on a few practices by other writers.
Happy writing!
They were too late.
She’d known it the moment the attack had started, but it didn’t do anything to stymie the well of agonized anguish that rose up in Silavara in a wave of destruction. Her spiritual energy, underused and swirling into a tempest of power, lashed out at the world as she fell to her knees beside her sister. Lightning cracked through the air and thunder growled over the world like a beast set free upon its enemies.
Wind howled, whipping Silvara’s carefully done-up hair into knotted tangles. Dust and sand became a blizzard of bullets, undulled by the torrent of hail that crashed down upon them all, as sharp and biting and eager for blood as their caller.
“No!” Silvara screamed, her voice silent inside the swirling storm. She looked down, shell-shocked, at her sister’s lifeless body, limbs in a listless sprawl and the blood of her death caked over her body. The dry blood ran in the rain, crimson tears soaking into the ground.
With trembling hands, Silvara ran her fingers over the fine, beautiful face of her sister; the high-cheek bones, the full lips. When she reached the eyes, large, green, and bright with their last terror, she gently closed them. Thunder boomed over head, and the black and purple sky snarled down upon them all, a mirror image of the twisting grief and rage inside of Silvara.
Silvara’s breathing shook in fury at those that had done this to her sister, so young and full of life, those who had taken all that miracle away from her. With waves of shudders still rolling through her, the tsunami of destruction, still tightly restrained behind a dam of hope, shattered, and the power thundered through into the world.
And then the storm really began.
Sand and ice became the messengers of her loss, whipped up into a flurry of enraged grief by growing winds. The wind pushed at the world, shoving, begging them to understand, begging to destroy those who could do this to her home. Slit was hurled through the air with deadly speed, as chaotic as it was fatal. But none of it touched her– she stood still, mourning and raging in a sea of death.
Silvara had lost any nuance of control she’d possessed, and the consequences would be disastrous.
~~~
Well, that was certainly interesting. I did *not* know that about Silvara….
Aha, prompt as character exploration. I take it this is written with an existing world of yours? I am currently using as many random prompts as possible to flesh out a fledgling world, and this powerful scene certainly seems to have leapt fully formed for you from that initial prompt. Great stuff! -Sef
Thank you! 🙂 Yeah, this is a world I’m currently working on building up… Silvara’s an important historical figure that apparently has more tragedy in her life than I knew. The prompts do seem to work, don’t they?
Wow, great use of a simple prompt. 🙂
Thanks! 😀
Great description, Brianna!
Thank you 😀
I admire writers that undertakes a story that also involves building the world that the story lives in. What a challenge! Great piece!
Thanks! 😀 It can be hard, but it’s so magical to have all that depth– it’s real, if only in your mind.
I love writing prompts. Just this weekend I got my friends to help me out. On my Facebook page I asked friends to submit one word in the comments section of my status and told them I would write a 150(ish) word piece for them based on their word. It’s been super fun and encouraging, and I’ve gotten a couple of good story ideas out of it.
What a great idea. Once my fb friends have got used to the idea of me writing I will do this!
What a great idea!
“Not all men are dogs,” he grinned, “but in my case, woof.”
She grabbed his arm and dragged him behind the funereal curtain. “Hush! This isn’t funny!” The chapel of rest was busy today.
“What, fifteen female coffins in a row and they’re all cats and you don’t believe there’s anything funny about it?” He gave a short laugh which ended on a yelp as she dug her nails into his arm.
“Not funny haha. Weird, yes.” She arched her eyebrows at him.
He shrugged it off, his good humour irrepressible. “I told you. It’s simple. Everyone reverts to their animal form after death. Some have experienced the change before, fleetingly or otherwise. But for most their secret nature is only revealed after their final moments, moments which we, as carers for the deceased, are privileged to witness.”
“And most women are cats.” She narrowed her eyes.
He waggled his head from side to side. “The recent facts do bear it out.”
“I am not a cat! And you are not a dog! That’s patently ridiculous.” She drove her fingernails into her palms.
“Ridiculous, perhaps. And yet you criticise me for laughing.”
He, and the situation, were too aggravating.”I – you – well -”
It rose in her throat unbidden and emerged too loud for suppression. He clapped his hand over his mouth in horrified glee. She pressed her own fingers across her lips – but it was done, and a room packed with mourners had heard her yowl.
Xxx
I just liked this prompt. And I agree – prompts which are dialogue or descriptive snippets are far more effective that more generic ‘write about x’ style prompts. I had fun with this, hope you like it. -Sef
I really enjoyed reading that. I can’t add anything more meaningful than that, but… that was a really intriguing and thought-provoking passage.
I would definitely like to see where you would take this if not stopped by the 15 min. time limit.
Very thought-provoking, and just slightly off-kilter. Thanks!
Great concept! And you did the back-and-forth dialogue extremely well!
I’ve started a blog, and asked Facebook friends for prompts, it gets really hard at times, but it’s all about practice, and any writing, even if it’s only half a story, is still better than no writing! My blog is here: http://chooseyourownmisadventure.blogspot.com.au/
Ah, how fickle the human heart, huh? I like the way you changed her uncontained rage into acquiescence in the last sentence. What a great emotional ride!
I like that we both chose to have the women getting ticked off. Apparently it’s not a big turn-on for women when men are covered in roses. 🙂
She smelled roses as soon as she walked into the candlelit room and saw him laying on the bed naked except for a singl rose he wore on his genitals. “What the hell is this?” She asked her anger, clearly overriding her urge and desire to remove that rose and let him wear nothing but her.
“Let’s call it a peace offering.” He said picking up that tiny remote next to him and turning on her stereo that was now softly playing her favorite music.
“A peace offering! After what you did! After what you said to me!” At this point her anger was getting the best of her as she turned on the lights full blast, before storming over and ripping the stereo plug from the wall. “Get the hell out! Get the hell out of my house before I call the cops on you. Actually, I think I’m going to do that anyways. I’m sure the guys in lockup will get a big kick out of where that rose is.”
He immediately jumped to his feet, knocking the phone out of her hands before she got a chance to dial. “Will you please give me a chance to explain. Please baby, just give me a chance.”
“No, I loved you. I wanted to marry you. I wanted to have children with you. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you.” Her anger had turned to tears as he wrapped his arms around her, trying to comfort her, trying to make the pain he had caused her go way. She had every right to not forgive him. She had every right to hate him for the rest of her life. But he still loved her. He still wanted that fairytale happily ever after fantasy to be with her. The truth was his little ‘peace offering’ was nowhere near enough to make up for what he did. But he still had one more trick up his sleeve, so he kissed her. A deep passionate kiss, filled with fire, filled with rage, filled with their love.
Makes me curious of what came before…what will com next. Great piece!
1- How to kiss someone? Not kissing, but the whole approaching thing can just be very pleasurable if you just go for it, most likely it will work out.
2- “Give me one solution for that problem”, he couldn’t think of anything. He said what he could to try to keep the situation more bland, his life was not feasible, and no excuse would somehow change that. All that he could do was submit to the feeling that he was the lost, the problem here was getting from one place to the other, and to be sure that when you would eventually would get in the other, that would be something different from nowhere.
3- “Are you not going to talk to me and just stay quiet?” The car drive was endless. He finally some peace from her silence with a cigarette.
4- “How can you be tired when I am next you?” “It was a very long day you know, it is not really a question of you, but of being tired despite of anything.”
5- Me and my dad watching the great army of Branca Leone on the sofa, the movie it is amazing and very funny.
6- Looking at the sea, the two characters see the sunset, in a mixture of beauty, nostalgia and the meaningless of their lives they find peace.
7- The silence in the island is full of noises.
8- He doesn’t remember how he got there, slowly he would try to discover little things, he knew perhaps some basic ideas, some facts, like that he had a wife, but he would miss someone he couldn’t remember.
9- I wish I could open my head and get back to the past, I wish I could read and hear you, I wish you could encourage me on what I am doing, maybe it wouldn’t be all great as it is now and I am pretty sure you would not have admitted my apathy and the lack of work and courage I have shown along the years, my life wouldn’t be what it is now, and if it was, I am pretty sure you would be disappointed.
10- He has some problems with his machine and the images and the whole experiment goes wrong.
They were too late – Will Coffy just knew it.
The old man had hoped for a storm to accompany their ride into town, something dramatic, in the same way the skies had opened up so many years ago, on the day he arrested Robert Forrest, possibly the greatest train robber of the early 20th century. On that day, the wind had preceded the black skies, rolling the wildflowers in waves before him as his white-maned buckskin thundered across the prairie in pursuit of the outlaw’s appaloosa. Forrest’s horse was winded, its eyes wide with fear and surprise, and Will could see the flecks of foam flying off the bit as he closed. Forrest turned as he drew astride, and Will saw his hand go toward the Colt he had holstered on his right hip, but he missed the handle in his urgency, and Will leaned over into Forrest and dragged him with him as he fell. The two men rolled through the scrub like a pair of bobcats, their bodies kicking up dust and dried sage as they tumbled. Will was better prepared; he brought up a knotted right fist and caught Robert Forrest’s chin squarely before they had even stopped moving, and he saw Forrest’s eyes roll backward in his head.
“Gotcha, you sonofabitch!” he gasped, and reached behind his back for the cuffs. The rain began at that moment, covering the two men like a slippery blanket.
These days the sky always looked the same, Will thought; too blue, too bereft of character. As his son wheeled the pickup down the smooth serenity of the blacktop toward town, Will felt himself being pulled backward once again, into a time of urgency, of men whose past defined their lives, and who would never change. When he had thrown Robert Forrest into that sunless cell and clanged the door shut, the prisoner had sworn at him. “I’ll remember your face, pardner,” he had said, and Will had been quick to tell him he hoped he would. Forrest would never set a foot on the dirt as a free man again, and Will almost felt sorry for that. True men were already becoming hard to find.
“Ya think we’ll get there in time?” he croaked, returning himself to the here and now, his old eyes squinting in the too-brightness of the afternoon.
“Sure, dad. It’s a 24-hour drugstore, remember?” Alan Coffy peered at his father through his dark-framed glasses. “You got a little nap there, huh?” he said, and smiled. He reached a hand over and squeezed his father’s shoulder lovingly. “Goin’ after outlaws again, Dad?”
Will didn’t answer. He stared forward, past the windshield wipers and mile markers and into the bright familiarity of the sage and scrub grass that flanked their route. He saw movement, and wondered if it was Robert Forrest, the outlaw’s face once again twisted with bad intent, his pistols drawn down on a nervous train conductor as the man stuffed valuables into a croker sack. The clicking of the car tires over tiny rocks sounded like distant gunfire to Will.
This reminds me of something one of my favorite writers could have written! Very good work.
Maggie regained consciousness slowly, not so much waking up as becoming aware, once sense at a time. The sound of flies buzzing loudly at that small window that she had glimpsed before the bag was placed over her head. It was high up on the wall, and she could hear the frenzied striving of the doomed insects thumping against it. An awareness that they were still up there, somewhere.
Simultaneously, the pain in her wrists and ankles where the wire had cut into the flesh, the parched burning of her mouth and throat and the sickening tickle of the maggots wriggling in the wounds assaulted her. Then the stench of her body’s excretions: urine, sweat, feces assailed her nostrils, all mixed with the fetid odor of their semen where they had masterbated on her once she became too foul even for them to rape or sodomize.
She began to gag again, a hoarse dry-heaving that she could not control even though it made the broken ribs ache in a bright arc of pain that overwhelmed everything else. The coils of the rusted bed frame she was bound to cut into her and when she moved, she could feel the flesh tear away from where the wires had impaled her.
“Please,God” Maggie whispered between shudders of nausea. “If you’re out there, please let me die today.”
Flies were buzzing around the bag that covered her face, trying to get to the dried blood from her busted lips, broken nose. Maggie could feel a scream building in her chest, finding its way up her seared throat and fought against it. Screams brought one of them, or some of them, downstairs to kick her with their steel-toed boots.
“Shutthefuckupyoufuckin’bitch” Kick.
“Whoyouthinkisgonnahearyoubitch?” Kick.
“Wantsumthin’toscreamaboutbitch?How’sthis?” Kick. Kick. Kick.
How long had she been here now? Was it days? Weeks? Maggie had lost track of time. At first, one of them, the same one, came every so often pulled back the sack and trickled warm, stale beer into her mouth that she gulped down, strangling on it in her desperate thirst. Then he’d pull the bag down over her head and stomp back up the stairs.
Suddenly she heard the sound of their voices outside the basement’s window, loud and brutal, punctuated with laughter and curses. One by one, she heard the sound of them starting their Hogs, gunning the engines, the unmistakable rumble of motor that she once loved the sound of. They were leaving? They were leaving her here? Maggie began to scream, beyond caring about the consequences, panic coursing through her broken body, over-riding every other sensation.
She heard heavy footsteps coming down the stairs.
“Please, please…” she croaked. “Please don’t leave me here. Kill me. Pleeeeeeeease, just kill me…pleeeeeeeeese….” She had stopped praying to be saved.
Brutal hands pulled at the sack on her head, pushing it back from her neck and she felt the bite of wire press into her throat as someone snaked the ends into the coils of the bed frame and pulled it viciously tight. She could feel a trickle of blood move down her chest.
“You wanna die? Do it yourself.” a voice hissed near her ear. She knew it was the same man who had given her the swallows of beer. The sack was yanked down again and footsteps ascended the cement stairs, the sound of a door slamming, the snick of a padlock.
One by one, Maggie heard them roar down the dirt road, gravel spraying from the tires, and then she knew she was truly alone. The surge of adrenalized panic seeped from her body all at once and she lost consciousness again.
Sometime later, she came to. The flies were still there, the pain. Only now, the absence of their presence screamed in the silence. It was too late for any hope of a savior. Maggie began to sob, dry, hacking noises, her body too dehydrated to make tears or snot, as she tilted her head back, fixedly pressing her neck into the wire.
They were too late. Every excruciatingly miniscule detail had been looked over and over
again, planned and practiced until it seemed like they could be blindfolded
with their hands behind their backs and still perform the plan, dancing as they
went. But one second – one excruciatingly miniscule second – brought them to
their knees, and with a gun to my head I wouldn’t say they had messed up.
Because they hadn’t.
Every single day Hurst would get in his car at 8:05, be at the warehouse by 9:00, and
take a smoke break at 12:00, right after eating his tuna salad sandwich for
lunch. This was absolute. It’s like he had fucking OCD or something; he never
went off schedule by even a second. So why today? Why, of all days in the god
damn world, would he choose today to stay in the warehouse?
The two things we knew we could count on were our abilities, and his rigid schedule. He
should’ve been out of the building by twelve, not a second before, not a second
after. How many times had he left during a conversation because it was noon?
How many god damn times did I watch him go out in the driveway to smoke? And
today of all fucking days, the one time we’re all waiting out here to take him
far away from his new hell, he doesn’t even make an appearance.
Someone must’ve known. Some motherfucker must’ve known that they were coming today, known what we planned to do. But how? How did they know? Who could’ve…
I guess it didn’t matter. They were too late, and everyone still in that warehouse was
dead.
He cut the car’s engine with a bloody, trembling hand and stopped his breath to listen for pursuers, but his pounding heart left him deaf to anything else that could be lurking in the night.
This was it. The shit had, indeed, hit the fan.
He had read many fictional books about this very thing, never imagining that it would actually happen.
The news was getting worse as the months passed. There were more shootings. The unemployment rate was the highest the country had ever seen. Food prices were out the roof.
Then it happened.
The stock market crashed harder than it ever had in American history.
People panicked. There was fighting in the streets. People, who didn’t have much to begin with, were looting. martial law was declared with a mandatory curfew. It got so bad that cops abandoned their posts and went home to protect their families.
So when Curt found himself in the middle of a redneck posse of sorts he wasn’t surprised. He just hoped he could get out alive.
He had gone to the abandoned convenience store hoping to find something, anything, on the shelves.
He was trying to get home to Bonners Ferry because he had been out of town for work. He had run out of food in his Go Bag never imagining it would take him days to get home. In normal conditions it was a 4 hour drive.
He made sure his 1911 was loaded as he cautiously walked in through broken glassed door.
I found 2 Red Bull’s and a bag of jerky. It wasn’t much, but it was better than starving.
Then he heard the click.
He moved only his eyes to see a large, bearded man to his right.
He did as the man told which was to walk slowly out of the store.
Once outside was when he saw the rest of this mans followers. He was clearly their leader.
A few of them were kids, not much older than 15 or 16.
Curt thought this wouldn’t be so bad. He could take the kids easy.
Then he thought all of this was going to be over Red Bull and jerky.
Another car had pulled up, causing the bearded man to leave Curt under the care of the kids.
Now was his chance.
He elbowed one kid in the nose and punched the other.
By the time bearded man noticed the ruckus, Curt was already behind the wheel of his car.
He was shot at a few times, but miraculously wasn’t personally hit.
Bearded man was after him in his beat up Chevy truck. It was no match to Curt’s Dodge and Curt left him in his dust.
“How did you get in here?” I ask.
Except I don’t ask it calmly. I ask it more like, “HOW DID YOU GET IN HERE?” and then I might have said “GODDAMNITALLYOUCRAZY,CRAZYMAN”
But seriously, how does he keep getting in?
I’ve changed the locks three times, re-enforced the windows, and installed one of those light timer things. He never does this when I’m actually in the apartment. Well forget that, I’m returning that timer and getting my twelve bucks back.
Roses are everywhere, again. He’s on the bed naked, again. And there it is, the piece of resistance (notice I didn’t write that in French, because this is definitely a cause for resistance), the rose on top of his genitals, again.
“I came in through the door of love.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“I came in through the door.”
“But how did you get in? Who or what is letting you into this apartment every Friday night?”
He doesn’t answer. He just grins.
This is my Friday night. Some women come home to throw on makeup and a cute dress before heading out to the bar. I come home to throw out this guy.
… And that’s as far as I got. I don’t think I’ll go any further, but it was fun to play for fifteen minutes. Thanks!
This made me laugh and feel very uncomfortable at the same time. (I mean that in a good way of course.) I love your writing voice. It’s very casual and familiar which makes it very easy to relate to your characters. (Well, maybe not BOTH of them…) It’s a very nice and fun post over all. Thanks for sharing!
“Not all men are dogs,” he grinned, “but in my case, woof.”
Her eyes narrowed as they swept up and down tis oily man’s rail-thin frame. His tinted, black hair gel glistened in a rather unflattering way under Kara’s yellow porch light. His arms remained outstretched, as if expecting an emotional embrace from the woman.
“You’re a pathetic creature, you know that?”
“Never said I wasn’t.” he replied, now dialing down the cockiness in his demeanor. Kara didn’t grace him with a response this time. Thus, in an effort to combat the silence, the man squeezed his way between Kara and the door frame with ease, saying
“Long time, no see George. How’s your life been George? Care to come in George?” he mocked.
Before Kara could protest, the oil slick known as George had already managed to situate himself in the most comfortable spot in her Martha Stewart living room, upon her once spotless sofa.
“You left me, Roberts.” she said in as even tone as she could mange. At this, he sat upright causing his faux-leather jacket to crackle in an unpleasant way.
“Aw, drop it Kara. It’s George. I won’t have ya usin’ all that formal stuff with me.”
“Well, I won’t have some drunk, sleaze ball just waltz back into my life after five years and soil my perfectly new couch. So, if you don’t mind…” George then proceeded to ooze slowly off the couch and onto the carpet.
“I liked that couch, but ya know what? The floor’s just as comfy…” With that, he lay splat on the floor, flashing Kara that same crooked smile that once enchanted her.
Now, it was all she could do to keep Eli’s roast beef down.
“Oh gosh, Eli…” Kara muttered to herself.
“E- who?” George stammered. For a drunk, he had incredibly sharp hearing.
“Never you mind.” she snapped. She span on her heel and began towards the back of the house, hoping to find that Eli had finished up the chapter and gone to his bed. Then, remembering her unexpected guest, she re-entered the room and forbade him from even drawing near the couch again. Though, by the looks of it, he seemed to have no intention of moving anywhere, anytime soon.
As Kara rounded the corner that led to the main hallway, she collided with the bathrobe-clad body of none other than Eli.
“Oh! Eli! I’m so sorry. I didn’t-” Kara stammered.
“It’s alright.” Eli smiled charmingly. “I thought I heard voices coming from the living room, so I came to check it out.” he replied in his gentile manner.
“Oh, well, I-” she stuttered, unsure of what to say.
Eli immediately took notice of her hesitance
“Kara, is everything okay? Who’s here?” he asked, now concerned.
“Well, there’s- ” Kara tried to explain, but didn’t have a chance to finish as Eli had decided to take off towards the living room.
“Wait! Eli!” Kara called as she chased after him. She nearly bumped into him again since he stood in the doorway between the hall and the living room.
“Hey Kar,” George slurred from the floor, “Who’s the Ken-doll?”
Kara blushed profusely.
“Roberts, this is Eli Reanolds, the co-author of my new book whose car broke down this evening.” She took a wary glance in Eli’s direction, afraid to read his expression.
“Eli, this is George Roberts, my stinking-drunk, ex-fiancee whom I haven’t seen in five years…”
I really don’t know where any of this came from to be honest. It’s unlike anything I have ever written before as far as subject matter goes (I’m more of a fantasy gal myself, plus I’m only 16 so I know little to nothing about the nature of engagements and that sort of thing), so I thoroughly enjoyed writing it. I really liked this prompt. Initially, I had envisioned this sweet, funny guy delivering those words, but the more and more I tried to write about him, the image of this sleazy guy just popped into my brain and things took off from there. I would love any and all critiques.
“not all men are dogs.” He grinned. “but in my case, woof.”
he let out a roaring laughter that echoed through the room and almost forced him off his chair.
“hhmm mmhh.” I said, backing up a little.
but he noticed my retreat and his grin only got wider. “really? you have no reason to be scared, go on, take a seat.” he nodded at the only other chair in the otherwise empty room.
“no thanks, I already have plenty at home.” I replied, ugh, what was wrong with me? couldn’t I keep my mouth shut for once?
“ah, that’s funny, I like people with a sense of humor.” he looked at me with his fierce dark eyes.
wait, why was I here again? oh yeah. “I have the disk.”
he’s smile instantly faded and he seemed to grow even bigger then he was. “oh, do you now? how did a young lady like yourself come in possession of something so dangerous?”
I hesitated and decided not to answer that. “it’s just a copy but has all the information.”
“you’re a hacker, huh?”
no way was I going to let this guy know anything about me. “maybe, I could of just stumbled onto it, I could of borrowed it from a friend.”
“what do you want for it?” he asked.
“not any kind of money.” I told him. “I want to trade it for a person.”
“a person? deal, who’d you have in mind?”
I held my breath, could it really be this easy? “Nicole Silver.”
he clicked his tongue. “sorry, can’t give you Silver, just got her.”
no! of course not, not with the amount of trouble Nicole has caused. “oh well, I guess she’s worth more than millions of dollars.”
I waited, he thought about that for a moment. “aw, fine.”
he got up and headed towards the door but then he stopped. “I need to see the disk first.”
I froze and paled. “I-I u-uh-”
he laughed. “should have known it was a bluff.”
but then I surprised him, I laughed too.
“what’s so funny?”
“what’s so funny.” I told him. “is what you’ll find when you open that door.”
he growled and mumble something under his breath, then slammed the door open.
the tip of a shotgun faced him right between his eyes.
“you’re under arrest.”
“And up next, we have Natalie, Abby and Alyssa!”
I took a deep breath in, closing my eyes for a moment as I let the nervousness and fear wash over me. This wasn’t my first time on stage but my previous attempts had ended with me in a quivering mess from stage fright, completely unable to even think beyond escaping the headlights. This time would be different. We had practiced for weeks together, singing until our throats gave out. It had sounded perfect. Sometimes, I would listen to recording of us and wonder how we had created such beautiful music. Determined to not let this become another one of my failures, I had made of an entire list of whatever could go wrong, starting from the mikes and the sound system to the roof collapsing in on us. We had triple-checked everything and everything was in place. Well, except for a few glitches here and their; Abby had a slight sore throat, but I had prepared for this; we would simply sing all of her parts together. Abby squeezed my shoulder and nodded to the stage. I looked around, giving what I hoped was an encouraging smile to my friends, and walked forward. This was my moment, that moment when everyone would know me for what I could do and I could finally create that name for myself. One more step forward and I would be on the stage. Another deep breath, a quick prayer and I walked straight into the headlights.
I flinched as I stepped into the stage, trying my hardest not to look at the size of the audience or the bored stares of the senior grades. High school audiences were ruthless at worst and apathetic at best, they would rip you to shreds at the slightest sight of any vulnerability. And vulnerable was exactly what I was at that moment, my heart pounding and my pulse racing as I deliberately set my shoulders straighter and my chin higher in a vain attempt to look more confident. It was pointless; high school could see through everything, exposing your most feared secrets and wanted dreams, then stamping all over them with jeers and laughter. I turned, another breath, and then signaled for the music.
As the very first notes of the guitar strummed through, I waited for precisely three beats and then started my song. My voice shook and I struggled to smoothen it, willing myself to calm down. And then I noticed. I couldn’t hear myself. My voice wasn’t coming through the speakers; my mike wasn’t working. My mind immediately went into panic mode, overcome with the frenzy of thoughts that had rushed in at this new problem. My brain froze, instantly, though I kept singing. It was no use, no one could hear me and hushed whispers immediately ran through the audience, all of the students exchanging bored and confused looks. As I finished my line, I fervently prayed for the mikes to come through for the others. And it did. But this time, Alyssa had panicked and started off at the wrong pitch and beat, mixing up her lyrics and not even realizing it. I look to Abby for help, but her voice was cracked and when it came through the mike, it sounded awful. Completely awful.
The rest of our performance was mostly a repeat of this. With all of us having completely no clue as to what to do, singing wrong lyrics in the wrong tunes and an utterly baffled audience looking on. I was down to tears at this point. All my dreams crushed. I had dared to hope and this was what it had come to. This wrecked mess of a song. A humiliating defeat which would probably be passed on from ear to ear, until the entire school had heard about it. I had made a name for myself, alright. I would now be remembered as that pathetic wreck who messed up the entire show. I wanted to just run and hide, away from school, away from ‘friends’, away from this entire embarrassment of a song. But most of all, I wanted to run away from myself. From that silent inner voice which kept telling me what a failure I was, how I would never accomplish anything, how I should just give up because I obviously couldn’t do it. On good days, I could have pushed down this voice but today, it raged through me, until it was all I could hear. It dominated my thoughts, taking advantage of every vulnerability I had, ruthless in its attack over me. And today, it’s not that performance I’m ashamed of the most. It’s how I let that voice have so much power over me, for so long. How I had let it take over my life for years, until each and every aspect of my life was being controlled by it. A voice that had told me that I was useless, completely worthless, utterly hopeless. A voice that had degraded me until I was just a shadow of my former self. Four years of making me shrink into myself, making me wish I was invisible- that was how much power it processed. Four years of wasted time, wasted talent, wasted opportunities. Four years that I now have the sense to regret.