Take one

 
The punch drew blood, loosened a few teeth, started skin-deep capillaries wailing - it shouldn't have. "Cut!" the director screamed. The crew had watched the tension build for weeks and now gasped, surprise laced with satisfaction. Supporting looked down at Lead's ruined face, sneered. "That's for sleeping with my wife."
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Grizzly Bear, Cheerleader

Snowflake

 
In the cold she could tell his breaths were becoming more rapid, heavier, angry. "Don't believe everything you hear," she coaxed, and put a hand on his shoulder. He shuddered and cursed, felt his fury start to melt, dripping in half-frozen morsels from his elbow, collapsing softly in the snow.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Bob Dylan, Don't Think Twice, It's All Right

Traffic

 
The chilled wind blowing up from the canyon showed more life than his purpled lips, perpetually smashed together. He looked back at his car – still parked in the worst traffic he'd ever seen – and shook his head with expectant regret. Bad things happened when he had this much time on his hands.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Bon Iver, Blindsided

Rain

 
Droplets spattered on the roof of his car in psychedelic rhythm, like someone was snapping their fingers in time during a bad trip. But they would never fall hard enough to wipe his memory clean of those savage recollections, those mind-killing sounds, those visions of a young summer at war.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Johnson&Jonson, Up All Night

Ladder

 
This wasn't going to be your run-of-the-mill staff meeting, but he was the only one who knew it. They gathered their coffee, their donuts, their uninterested stares, and sat quietly. He stood, walked to the front. "Ladies and gentlemen, I've murdered our boss. And named myself CEO."
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Dull Life

Abandoned building

One glance at the warped fence and hollowed old windows told her all she needed to know: it had been too long. She couldn't see his face in the doorway anymore, waiting for her to come home. With a slow sigh she got back in her car. No closure here.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Arcade Fire, Old Flame

Hell

 
I clawed desperately at the mud, freeing rocks and small tree roots from their amorphous enclosure. My only chance was to bury myself and hope they weren't interested in an otherwise empty foxhole. Then: the clack of a rifle behind me. I froze. "We don't tolerate cowards," a voice said.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
OK Go, This Too Shall Pass

Murder

 
The first of the 50-worders:

His hands were a deeper pale color than I expected. His face, too - a lazy coral. I knew it would elicit a reaction, but not like this. I grabbed the nearest bit of cloth to shield him from the truth. One should never have to witness one's own death.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Radiohead, How To Disappear Completely

Desperate, much?

 
My friend and I have decided we needed more impetus to keep writing, and our strategy has boiled down to making each other write a 50-word story every day for the next 4 weeks. The first one should go up tomorrow (dunno if he'll let me publish his, too, but I'll try) and the run should end sometime around the middle of October. I figured NaPoWriMo worked so well for me, why not try the same method once more?

We'll see.

Smartphone

Decided to try this again, but with my work Blackberry this time. Not as good a shape as the recorder, but still a challenge to fill it with meaningful language...which, of course, is the point.

                                    A structure
                          so incomplete, but
                so meaningful. A bare frame
              filled to its empty walls with the
              pale ghosts of our collective past,
                shining in the mirrored glass and
                  howling to be forgotten - no, not
                    forgotten, let go. Released from
                     our memorial tethers; allowed to
                       stay at rest without the imminen
                         interruption of policy, rhetoric,
                           commercialism; allowed to settle
                             into the light grooves of their new
                               homes - at home in the mind,
                                 and at home in the heart.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
TV On The Radio, Blues From Down Here

Something's fishy

 
Welcome
to my halibut-lined anxiety.
Allergies hold no promise
but the constant itch
of time
spent in a cathedral,
colored in stained glass.
My years in the sea
spent yearning
for a tinge of hell,
salty misery
seasoned to taste.
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Playing on my iTunes at this very moment:
Rage Against the Machine, Wake Up