by

You Don’t Think of It as Murder

This week’s attempt at Inspiration Monday. This is the quickest I’ve written and it’s going up unedited. Yikes! But what fun!

*****

He turned around and looked at me even though we were supposed to be reading the exercise to ourselves. He picked up one of my freshly sharpened pencils and smiled.

That’s when the bombs started going off. One. Two. Three four five. The wall to my right collapsed. Six. Seven. He grabbed my hand, and we were running. Eight. And then I stopped counting. The screams so close to my ears spread out, thinned, dampened by the heavy air around us. Air too heavy to breathe. We fell to our knees in the grass. He pulled me up, and we were running again. Dodging bodies. People I should know, but I couldn’t recognize. Some upright, running like us. Some not.

You don’t think of it as murder when it’s happening to you. It’s survival.

32 thoughts on “You Don’t Think of It as Murder”

  1. Nice!!!

    Way faster than I would have gone. I won’t be posting for another day or two at least, unless I feel inspired to stay up until two tonight.

    • I think I was inspired. I dropped everything to vomit this out. Love it when that happens. Reading it back now I wish I would have slept on it and made some changes today, but I’m glad I didn’t. The freedom of flash fiction is too nice.

      • I’m unsure of mine. I never like it, at least at first. And I rarely end up liking it at all. I think it’s happened with 3-4 of my 50+ recent scribbles.

  2. I love the graphic feel to your stories. I’m not sure I quite get it, unless I’m reading more into it than you meant. Does it mean the people who got bombed would be able to kill because they would be forced to for survival? Does the exercise in the beginning relate by being about murder?

    • My thought was, when I hear about bombings and war happening in other countries, I think of it as violence and murder. You have that luxury when you’re removed from it. But if it happened to me, I’m sure all I could think about was surviving. I don’t think I’d have time to blame anyone because I’d be too consumed by staying alive.

      And I think you’re right, the people would be able to kill if it meant protecting their own lives. Murder becomes self-defense. Although I didn’t think that far, I like it. Thanks. :)

      The exercise in the beginning, I’m not sure what that was. Some kind of school work. Unrelated, I think. But I imagined this in the future, so maybe it could be related.

      Thanks for the questions. I love them.

  3. This is so timely…all the terrorist experiences folks are now in fear of. You got everything across so well with so few words.
    What a vivid picture….”People I should know, but I can’t recognize. Some upright, running like us. Some not….”
    Succinct writing.

  4. Kay, that was absolutely fantastic! And no, I am not just saying that to “butter you up” but as truth-speak. I fully agree with what MyWordsWhisper said, you conveyed so much emotion and atmosphere into what has to be one of the best examples of “fly by the seat of your pants” inspired writing I have read in quite a while. I couldn’t stop reading.

    As I have told several others here on wordpress, you have one heck of a lot of talent. Please promise you will never “set it on a shelf”, for if you do, the world will lose a small piece of beauty.

    Best wishes always,

    marantha

  5. Marvelous piece. The brevity and pace are awesome, as is your last line. The scene felt visceral to me, and I totally got it. I wonder if those controlling the drones dropping bombs on innocents also say, “You don’t think of it as murder”?

    • Thank you! Your blog inspires me as much as BeKindRewrite’s prompts. You make this flash fiction thing look so effortless I couldn’t help but try myself. I admire what you do, and your comment means a lot.

  6. hey, it’s me, that slightly nutty and definitely one hundred percent guaranteed to be wordy marantha again, i just wanted to give you a “cyber hug” for luck and happiness and also a little gift i made for my wordpress “family”.

    simply click on the links, then, if you would like to save the gift, simply do a “save file as”, and be sure to format the file name as “file name.jpg” so it will be saved as jpg image. then you can use it in a post or share it with your friends.

    here is the “hug”…
    http://1.gravatar.com/avatar/3132af07fdd9b6df0f55eebb2a4415e6?s=128&d=identicon&r=G

    and here is the gift…

  7. I like this piece. I’m glad that you found the inspiration to write this. Love when inspiration hits like that! This piece is wonderful, it’s length completely adds to the overall tone of the peace, it’s emotionally charged and draws the reader straight in. I like it :)

  8. Great scene! Good pacing, and I can feel that drive for survival in the gut as I am reading. You’re right, the labels come from different parties.

    • That’s one of the changes I wanted to make after sleeping on it. The smile didn’t feel sudden enough. It is supposed to rattle her world (like the bomb).
      But you caught it, so maybe it didn’t need anything. But I’m pretty sure nothing gets by you. :D

  12. What a wonderful example of having every word make a difference. Not one extra bit wasted and the story unfolded so cleanly and achingly. Thank you for sharing your gift…

  13. Pingback: Inspiration Monday X « BeKindRewrite

    • To be honest, I didn’t think much past this, but now that you’ve said that, I hope they make it too! Thanks for the comment. It makes me want to continue this story. :)

  16. Pingback: Inspiration Monday X | bekindrewrite

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