My Words, My World

First drafts – A few pages in the large wilderness of the world of writing

Archive for the category “99-words”

99-word fiction – Moonlight

The full moon lit the winter sky, its cold light streamed through the small window high above the man’s head, and illuminated the white walls which turned the night to day, and glinted off the chrome taps on the steel basin. Even his tin cup of water shone with a small square of light. The man couldn’t sleep, his back felt every lump under the thin mattress. He pulled the blanket around his cold body.

He had once counted the passing of the full moon but had long ago accepted he would never walk free in the moonlight again.

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99-word fiction – Voices

I sit down on a stool at the bar. I order a beer. I watch the barmaid tilt her head as she tilts the glass.

Voices getting louder. Behind me, to the side of me but not in front where I can see where they’re coming from. I’m trying to understand if they’re talking about me.

They are, I can hear them. Now they’re trying to whisper but it’s too late for that. They’re provoking me. This happens everywhere I go and it always ends the same way.

I turn on my stool and look around an empty bar.

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99-word fiction – The stranger

The stranger stepped in out of the rain. He wore a trench coat, hat and looked like he needed a gun. He ordered a double whisky. He removed his hat and his wet face shone with the light from the bar mirror. The old men playing poker at the corner table ignored him with straight faces. The barman cleaned glasses with a cloth. The stranger sipped his whisky.

He kept his coat on and wrapped it tighter around himself, as if he could keep the world’s evils from getting in.

Or to keep his own evils from getting out.

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Breathe and look and listen

At 4 am when the world’s at rest and the only ones awake are those that should be and those that don’t want to be. I step out onto the balcony, breathe in the deep pine scent which flows down from the mountain. In the clear air the black sheet of night is bejewelled by a thousand diamonds and the planets are visible without the need for technology (except for my glasses). I sit and breathe and look and then I listen to a distant owl, in my usual waking hour before the hooligan cries of the crows begin.

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