I'll take the other thing.

[in_the_blue]

I miss the days when I used to host writing challenges right here in this very journal.

So. Now that the seventh Harry Potter book has been written... I think it's time for a different kind of writing challenge. I used to host the short-short ficlets, 300 words or less, open fandom.

Today, I'm going OC. And that doesn't stand for Orange County: it stands for original character.

Ready? 3, 2, 1, let's... get inspired to write original fiction, folks. The theme for the challenge is change: take 500 words to introduce an original character and demonstrate some measure of change for him, for her, for it.

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Rules:

• Fandom: original only


• Word count: 500 or less


• Main theme: change


• Ratings: No restrictions.


• Duration: Challenge opens now (August 30) and closes at 11:59 p.m. in whatever time zone you inhabit on Wednesday, September 5.

Post your ficlets as comments to this entry. Feel free to do as few or as many as you want, and if you see one you really like, be sure to leave a review or a comment. Remember, original fic only. I'll crack my knuckles and get going as soon as I get a few hours' sleep.

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NOTE: All ficlets in comments here are the property of their respective writers. Consider them copywritten with all rights reserved. If you want to quote, copy, or redistribute, please get the author's permission first. Otherwise, I'll have to lock this down. Thanks.

Comments

I really should get back to my pile of Child Lit books....

[proudofthefish.livejournal.com]

He watched the water rush past below him and felt rather then saw the change in wind. The string in his hand was rough against a rough palm as he tightened the sail and leaned with his boat as it dipped low on the one side and he watched the ripples in the water. His brown curls were damp from the spray but his wet suit was dry. It was warm enough without the suit now at the end of August, but he had become so used to wearing it in March and April that his mother had taken to calling it his second skin. The wind was gentle and he never tipped on purpose. Tipping on purpose was stupid. If you were going to sail why waste time making yourself fall, making yourself fail?

He never did anything without precision, but when he sailed he flew, the wind in the sail his wings. But what he was about to do was still crazy. A suburban boy in a fast paced city, a city that could be at its most brutal when you tried to stand for something and he had been taught to always stand. He wasn’t sure if he could do it, if he could leave this place. The water he loved so much was giving back his own distorted reflection. Blue eyes staring back at a face that showed resignation. He wasn’t sure he could stand in such an environment because he had never tried and there would be no one to lean on, to turn to.

He steered the boat back to the shore relishing in the systematic way he took it apart and lifted the pieces into the trailer hitched to the back of his beat up old truck. It didn’t mater if he wanted to leave or not. He had made that choice. Made it before he had really realized what he was doing and there was no going back now. There were people and some unknown future awaiting him. There were people who thought he wouldn’t make it to prove wrong. He slammed the door of his truck and started the engine. But he refused to believe that there would be any adventure worth having because despite the bravado, he still felt that he was leaving the best of things behind him, and he knew if he came back they would never be the same.

Re: I really should get back to my pile of Child Lit books....

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

Wow, Ally. That's all melancholy and everything. I keep getting these glimpses of you and your boat, and leaving it behind last year. But this one's really nicely done. That whole sense of resigned destiny when one leaves home plays out very effectively here.

Re: I really should get back to my pile of Child Lit books....

[proudofthefish.livejournal.com]

Thanks it's been a bit of a melancholy weekend so this was a good bit of therapy.

Re: I really should get back to my pile of Child Lit books....

[arasnaem.livejournal.com]

I love the idea of packing up the past and driving off into the future. You can almost taste the uncerainty filling him. I hope the future that awaits him is a good one, rather than the best being behind him.

Re: I really should get back to my pile of Child Lit books....

[kit-the-brave.livejournal.com]

Wow! I love that it's such a good strong character in such a short space. And the way you use sailing to show us his thought processes - it's done with such a deft touch that I only gradually realized how much he was revealing about himself in the things he's thinking about sailing. So well written! You rock!

Re: I really should get back to my pile of Child Lit books....

[slaversbane.livejournal.com]

I got that cold feeling of excitment in my stomach! I felt the spray in my hair! Fingers are still tingly, I wanto to see where this goes!

This tenison and uncertainty is marvelous!

Re: I really should get back to my pile of Child Lit books....

[erised1810.livejournal.com]

that is so wird. That we both saw this theme and then write somethign about someone who's leavign home. heh...I wonder where he's goingthough.