With over a month until Sunday Writers’ Club returns from summer break, we thought we’d climb out of the swimming pool for just long enough to share some more writing with you.
This time we’re pleased to present a creative writing collection from Patrizia Stiegler. On many a Sunday, Patrizia has joined us at a Vienna café for an hour of writing and sharing. She’s not only a talented and energetic writer, she’s also fun to be around. We hope you enjoy reading Patrizia’s creative writing as much as we do.
Comments are always welcome!
Zombies at Midnight
By Patrizia Stiegler
Image by Russell Holden from Pixabay
Writing prompt: Write about two objects ( Dice with skulls, Christmas bauble)
The bauble rolled over the floor, its shiny surface reflecting the light shimmering through the gap under the door. It had not been the plan to leave the Christmas decoration up till the end of February, bordering March, but Felix did not have the mind to put the array of candles, glitter and baubles down. The few branches of the evergreen tree had by now lost their needles, creating a neat carpet of small spikes in certain parts of the living room.
The bauble continued rolling till it was stopped by the paperwork, which had found its way to floor from the overcrowded table. The once neatly stacked folders had created a waterfall of different coloured files cascading down. The bauble rocked slightly back and forth before it continued ton its left over the wooden floor, filling the room with it a quiet clicking noise. It had nearly reached the front hall when a hand caught it by the band hanging off it and lifted it from the floor. Felix critically looked at bauble. The bauble tried to look innocent. Felix looked harder. The bauble gave up.
“No offence, sir, but you could not just use the phone like a normal person or the mirror in the front hall?”
The face of Mr. N. White appeared in the mirrored surface of the bauble. He was one of those people that had such an ordinary, innocent face, that it made people uneasy. In fact, he looked so normal that people just had to suspect that he was up to something. Felix counted it as a good sign that he wasn’t smiling. Mr.N.White smiles were terrifying.
“I would if you had not managed to lose the last one on the bottom of the Danube. Anyway, dare I ask why the nearest mirroring surface is a Christmas bauble? No, don’t answer that, I would rather not know.”
Felix was suddenly very glad that his boss could only see a small part of this living room. He had the distinct feeling that Mr. N. White would not have approved. He subtly tried to turn himself so that only the fully stocked bookshelf behind was visible. He was not taking any chances that his boss might get a glance at the state of the kitchen.
“We need you to come in. One of your staff has found another of those damn skull dices and that idiot rolled it. I now have five former corpses trying to escape from the morgue. One is quoting the law book at me. You minion brought back a damn lawyer. On a Sunday, Walden. On. A. Sunday!”
Felix sighed. It was always unpleasant when that happened. Some people thrived as a zombie, others… well, they did not and had to be put down again. The necromancy department was always happy when one of those dices made way down to the morgue, because not only do they got a few new officers, but a few new bones to play with.
“If you could please confiscate the dice, Sir, I will be down as soon as I can.”
Mr. N. White nodded and then vanished from the bauble. Felix sighed once more. He could see another “Why we don’t play with magical evidence” seminar coming his way.
Just Keep Smiling
By Patrizia Stiegler
Writing prompt: Write about leaving
People tend to see the act of leaving as a new beginning, as the start of an adventure. Most of them sprout those words with a fake smile on their face, which is so fixed that their muscles hurt and their teeth are grinding. It is often accompanied by a lot of inner screaming. It would be a lot more truthful to confess that we leave because we have to, want to, are forced to or, in the very rare golden cases, actually wish to. And with an iron will, so we do not look back, because that hurts and we are supposed to be happy now. We left after all. And if you are crying into your pillow every evening before you go to sleep, because you feel like an alien, no one needs to know about that. No seriously, no one needs to know. That fake smile might just become real after all. At least that is what it says on the internet.
The Promise
By Patzrizia Stiegler
Writing prompt: Writing about a lost thing.
I constantly lose things. Not normal things like the socks in the washing machine or a towel in the gym. Rather they have been things that I really, really should not lose. This includes scarfs, jewelry, money and motivation, which are the usual suspects.
When I lost the ring my father gave me in Hamburg I always loved to imagine that through some convoluted coincidence it would end up being found again and would turn into someone’s cherished memory.
I would even accept it being the main evidence in a mysterious murder case. The last bit that gets presented and with which the detective would turn around the whole case.
None of those were true of course. It currently sits in a house nowhere near Hamburg. It rests there comfortably, snuggled in between back satin. Waiting to be used. And sometimes it will be pulled out and carefully, nearly tenderly, touched by its owner. The green stone twinkles in the light, a reminder of a promise made a long time ago.
A soft smile, and then he tells the ring to wait some more before it is put back. The case snaps shut, and disappear back into the corner of the right drawer. The only one with a key to lock it. There it sits waiting. A silent promise that will be passed on sooner than later.
Always Have a Plan B
By Patrizia Stiegler
Photo by Kristina Paukshtite from Pexels
Writing prompt: why did she take the flowers and toss them out of the window?
Tia and Davina stare at the bouquet in the middle of the side path, like it was a crime scene. Tia had been tempted to draw around it like it was a dead body but had heroically restrained herself. A few sad petals had joined the scattered green leaves on the floor. The bouquet in itself had been certainly eye-catching before it had been thrown out of the window of the 2nd floor. Lush flowers off red, blue and magenta, beautiful on their own, but all mixed together they formed a rather peculiar mix of colours. Still not enough that she would have thrown it out of the window, but still.
Tia drank her coffee and settled back on the bench, eyes on the second window. The curtains had been dragged out on the windowsill, joining the pair of cacti already on it. Who would have known that C had such a green thumb? As long as Mr. White or Felix did not follow the bouquet out of the window, it was all fine.
“I mean he is immortal, right? She can’t kill him as such?”
Davina, who sat next to her held her smoothy like it was a lifeline. Well, she called it smoothy, but Tia was pretty sure that there were at least two shots of espresso in there.
“Well he is an elf, Felix a Werwolf and C is an ice witch. I think the odds are pretty even.” Tia eyed the bottom of her coffee cup in the hope to find one more sip of the brown elixir of life down there, but it was empty. She still had two take away cups next to their her, but they were for Mr. White and Felix and both took their coffee very seriously. One did not get funny with their coffee, the consequences were not worth it. With a sigh, she pulled her scarf higher and checked her watch. They had only been up there for twenty minutes. Suddenly the wind picked a little and cloud of cold sweetness waved over them. Tia took a deep breath and nearly gagged on the cold air that filled her throat. Magic was in the air indeed. Tia stared at the windows on the second floor to catch some glimpses of what was happening, but the curtains were shielding the view from whatever was happening inside.
“But why the bouquet? I mean it was hideous.” Davina had started to jiggle her left leg nervously. There had to have been more than two espresso shots in her drink. Tia eyed the coffee cups next her longingly, before mentality slapping her fingers. A tired Mr. White was a dangerous being that needed to be avoided at all costs.
“I don’t know. A tradition I suppose.” In that moment a window on the second floor burst into small pieces, threatening to come down on the pedestrians, like rain. However, the moment they would have spilt over the imaginary line where the bouquet lay in the floor, all the small pieces suddenly sprang back into the shape of the glass window. Silence followed that with the occasional honk from a car. A hand waved in the new window for them to come up. Well, at least this answered the bouquet.
Tia just nodded absently minded, before she stood up, took the coffee cups and made her way to the door. Davina followed her, with her smoothy in hand, avoiding the bouquet like a bomb. After all one was never quite sure what could happen with Mr. White.