Dried Ink
Prompt Challenge Showcase
The Missing Link
By Marylee Nicholas
April 1, 2023 - April 8, 2023
For David, It was commonplace to find little odds and ends in the pockets of his customers when they leave their clothes to be dry-cleaned. Jackets were black holes of forgotten property. Loose change, credit cards, pens, receipts, rings, necklaces, and even condoms were frequent travelers on the Deep Pocket Express. He had grown accustomed to such discoveries and learned long ago to never ask questions when handing the lost items back. It was therefore no shock to David when he felt the thin, metallic necklace out of his customer’s jacket.
He had seen jewelry hundreds of times and could guess, simply by touching it, that it was a decoration belonging to a woman. It was odd, he thought, that such a thing was in the pocket of Brian Kelly, a widower and beloved schoolteacher, but he dismissed the curiosity and put the necklace in a Ziplock back for safekeeping.
He placed it in the cash register drawer and was about to close it when something about the necklace made him pause. He stared at the piece of jewelry for a long minute, unable to shake the feeling that he’d seen it before. He brought the Ziplock back close to his face and studied it. Hanging from the multiple golden threads was the pendant of the sun. He had seen this design on someone before.
He remembered seeing it resting on a woman’s neck, someone he knew, but couldn’t put his finger on it. Unable to fight the curiosity rattling his brain, he flipped the pendant over to see if there was anything else familiar to him. Faded and unpolished, he was able to make out a name engraved into the metal. Susan N. Pittis, it read, the name of his long-dead mother.
What we liked:
You get the idea that this man leads an honest, quiet life until something crazy happens. Loved the twist at the end and left us wanting to know more! This would be a terrific start to a short story.
What could go wrong?
By Frank Charles
March 26, 2023 - April 1, 2023
"Ten bucks says you can't go a week without your phone," I said to Mark, “If you want to get back into the workforce, you gotta cut out the distractions and get off your phone.”
Mark raised an eyebrow, "Are you kidding me? Fine. It's not like I'm addicted to my phone."
I chuckled, "You freaking are, you’re on it all the damn time. I’ll tell you what - If you can go a week without your phone, I'll give you one hundred bucks. But if you can't, you owe me."
Mark thought for a moment and then finally accepted the challenge, "Alright, you're on. I don't need this thing to survive anyway."
To my surprise, Mark managed to make it a whole five days without checking his phone. I came to find out that Mark missed an important job interview because he didn't have a phone to remind him. He also missed rent because his phone didn’t remind him to pay, so he got evicted, and found out his girlfriend was cheating on him because he wasn’t speaking to her. What’s worse is that someone used his credit card info to buy tickets to a Nickelback concert.
Not a day goes by where I don’t think of Mark. Especially since I pass him every day on the bridge asking for money. I’d give him some, but he never made it the full week.
What we liked:
The dialogue at the beginning engages the reader and lets them know what the conflict of the story will be. The humor was a great twist, and it took an unexpected turn by the end. On another level, it has a deeper message about our dependency on cell phones.