Well I made my boyfriend pick a number 1-30 to decide what prompt to do next and this is what he picked. Here goes nothing.
29. Story about space.
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Carah stared at her laptop screen, hating Mr. DuMont and his ridiculous writing prompt assignments. She was sitting cross-legged on the bed, her French manicured nails tapping against the keys but not typing anything. Her blonde hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun and she was still in her yoga pants from her morning workout. Sighing heavily, she propped her elbows on her knees and held her head in her hands. Only seconds later, she dropped her arms back down, too frustrated to sit still. Pushing up the sleeves of her blue sweatshirt, she picked up a small piece of paper from the comforter. In neat capital letters was one word: SPACE. Every week, her English teacher, Mr. DuMont, would put twenty folded pieces of paper in a fishbowl. Each piece of paper would have a word or a phrase on it and the goal for the week was to write a story based around the subject you drew from the bowl. He claimed this would "broaden the horizons" of his students and make them better writers in the end. Carah thought it was just lazy.
So now, on a Sunday afternoon, with the deadline less than twenty four hours away, Carah was stuck trying to figure out how to write about SPACE. Her first and only thoughts on the subject were evidence of her generation. Space was "the final frontier," where stuff happened in "a galaxy far, far away" and the only purpose it served was to make pretty iPhone wallpapers. She was certain none of this speculation would fly with her teacher, but pop culture had invaded her subconscious and she could think of nothing else. "Stupid Vulcans and Jedis and hipsters. Ugh." She muttered to herself. Her boyfriend Daniel was the only reason she even knew half the stuff that was running through her head. Over four years, she sat through countless movie marathons and suffered through costumed conventions just to see the goofy smile on his face. Minimizing the Microsoft Word window where there were still no words, Carah stared at her desktop wallpaper. The picture was from Daniel and Carah's last anniversary. It was her favorite picture of the two of them because it was such a clear, professional-grade photo. Carah was wearing a silver party dress with her hair in elaborate curls and her blue eyes sparkling. Daniel was in a navy button down, his hazel eyes peeking from under black fringe. Their photographer friend Benji had taken the picture, which is why it was so good. Her head rested on Daniel's shoulder, his arm around her. She ran her hand across the screen lovingly. If she closed her eyes, she could still feel the warmth of his hand on her arm.
Carah shoved her laptop away from her and hopped up from the bed. Raising her arms above her head she leaned to either side and twisted her torso until her back made a popping noise. Daniel hated it when she did that. She dropped her hands to her sides and glancing at the clock, decided it was time for a snack break. She made her way down the hall to the kitchen, but as she stepped over the threshold she felt her throat close. The kitchen was so wide and... empty. This whole house was empty. In her frenzy to finish her writing assignment, she completely forgot about her situation. Or maybe her brain made her focus on her assignment so she could be shielded from what was happening. She took a deep breath and eased herself into a wooden chair, one of six at the large dining room table. This was Daniel's grandmother's house, which he inherited three years ago after her peaceful passing. Carah had just moved in a month ago and the three story Victorian-style beauty still intimidated her. Looking around at a room twice as big as her living room growing up, she realized how alone she really was. Her friends Siera and Lexie thought she should not be alone, but Carah repeatedly denied their offers to stay with her. It was times like this that she wished she had just let them distract her. Daniel's well-worn brown leather jacket was draped over the edge of the marble island that separated the kitchen from the dining room. Hesitating for just a fraction of a second, she stood up and walked toward the jacket slowly, as if it were a living thing and she didn't want to frighten it. She ran her fingers over the leather, smooth and cool to the touch. She picked it up with both hands, bringing it up to her face to inhale the scent of his cologne.
She remembered everything, even though she had a notoriously bad memory and all this happened a week ago. Daniel kissed Carah on the cheek from her spot curled up on the couch and walked out the door. She was in the throes of a terrible cold and Daniel was going to the drugstore to get her some more medicine and soup. He walked because the distance was not very far and it was cloudy and cool outside, a plus in Daniel's eyes. But while he was inside, the rain started. He pulled his hood up over his head and stuck to the sidewalk. All at once the sky opened up and he tried to pick up his pace to hurry home. He thought he would be safe on the sidewalk, save for the growing puddles--- until he was blinded by the headlights. The police, knocking on Carah's door twenty minutes later, told her the driver hydroplaned, losing control of the vehicle. He swerved in a panic, then overcorrected, sending the car right into Daniel's path. Daniel was struck from the side and when he fell, his head hit the concrete curb with such force he was knocked out cold, his bag of soup and medicine spilling across the road. He had been in a coma since then, while Carah struggled on the other end to not slip into her own form of unconsciousness.
Shaking herself from the memory of what she was told that day, Carah felt the tears on her cheeks and hastily wiped them away. Hugging the jacket to her chest, she began to think of space in an entirely different way. It had not occurred to her to think of all the meanings the word could imply. She had only been thinking of what lay beyond the atmosphere. But she was surrounded by another version of space right here on Earth. With this realization, she had a starting point for her prompt now, but that did not make her feel any better about current events. She sighed at the hopelessness she suddenly felt weighing her down. The vastness of this house was nothing compared to the hole growing in her heart. Daniel had always been the gravity holding her down, keeping her sane. Now he might not wake up and without him, she would float off into orbit without a tether. But far worse than the dark recesses of the galaxy, she would face the darkness of her own making. Carah would become a victim of the worst kind of space, the kind that swallows you whole from the inside.
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Disclaimer: I don't own iPhones, Microsoft Word, or any of the famous sci-fi movies I alluded to in the second paragraph.
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