So, I'm not sure how in the world I'm going to write a short story about writing for a third time. I might say screw it and just write a regular short story. Writing about writing is only really fun with poetry and non-fiction. It's sort of difficult with fiction. So, let's see then.
Wheel of Genres, turn, turn, turn! Tell me the genre I will discern!
Today's topic is... well, to be honest, I spun it multiple times because I wasn't satisfied with what I got. First I got legend, then horror, then mystery, and finally fairy tale. I do have a story idea that is about writing for horror/mystery, but it's more of a novel idea and I don't want to give it away here. Or, maybe what I could do is write a horror-mystery-legend and make it the prequel for my novel. That would be fun. Let's do it.
Thirty minutes on the clock: 30:00. And... go!
A long time ago, there once was a man. He lived in a mansion on top of a hill. Those who saw him thought he was a most peculiar man. Whenever they saw him, he would be bent over, muttering curses under his breath. He always eyed everyone in the world with an eye of suspicion and hate. No one knew why, but he loathed the world and everything in it.
But the most peculiar thing about this man was that he always carried with him a leather bound journal. As he walked the world, he would be bent over his journal and constantly scribbling in it. Every day he filled those pages with his demented, wrathful thoughts. They seemed to fill the journal from cover to cover. But what was most alarming was that every day he filled the journal from cover to cover. Monday, cover to cover; Tuesday, cover to cover; Wednesday, cover to cover; the whole week, month, year long.
Some thought that perhaps he had more than one, but where he got them from no one knew; no one ever saw him buy anything. And yet, every day he had a journal filled with curses and malcontent thoughts. Some thought it was the same journal every day, but how could that have been possible?
Those who claimed it was the same journal said the journal was bewitched and that every day, the writing would be erased and the man would be forced to fill it again. But, there was another phenomenon that came to pass as the man continued to write. Every day he became a little bit meaner and a little bit older. Things that he didn't use to hate so much, he now abhorred, and though only a year had passed, he looked as if he had aged ten.
This led some people to believe that as he pored over the journal, he actually poured himself into it--his very life's essence was transported from his pen to the page and it became a part of the journal. For what point or purpose, no one knew, but they could see that the longer he wrote in the journal, the more embittered and older he became.
Then, one day, he no longer came around. For several days, no one said anything for they hadn't noticed his sentimental poison permeating the air. When someone did ask, no one answered. It took several more times and several more times after that for the question to be asked before someone finally gave the answer, "I don't know."
They went to his house on the hill and broke in. It was a cavernous, Gothic mansion, as bleak and as dark as him. They searched the whole house but found so sign of him. What they did find though sent shivers down their spine. While looking in his bed chambers, they found a skeleton, sitting at a desk, and beneath its hand was the leather bound journal--its pages were completely blank.
Haunted by the thought of what this could mean, they hastily dropped the skeleton into a trunk and moved it into the cellar. One paranoid fellow put a padlock on it for fear something might escape. As for the journal, it was lost in the shuffle, but some say it's still up there, hiding in the mansion somewhere.
***
Stop the clock! Okay, that's almost eleven minutes left. I know, I still have plenty of time, but I don't know how to make this longer and I'm getting sleepy. Which isn't good because I have Christmas cookies to bake. So, I was sort of rushing the story. Not everything is written as well in this piece as I would like it. For this week, I don't think I'm going to do a theme, but with Christmas coming, you can expect a lot of Christmas related posts. Maybe I'll write my own carol.
Keep writing, my friends.
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