Kathy! Love this prompt. It was the prompt that led to a few sections of the title story for my upcoming collection. Thank you so much for these always inspiring words and lessons.
This is twice as long as the others and I apologize. It's a great prompt and great examples and I think this is just a first attempt.
Ghost Girl
1. In the dining room, grown-ups from the theatre talk and laugh. They are beautiful and huge, like the people at the drive-in movies, as big as the sky. They swirl the wine in their glasses and hold them out to be refilled. Peeled pink shells of shrimp, my mother’s party dish, curl emptily on their plates like ghosts. My father tells stories; my mother smiles and smiles and refills glasses. I am not in bed. I have ridden the air down the stairs and hover now above the table. No one can see me.
2. My father is cast in a play whose name I am not supposed to say because it is bad luck. He’s the main character, but they kill him anyway. I get to watch a rehearsal. When the other man brings my father’s head on stage all red at the bottom where the neck was cut with something white sticking out, I can’t breathe. Someone I don’t know who smells like mint pats my hand and says, “It isn’t real, darling.” Backstage, my father sits in an orange chair; his palms are red and he’s drinking Coke from a bottle. He laughs when he sees me and pats my hair. In the morning there will be red stage blood on my pillow.
3. My grandmother stops the car in her driveway, but leaves it running. We’re staying with her just until we get situated. It’s a big car with air-conditioning which we don’t have, and a 8-track tape player that plays songs like “Flat Foot Floogie with the Floy-floy.” I don’t know what a floy-floy is, but the music would be good to dance to if we weren’t in a car. “Your father was in a play in New York,” she tells me. “Of course, we didn’t go to see it.” I don’t know what I’m supposed to say back.
4. I’m the queen in the school play. My costume is a red velvet princess dress the theatre didn’t want to keep. I have to keep pulling it up which isn’t very queen-like, but I don’t have a bosom yet (my grandmother says). I share the other dress with my friend, Sharon, who gets to be a lady-in waiting, which is a good part even though she doesn’t have lines. Actually, the girls’ parts mostly don’t have lines. I am in a stall in the bathroom when I overhear Sharon say, “She just got the part because of the dress.”
5. Before we leave her, my grandmother teaches me to play Double Solitaire. The cards fly like birds flumping against the cage of her hands. She deals fast and she doesn’t let me win. You have to build the cards like a family in descending order and only kings can fill the empty spaces. I’m in love with The King of Spades. Every time he appears it feels like a win.
6. My mother’s new friend who is a poet leans back in the grass in our new yard and lets her breath out slowly like it’s a dog on a retractable leash. “This year I am only going to read work by women,” she announces. I am sitting on the back porch listening and petting the dog who smells cheesy because he’s been swimming in the creek and his ears get infected. I feel like I’m eavesdropping even though I live here. Can you do that, I wonder? Is it allowed to only read work by women? No one but me and the dog notices the snake slipping from the foundation of the house, crossing the yard behind the poet.
7. I am afraid to dream now, almost afraid to sleep. What will happen if I leave my body to check on the grown-ups, to go back stage at the theatre to make sure we’ve all kept our heads. I make my boyfriends promise to wait even if it suddenly seems like I’m not in my body anymore. Don’t do anything rash, I tell them. Just check for a pulse and breath, and hold my hand and wait until morning.
Bookmarked this. Lot of good resources.
Glad you found it useful, Tarun. Thanks for reading!
Kathy! Love this prompt. It was the prompt that led to a few sections of the title story for my upcoming collection. Thank you so much for these always inspiring words and lessons.
Thanks so much, Jolene! I'm very excited for the release of SIDLE CREEK!
This is a lovely page, Kathy. And I write because of Kathy Fish and a few other generous writers.
That's so kind of you, Gay! Thanks for reading. <3
I'm a fan if you haven't guessed it!!!
Aw, that means the world to me, Gay. Thank you. I admire you and your writing so much.
thank you!!!
This is twice as long as the others and I apologize. It's a great prompt and great examples and I think this is just a first attempt.
Ghost Girl
1. In the dining room, grown-ups from the theatre talk and laugh. They are beautiful and huge, like the people at the drive-in movies, as big as the sky. They swirl the wine in their glasses and hold them out to be refilled. Peeled pink shells of shrimp, my mother’s party dish, curl emptily on their plates like ghosts. My father tells stories; my mother smiles and smiles and refills glasses. I am not in bed. I have ridden the air down the stairs and hover now above the table. No one can see me.
2. My father is cast in a play whose name I am not supposed to say because it is bad luck. He’s the main character, but they kill him anyway. I get to watch a rehearsal. When the other man brings my father’s head on stage all red at the bottom where the neck was cut with something white sticking out, I can’t breathe. Someone I don’t know who smells like mint pats my hand and says, “It isn’t real, darling.” Backstage, my father sits in an orange chair; his palms are red and he’s drinking Coke from a bottle. He laughs when he sees me and pats my hair. In the morning there will be red stage blood on my pillow.
3. My grandmother stops the car in her driveway, but leaves it running. We’re staying with her just until we get situated. It’s a big car with air-conditioning which we don’t have, and a 8-track tape player that plays songs like “Flat Foot Floogie with the Floy-floy.” I don’t know what a floy-floy is, but the music would be good to dance to if we weren’t in a car. “Your father was in a play in New York,” she tells me. “Of course, we didn’t go to see it.” I don’t know what I’m supposed to say back.
4. I’m the queen in the school play. My costume is a red velvet princess dress the theatre didn’t want to keep. I have to keep pulling it up which isn’t very queen-like, but I don’t have a bosom yet (my grandmother says). I share the other dress with my friend, Sharon, who gets to be a lady-in waiting, which is a good part even though she doesn’t have lines. Actually, the girls’ parts mostly don’t have lines. I am in a stall in the bathroom when I overhear Sharon say, “She just got the part because of the dress.”
5. Before we leave her, my grandmother teaches me to play Double Solitaire. The cards fly like birds flumping against the cage of her hands. She deals fast and she doesn’t let me win. You have to build the cards like a family in descending order and only kings can fill the empty spaces. I’m in love with The King of Spades. Every time he appears it feels like a win.
6. My mother’s new friend who is a poet leans back in the grass in our new yard and lets her breath out slowly like it’s a dog on a retractable leash. “This year I am only going to read work by women,” she announces. I am sitting on the back porch listening and petting the dog who smells cheesy because he’s been swimming in the creek and his ears get infected. I feel like I’m eavesdropping even though I live here. Can you do that, I wonder? Is it allowed to only read work by women? No one but me and the dog notices the snake slipping from the foundation of the house, crossing the yard behind the poet.
7. I am afraid to dream now, almost afraid to sleep. What will happen if I leave my body to check on the grown-ups, to go back stage at the theatre to make sure we’ve all kept our heads. I make my boyfriends promise to wait even if it suddenly seems like I’m not in my body anymore. Don’t do anything rash, I tell them. Just check for a pulse and breath, and hold my hand and wait until morning.