Start With This – Create Assignment, Solution #1
Pick an idea that you’ve had for a while. Take exactly 1 hour to work on it exclusively. This can be one continuous hour, or 30 minutes for two days, or 10 minutes for six days. Then put it out there (written or recorded) on our Membership Community, your website, or shout it to a bird from your porch. Consider this your first try of many at this idea.
This piece comes from a character I've had in my head for LITERAL YEARS. I could never get the right story for him. I'm not going to say this is perfect or I've finally found my perfect opening scene for the character, but this does feel like a genuinely good representation of what's been cooking away in my brain for years. Or at least it hits all the right notes. I'm so glad I chose to START With This! Hopefully I can keep it consistent. Feel free to ask questions or drop comments! Liking and reblogging is encouraged. Please do not repost. Thanks in advance.
It was blue, in both the senses of the word.
A ruffled young man sat on the edge of a bed whose covers were like the waves of the ocean – they were undone, white as the foam on a crest and, most of all, they were easy to be drowned in. Afraz sat, a figure reminiscent of one lost at sea and without much hope of ever finding land again.
His hair took on the majority of the ruffle, sitting atop his head, a crown of despair. He slowly blinked his blank dark eyes, staring at nothing. He had a long, not unhandsome face and a very light stubble. His thin white shirt was old and faded, and his sweatpants had not been changed for days.
Such was his folded figure, elbows on knees, listless, in a blue bedroom.
The rest of the space was full of dust mites catching the Saturday late afternoon light from the window. Books were littered on the desk to his right and some more lay on the floor, among some socks.
Afraz breathed in a deep, slow breath, straightening his back gently. He knew this: he was alive. And he knew that was supposed to be some kind of silver lining. He confessed to himself, he couldn't really see it.
Sleep. That was his solution. These days, whenever he felt the despair returning, he would come to his welcoming bedspread and bury himself in its embrace. This had worked for a decent while. But now he had run out of slumber. There comes a point when you have slept so much that sleep itself rejects you, and you are forced to turn, dazedly, to the face of the day, and actually earn your escape… by creating a life to escape from. Why did he have to do that? Why couldn't he be passive to his existence? Why couldn't he refuse?
There was a shadow in his blue walls, a fluttering shape that was gone the moment he noticed it. His eyes flickered towards it.
Knowing he would regret it, Afraz shifted his weight onto his feet. For a second his vision winked away. He knew he probably needed to eat. Still, ignoring it all, he stepped across to the open window, seeing a bright pink diamond floating by it.
'Hey, Afraz!' came a cheerful voice. She had a twinkle in her eye as she tugged on the string to manipulate the kite until it was close enough for Afraz to grab on to. Her giggles laced the air and made his head ache. He was about to leave Zinat to her little games and go back inside when she called out again.
'Wait! Afraz.' She snatched at the string as the kite nearly dropped on to the road, and relaxed her hand as it caught a steady breeze cutting between them. Then she stared right at him.
Zinat was a child, at least to him, and she was wearing dusty denim dungarees. Clearly she was out to play and had no reason to be in his neighbourhood, nor to look as worried as she suddenly did. Unless he looked particularly scary…
'Apa wrote to you. And it's none of my business, I'm only ten, I know,' she adopted a strident, annoyed voice for her next bit, 'Go sit in your tuitions and stop meddling with my life! – I know you usually say that. But… like…' The twinkle was now clouded over by doubt as she struggled to keep to the point. 'Did you read it?'
He broke eye contact and glanced at the sky, to which she immediately said, 'Oh, you're rolling your eyes. Hah. Of course you read it, silly me. Sorry for even asking. I'll stop bothering you.'
She let her bright pink kite fall gently to the white stone pavement and looked at Afraz for, he knew she felt, the final time. Then she said, 'She's really very sorry, you know. About everything that happened. And maybe you're handling it okay on your own but, well… She misses you.'
He still said nothing. He had nothing to say. So, dragging her once airborne paper kite along the ground, she walked away.
Afraz stared at that kite for a long while, then saw it in his mind's eye when it disappeared from view. At some deeper level he felt for that kite. He knew what it was like, being scratched in the dirt after flight.
He hadn't read it. In fact he didn't know what had been written to him or when. He did know he had a pile of unread mail sitting in an untidy heap downstairs…
He marvelled at the comment of her missing him. It seemed not to fit in with any of his life anymore. A few months ago he would have grown soft at the mere suggestion of such a sentiment. At the moment, he didn't have the capacity to do or feel anything. His energy was busy reigning in the more unpleasant detours of his wild train of thought.
He walked away from the window, from the kite, from the after-image of Zinat's worried face. None of it was her fault. He should have said something. But then, she had her parents with her, and of course, her Apa, her older sister. She could easily find support for her scars. Whereas he had no one.
He placed a hand on the doorknob, thinking longingly of instant noodles.
For the first time in days, Afraz smiled. It was a shockingly toothy smile and made him look slightly evil.
He must be really starving, he had reflected, to actually be pining for instant noodles!
Shaking his head at how his sense of humour had actually hit a new low, he unlocked the door and left the silent, blue room.
