5PM Fiction 022: Cold feet

Welcome to the twenty-second in the series: 5pm Fiction.

Late April 2011 I discovered http://StoryADay.org and the project that is to write 31 stories in 31 days. Anyone who knows me or follows this blog, knows how passionate I am about short stories so my clichéd eyes lit up at this new marvel. And just a few days later there I was, breathing life into new characters. This went on to become (with some editing of course) my 31-story collection eBook Story A Day May 2011.

I was nearing completion of the 2012 project when I decided that I didn’t want to stop at the end of May so 5PM Fiction was born. I put a load of prompts on the 5PM Fiction page and today’s was to write a second-person viewpoint (my favourite) story where Irwin has cold feet, so here is my 145-worder.

Cold feet

Hand hovering over the door handle, you want to go in but debate the outcome.

You’ve come here for the prize… for something that will change your life.

“Go on!” your head tells you. “It’s what you want.” But your heart tells you things are fine as they are.

Either way you have to go in, go through with it or say something, say you can’t and want everything to stay as they are.

So you open the door and your boss is there, smiling, so you smile back and feel better, your heart overtaking your head, then you see your colleague, Sarah, in tears and as you approach, she says the words you wanted to say.

“I’m sorry, I can’t go through with it… I can’t marry you.”

And as you leave the registry office you straighten your back, and do a little skip.

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Unfortunately, as I post an interview a day (amongst other things) I can’t review books but I have a feature called ‘Short Story Saturdays’ where I review stories of up to 2,500 words. Alternatively if you have a short story or self-contained novel extract / short chapter (ideally up to 1000 words) that you’d like critiqued and don’t mind me reading it / talking about and critiquing it (I send you the transcription afterwards so you can use the comments or ignore them)  on my ‘Bailey’s Writing Tips’ podcast, then do email me. They are fortnightly episodes, usually released on Sundays, interweaving the recordings between the red pen sessions with the hints & tips episodes. I am now also looking for flash fiction (<1000 words) for Flash Fiction Fridays and poetry for Post-weekend Poetry.

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