Category: Writing Prompts

Prompts are short, fun exercises that can be used to get the creative juices flowing or break the ice at a critique meeting. They start as a brief list of ingredients, forming a challenge for the writer to incorporate all of them into one self-contained piece. There are many ways to come up with prompts and each author will find a unique way to express a given prompt.

The Aztec Twelve-Step

  • by Kentsecret network of spies
  • standard practice to have a pig diagram tattooed on your body
  • … well, your friend, really
  • I touched his arm that day in the park
  • glued to your head

Tune in next time part 788      Click Here for Earlier Installments

The Aztec twelve-step was thought by many to be a myth, but those of us in the business knew it was the initiation protocol of a very secret network of spies, like, even more secret than a regular spy network. Steps one through eleven were not too hard to track down, but of course the twelfth and final step was the one for all the marbles.

“That still doesn’t explain your escape,” I said.

“Well you see, it enabled me to become initiated, and the secret network released me so I could go on my first mission for them.” Tessa’s eyes became evasive. “I never completed that mission, so now I’m considered a defector.”

“Teach me the twelfth and final step,” I said. “Then maybe I can clear your name.”

She shook her head, but then she scrunched her forehead and stared at me. “All I can tell you right now is, for male initiates, it’s standard practice to have a pig diagram tattooed on your body.” She smirked. “We could kill two birds with one needle, if you let me ink you… well, your friend really… with that design.”

“No deal,” I said. “I want to help you out, but not like that.”

She gazed off into the distance. “If only I’d known where it would all lead, when I touched his arm that day in the park.”

“Whose arm?”

“I didn’t know it was him until later: the Silent One, the Prime Mime. It was an honest mistake! I was distracted. You would be too, if you had a xylophone glued to your head.”

“Why was there…” I trailed off. I knew she wasn’t going to tell me.

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“What Happened to Timmuth-A Through Timmuth-D?”

  • by jenno easier way to put someone in a box
  • gently inserting the tines around the circumference
  • on a gondola in Venice
  • drinking mimosas in secret
  • the Aztec twelve-step

Tune in next time part 787      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“What happened to Timmuth-A through Timmuth-D?” I asked, knowing it wouldn’t be pretty. Mimes are ruthless.

“There’s no easier way to put someone in a box and get them to stay there than to kill them.” Tessa looked haunted. “At least that’s what Timmuth-E said.” She’d picked up the pickle skewer and was gently inserting the tines around the circumference of the kosher dill she’d been nibbling on.

“That’s pretty dark,” I said. “I wasn’t expecting you to say they were all on a gondola in Venice, drinking mimosas in secret or anything, but, shit, man. Mimes.”

Tessa nodded solemnly. “Mimes are the worst.”

“Except Timmuth-E helped you escape…”

“No he didn’t. He slipped up and spilled some intel he shouldn’t have, that’s all.”

“What was it?”

She looked me dead in the eye and said something that took my breath away. “He taught me the twelfth and final step of the Aztec twelve-step.”

I couldn’t believe it. “You mean…”

She nodded and threw back another bite of pickle.

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Tessa Steeled Herself With Another Chomp of Pickle

  • by Kenta lot of maraschino cherries
  • giggling under inappropriate circumstances
  • flirting with my husband forever
  • never done anything more musical than cupping his armpit
  • usually requires special eye drops

Tune in next time part 786      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Tessa steeled herself with another chomp of pickle and continued her tale.

“They knew my mission was hopeless, but they sent me in anyway. They sent me in there for answers, knowing it’s impossible to make mimes talk. Well, I tried my best and all I did was make a bunch of very important enemies. It didn’t take long for them to catch on that I was up to something and lock me up. At first it wasn’t so bad, because they just put me in one of their invisible boxes. But I got sloppy and they figured out I was escaping, so then they used an actual cell.”

“You mean like in a jail?” I asked, smirking.

“It wasn’t jail!” Tessa grumbled. She bit into the pickle again. “You know what this needs? A nice garnish. Most bars have a lot maraschino cherries and shit like that. Can we get some?”

I signalled the bartender while making a rolling gesture to tell Tessa to go on with the story.

“Anyway, it was technically solitary confinement because I was the only one there. And being alone too much made me act weird, like giggling under inappropriate circumstances and hallucinating that I had a husband and then hallucinating that my sisters were flirting with my husband forever. Which, of course is what they would do. But giggling is against the rules, as is shouting at hallucinatory siblings, so my punishment kept getting extended. That’s why I was still there when another malcontent got put in the slammer and suddenly I had a cellmate. His crime: singing.”

I whistled. “That must be verging on treason in the mime community.”

She nodded, then shook her head. “It was a total frame-up. He had never done anything more musical than cupping his armpit, which they all do. It’s why their hands smell.” She glanced around. “Where the hell are those cherries? Whatever. The new guy’s name was Timmuth-E, which he told me in one of the many notes we passed back and forth. We wrote them on thin air with our fingertips, and reading them usually requires special eye drops but we got good at it. Eventually, he shared the information that enabled me to escape.”

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“Don’t Be a Baby”

  • by jenLast I heard, you were in jail.
  • chew it a little if needed
  • know that you are very rude and are also now my enemy
  • throw the glove in her face
  • You got guts, kid.

Tune in next time part 785      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“Don’t be a baby,” Tessa cajoled. “You can take it. You got guts, kid.”

“What I have, Tessa, is the need for you to listen to me. You can’t give me a tattoo there, and if you don’t stop pushing my boundaries, I won’t let you give me a tattoo anywhere.”

I knew I was being blunt, but sometimes that sort of thing is called for. I did not intend to metaphorically throw the glove in her face, but she took it as an insult anyway.

“If that’s how it is, then know that you are very rude and are also now my enemy,” she huffed. She turned her back on me and crossed her arms.

The bartender approached obsequiously, with an oversized pickle on a tray. The fumes wafting from it were eye-watering. He murmured, “This will calm the lady down, sir. She can sniff it, or lick it, maybe chew it a little if needed. The mix is very potent.”

“Thanks.” I took the pickle from him and he scuttled back to the bar.

I laid my hand on Tessa’s shoulder. When she whirled around, I offered her the alcoholic vegetable. “Maybe we should slow down,” I said. “We spent so many years apart, it’s hard to jump into a relationship, much as we both might want to. We need to get to know each other again. Tell me your story,” I coaxed as she eyed the pickle warily. “Tell me what happened to you all those years we were apart. I lost track of you when you went to South America. Last I heard, you were in jail. Mime jail.”

“It wasn’t jail.” She took a hefty bite of the pickle. “At first I was undercover, and then I was their prisoner.”

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Contrarian Pickle Brine

  • by Kentlittle piles of salt
  • located at the base of your spine
  • suitcase full of raw meat
  • meant to be a group experience
  • I have held my tongue

Tune in next time part 784      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Contrarian pickle brine is extremely volatile and evaporates rapidly, leaving little piles of salt to mark each place where it has dripped. The air inside St Mungo’s was mostly brine fumes, and Tessa was less adapted to such an atmosphere than the bartender or myself. She giggled and her eyes had become a bit glazed, but she spoke distinctly. “I want you to have a three-pointed tattoo, and I want it to be located at the base of your spine,” she said.

That was a welcome change of plans.

“…in the front,” she finished belatedly. Even through the haze of Contrarian pickle-brine vapors, the look on her face made me feel like a suitcase full of raw meat in a tiger cage.

Tessa summoned the barkeep with her finger. When he leaned close, she said loudly, “Help me take his pants off.”

Intimate tattooing is not, in my opinion, meant to be a group experience. The bartender sized me up, then muttered something about needing to arrange the gherkins as an excuse to go back behind the bar. Tessa seemed undeterred, brandishing the skewer and shaking the ink bottle. Please understand that I wasn’t afraid of tattoos in general. I have applied ointment by the quart to my chest. I have held my tongue between ice cubes. There’s a lot I’m willing to go through, but we all draw the line somewhere. And I draw the line at where I’ll let anyone — even Tessa — draw the line.

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Mincers and Bustlers Alike

  • by jenroom to enjoy pickles
  • drunk and frisky
  • gathered there in St Mungo’s
  • I kept a toothbrush there
  • wiping the perspiration from his forehead

Tune in next time part 783      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Mincers and bustlers alike were tripping over their feet far more than even the scathing reviews had led me to expect. When I realized where they had just come from, it all made sense. Every Royal Contrarian Airship has a Pickle Chapel (a room to enjoy pickles in), and Contrarian pickles have a very high alcohol content. Spending time with high-octane phallic objects had left the dancers drunk and frisky, and promised to make their next show quite interesting. I wondered why they were gathered there in St Mungo’s Pickle Chapel. It was nowhere near the auditorium.

“Let’s go in,” I said to Tessa. The pickle chapel was one of my favorite places. I spent so much time in St Mungo’s, I kept a toothbrush there. Once Tessa tasted the pickles, she’d forget all about giving me a tattoo.

We dodged around the inebriated dancers and entered the hush of the chapel. The bartender looked exhausted, wiping the perspiration from his forehead with one hand while refilling the pickle barrels with the other.

The sting of vinegar and alcohol in my nostrils made my eyes water. Tessa seized a pickle skewer from the tray on the bar and grinned. “I was looking for something sharp to give your tattoo with!”

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Tessa Slipped My Grip

  • by Kentput the paper back into the envelope
  • Come, girls, bustle about.
  • all the feathers were in their correct positions
  • “throwing ice cubes at a parade”
  • bag of greenish-brown sludge

Tune in next time part 782      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Tessa slipped my grip and took hold of my briefs-weasel once more. “You know you want it,” she purred. Her fingers performed an elaborate shimmying dance in there.

“But, um,” I stammered, “that’s just it. I’m not sure, but what I do know is that you can’t, uh, put the paper back into the envelope. Or something. There’s no going back.”

Just then a nearby door burst open. A dozen people trooped into the corridor, last of all a woman in jodhpurs who barked, “Come, girls, bustle about. Boys, keep mincing. Good, good. We don’t need a repeat of the matinee, when not all the feathers were in their correct positions!”

Some of the bustlers and mincers glanced our way, but no one fully acknowledged our presence. The sudden crowd did distract Tessa long enough for me to escape. If I was not mistaken, we were witnessing a rehearsal for the show one Contrarian critic described as how it would look if a troop of wombats began “throwing ice cubes at a parade” and less enjoyable than “drinking an entire bag of greenish-brown sludge.”

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A Tattoo in the Shape of a Triangle

  • by jen(who is awesome)
  • I like seeing the diving board go boi-oi-oi-oi-oing!
  • potential discombobulator
  • small, stumpy feet
  • returning to my spider-infested college

Tune in next time part 781      Click Here for Earlier Installments

A tattoo in the shape of a triangle didn’t sound too bad, all things considered. I started to relax. Tessa (who is awesome) said, “Not so fast. I like it better when you’re tense.” She ran her hand down into my white lab pants. “I like seeing the diving board go boi-oi-oi-oi-oing! If you know what I mean. It makes the tattooing much easier.”

I didn’t want to be the potential discombobulator of Tessa’s dreams, but there was no way I was going to get a tattoo on my junk. Not even from someone as awesome as (or with such adorably small, stumpy feet as) Tessa. I grabbed her wrist and shook my head. “Not there.”

She pouted, and my heart broke. I felt as if I was returning to my spider-infested college years — a wretched stretch of time bereft of Tessa. It was during those years that she’d learned the art of tattoo, when she’d been a captive of the mimes. I had missed her terribly, but she’d had it far worse. Now that we were finally together again, for keeps, could I deny her anything?

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Tessa’s New Zoot Suit

  • by KentI don’t know if you can tell or not, but
  • yoga at gunpoint
  • –in a coffin
  • visionary, fantasist, poet, and painter
  • the term “Bermuda Triangle”

Tune in next time part 780      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Tessa’s new zoot suit had many pockets, but none of them had any money in them. For a moment I thought that would put an end to the tattoo peccadillo, but she simply told the roving tattooist, “I don’t know if you can tell or not, but this man is a general, and he’s commandeering your ink bottle on official business.”

“No sweat,” the man replied. “That just means I get to knock off early!” He pedalled away.

Tessa hauled me around a corner and asked me what I wanted my tattoo to look like. We didn’t have a needle, but I knew from experience that wouldn’t slow her down. Her talent for improvisation had allowed her to write a lengthy coded message on my chest, and the prospect of going through something like that again was about as relaxing as doing yoga at gunpoint — in a coffin — so I couldn’t even begin to offer design suggestions.

She made me take off the white lab coat. With a faraway look in her eyes, she said, “How about something in the style of visionary, fantasist, poet, and painter Melvil Dewey…” I resigned myself to my fate, knowing Tessa was in a creative fugue state where no appeal to reason could penetrate. “Yes,” she gasped, “I can see it now! A symbol, a shape, that will rehabilitate the term ‘Bermuda Triangle’ for future generations!”

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“There are no squids in the aquarium”

  • by jenThe most extraordinary thing about the man
  • The red uniform
  • undergarments, sneakers
  • Clearly, this man is a fuckwit.
  • equipped with a single, huge gold-plated

Tune in next time part 779      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“There are no squids in the aquarium,” I said, feigning sadness. “No squids means no squid ink, and that means no tattoos for us.”

“Don’t be so sure.” Tessa pointed across the concourse to a man on a bicycle. The airship’s official roving tattoo artist, I realized. What were the odds he’d be right where we were when Tessa got the urge?

The bicycle sported a striped umbrella and a large box on the front like an ice cream cart. The most extraordinary thing about the man, though, was not his mode of transportation. The red uniform, visible undergarments, sneakers, and sunglasses were quite arresting. His mobile tattoo kiosk played an inane chiming tune on a loop.

I turned to Tessa in puzzlement. “Clearly, this man is a fuckwit. All of the roving tattoo artists are. We can’t get tattoos from him.”

“Of course not. We have to give them to each other. We’ll just get the ink from him.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me along as she flagged the artist down.

We didn’t have a choice as to color, for the artist was only equipped with a single, huge gold-plated bottle of ink, and it was as red as his uniform.

“Perfect!” Tessa cried. “I’ll buy the whole bottle.”

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