I’ve never responded to a short story prompt, but why not? Here is something new for this blog!
An offering for the Short Story slam prompt: http://bluebellbooks.blogspot.com/2011/08/short-story-slam-week-8.html
My grandmother looked over the field of ripening grain and saw into her future. She saw my grandfather driving his beat up ’46 Ford pick-up down the dusty road, saw six babies, saw two funerals, four weddings, and then she saw me.
I was wailing in a cradle, waiting and wailing. The house was filling with smoke. She saw two more funerals.
On the day of the fire, my grandmother phoned my mother. “You be careful, hon.” Grandmother could feel the fire coming.
My mom, she told me later, had laughed dismissively. “Yes, ma.” She had set out the candles and was enjoying the twinkling. She fell asleep on the couch. Dad was in bed, gone to bed early because he was on the early shift the next day. One candle had caught the drapes. The house was engulfed in moments.
Grandmother felt the flames grab the fabric, and phoned. When there was no answer, she called the fire department. They didn’t ask how someone 400 miles away knew there was a fire. They went. They found me, waiting for them and wailing to tell them where I was. My door was shut. The master bedroom door was open. Two more funerals.
And so I came to live with my Grandmother, and to look across the same fields, and to glance into my own distant future.
But that is another story.
Shawn L. Bird 
Awesome story! Sad, but written well.
Here is my story for week 8: http://charleslmashburn.wordpress.com/2011/08/18/amber-waves-of-grain/
beautiful, keep those dreams alive.
😉
for a minute i was wondering where the story was headed. very nice finish, great ending! 🙂
It’s amazing what old women get slighted for. Their tales, their medical advice. Nice to know someone took this gran seriously! I really enjoyed this tale.
wow….this was really well written… quite a sad piece, but hopeful also! well done 🙂
This is has a powerful, lyrical quality that I find compelling and I admire you for being able to write something this short and have it tell a story.
Thanks. I find that ‘brevity is an art’ and I am frequently irritated by long-winded poetry that is long for no particular purpose. lol Though I certainly can do it, which you’ll see if you spend a lot of time here. 🙂
You’re welcome. I have issues with stories that I think are going to be relatively short becoming a lot longer by the time I’m finished, so I always admire writers who can work with short-shorts like this one.
lol I’m presently working on a series of novellas. It’s a fine dance, to be sure! Though I confess, it is refreshing to be able to read through a work easily in an evening during edits! The 80-100k word tomes are much more labour intensive. 🙂
This story peaked my interest. I can relate. I record my dreams daily and translate them when the time is right.