Deb over at San Diego Momma has a fun writing challenge. I always mean to try it, but then I read some of the submissions and get clouded with other people's images, and lose my nerve. So this week, I'm playing along before I read the other entries.
The rules are simple. 10 minutes only. Follow the prompt and write. Here we go:
Her hand reaches across the table, fingers tracing the outline of letters. She circles the book table once, first searching for titles, then twice, searching now for photographs on the covers. Is it here, she wonders? Week after week she searches for the one. She settles on a paperback, rubber boots on a porch, a hand print on the glass door. Flipping the pages quickly near her face, she inhales. The smell of fresh paper and ink. No. Not this one. Next her hands float along the table straightening stacks, feeling the raised print of text. This time they reach for a hardback, a black and white photo, a child, perhaps four, centered between a man and a woman. The young child, head thrown back, toes reaching for the sky as the couple swing her forward. Once again, the pages are brought up close enough to smell. The woman fans them again, and breathes deeply. Instantly she knows, this is it. This is the one he left for her. The one lightly scented with his familiar scent of bar soap, and leather. She's found it. Tomorrow, the title reads. Satisfied and enthralled with her discovery, she tucks the novel under her arm, and heads for the counter.
(You can play along too. Head over to San Diego Momma for some divine entries.)
