Writers Victoria just held its fourth flash fiction competition. This year, the theme was ‘Glimmer’. For the 30 days of April, they posted a single-word prompt and entrants wrote up to 30 words in response.
Here are my first 10 stories. And lucky me scored a win on day one.
Theme: Glimmer
April 1 Hint
The hint effectively built up to letters, each read doggedly in directly introducing the word. If the hint and clues are now dramatically lucid, everyone sees the insidious cold killer.
(In case you can’t figure it out, you need to read it with only the first letter of every word: The butler did it with a candlestick.)
April 2 Pyrite
The pyrite glistened beside her bed. Who put it there, this fool’s gold? Damn her honeycomb memory.
She held the crystal, closed her eyes. ‘Mum, it’ll help you remember things.’
April 3 Glow
The water glowed under the fiery sunset – not a lake, not the sea, but the wreckage of her flooded home. Nature’s shards of bittersweet beauty brought her to her knees.
April 4 Fortune
At her school reunion, Miss Guided listened while Miss Behaviour shared lies about Miss Chief and Miss Demeanours. Taken aback, she met with Miss Fortune and tumbled down the stairs.
April 5 Idol
He lay on the forest floor,
Bleeding from
War
Fallen idols
The black dog’s bite.
A pinprick of sunlight grazed his cheek.
A glimmer of hope
Until the rain fell.
April 6 Intermittent
In Grandma’s house
Floorboards creak
Walls groan
Intermittent clanging breaks the night.
Grandad’s ghost
Shimmers
Hovers
Intent on revenge.
I cower lower
Hands aquiver
Until Dad explains
It’s water hammer.
April 7 Bright
Feted for brains, not beauty, she yearned to be the fairest one of all.
False prophet, Dr Makeover, took her money and her looks. Now she wished she’d been brighter.
April 8 Moon
As she slept, moondust scattered forgotten loves and abandoned dreams. Starlight danced on her brow. When she woke, she shrugged away whimsy, brushed off romance and faced the world unarmed.
April 9 Perceive
Gawain perceived the emerald orb glittering inside the lair. Now was the time to seize his destiny.
The earth before him stirred, writhed. A dragon rose, breathed fire.
Gawain ran.
April 10 Twinkle
Bill considered himself a good man, self-righteous, superior. But as if by magic, the diamond ended up in his pocket.
Closeup, the twinkle of temptation was too hard to resist.
Brightside Story Studio 
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