My mother was doing that thing she did. That thing with the rag in the sink. Calloused hand pushes the rag around the cast iron pan. Semicircles trace sunset arcs of detergent, scrubbing indelicately, scouring away pain in the balm of the mundane.
"See that's how you do it properly. Now you try."
A smaller hand, soft as a seals belly grips the rag. Seaweed swaying in foam flecks. Pushing up against the pan, ineffectual, soft.
"Put some effort into it, for god’s sake."
Gargantuan hand plunges through scolding water, enfolding the smaller in its puffy embrace, buffeting flesh and cloth into metal, changing its nature. The rag crushed between flesh and iron, caught between the hammer and anvil.
"Do you see how much better that is?"
A question asked as a statement, barely rhetorical.
The plane was two hours late. Fingers slam against the neon glowing keyboard of the laptop. Dry recycled air circulates. Stifling air-con air, lulling the lizard brain. He fights through, tapping a white-hot cadence in counterpoint to the metallic voice.
"There will be further delays to flight 512 to Munich out of gate number six. Please proceed to gate number six for further details. We are sorry for this delay and are working on a solution. We thank you for your patience."
Eyes droop as the announcement plays a loop in his mind. SNAP-TAP-SNAP, fingers continue their dance, strong fluid soap-sud bounce. Firm semi-circular motion across the keyboard. Metallic voice fades to La petite mort.
She watches the way he writes with both his left and right hand.
"That's not the right way to do that you know? There is a technique called touch-typing."
Blonde frizz stretches up towards brown shaded light. He looks up, the laptop glow haloing his face, dun-green pallid flesh. Sunken eyes stare.
Calloused hand grabs fingers, twisting, re-positioning. Thumbs rest on the space bar, little fingers to 'A' and 'L'.
"See that's how you do it properly. Then move your other fingers to type, using the little fingers as an anchor. Now you try."
Sunken eyes stare. Wind rattles roof tiles as the window creaks. Silence grows its own conscience as he stares through the window. Washing line snaps back and forth. Gales build momentum, dish rag convulses, pegged down.
All dried out.
If you would like to join a fantastic community where we strive to help new steemians grow and develop, why not join me at #promo-mentors discord group which you can find here. I am one of the poetry/fiction mentors over at #promo-mentors, if you have any questions or need any guidance with either of these tags please don't hesitate to ask for me, @raj808.
Hello @raj808
Well well, I don't know how to praise someone so good at what he does best. Your writings are always a level above my comprehension and at such, I do grab the dictionary. Oh, did I say grab?😂😂 Meant launched the dictionary app on my mobile to fathom the meaning of some of your words.
I'm glad, I'm learning some vocabulary from you and learning how to write and improve on my own writing too.
Keep being amazing Mentor, your mentorship skills are truly inspirational.
Thanks @nexrules. I really appreciate your generous words.
This is the greatest compliment that you could give me. If I am inspiring others to increase there word-store I am a happy chappy. Thanks for stopping by to check out my blog. I shall keep trying to be the best mentor I can be :-)
Hehe 😀😀.
The pleasure is all mine, keep being amazing.
As a follower of @followforupvotes this post has been randomly selected and upvoted! Enjoy your upvote and have a great day!
What a journey those small hands took! From the gentleness of a child to the harsh callouses of adulthood, the same rough pattern of the semicircles and the snaps following through his life. Then the ending, with his sunken eyes and the rag on the line left me feeling tired and wrung out along with him.
Here's today's prompt for you!
Should this prompt hit your head I do apologize, it's difficult to aim while flying through the skies!
Thank you @brisby. I am thrilled to hear that it left 'wrung out' at the end as it's completely the impression I was trying to give. I'm chuffed 😁
I love how you brought it back to the rag being buffeted now by the elements.
did you edit at all (besides typos) or you brought it all together in one swoop...
Thanks, yes bringing it back around to the rag on the washing line was something I had in mind from the very beggining of the story. Also, this was based on one of my best friends mother's behavior in her obsessive fixation on teaching me and her son how to wash up 'properly' as she called it, lol. It is fiction, she was by no means as mean as the mother in this story but she certainly had a screw loose about this particular thing in my opinion. Or maybe, I just needed to learn the right way 😉 😄
Anyway, because it was inspired by memory the story just seemed to solidify quickly and in 'one fell swoop' @mariannewest. I must admit that I allow my self about a minute between each prompt sentence to figure out where I want to take it but other than that, this was just one of those natural flows that kicks in when the time is ticking but you know what you want to achieve with something. It helps that one of my favorite authors is Chuck Palahniuk (author of fight club) who writes mainly in this Deep POV first person. Once I got the first few sentences written it flowed so naturally for me, I guess because I entered that mind frame that I get when reading Chuck's work. Thanks for checking out my freewrite marianne, I'm glad you enjoyed it
Now, I am even more impressed. It is such a pleasure to read your work. Thank you!!
@raj808 ... damn! blow my mind why don't ya?! I have so much to learn and so grateful to have met you on steemit.
Lyrical master! ...I'm speechless ...
Your too kind @blanca237 😊Thank you 🙏
impressive writing skills, as usual!!! I love these little prompts!
Thanks evecab. I'm glad you enjoyed the freewrite :-)
I'm amazed how you transformed all of the freewrites and melded it into this.
I was doing the freewrites before and I did the same thing that I used about less than a minute to think of the story, its beginning and its end so that the prose will flow when I start the remaining 4 minutes or so.
Yes I agree, I think it works out so much better if you do that. I read the first sentence only then get an idea about what I want to do with the beginning and ending and then launch into the freewrite. I don't look at the second and third prompt though, and then I see it as a challenge to work from those prompts to try and achieve the ending I was looking for. Sometimes it woks out well, often it takes you in a bit of a different direction but that direction is also really good. Occasionally ;-) It trips me up, but I love the challenge of it all. Thanks for stopping by to check it out @maverickinvictus