Title Game Mini-Writes Wk One

One weird word you like 

CACOPHONY

Why hadn’t she noticed it before?  Another one.  God.  Steph tried to put the sound out of her mind and continued cleaning the dishes.  She put the garbage outside the door.  Another ambulance.  She crossed the room to close a window and heard another on the street behind the house.  Ceaseless. The cacophony was morose and disconcerting, mostly, though, it was nerve wracking.  The numbers were climbing by the hour and did not stop.  People dropping like flies.  When she told her family on the other side of the ocean, they listened distractedly.  Maybe it would not reach the US.  Steph knew they said she was dramatic.  Impossible to describe how everyone here in Milan was closed-up behind the huge building doors.  No one dared to move unless it was an outright emergency.  Those that went to the hospital were at the end of their rope.  The hospitals were overflowing with the sick, no one wanted to go there.  A last resort.  If doctors deemed you needed a ventilator, you were most likely to make it off the machine by leaving the room feet first.  God, another ambulance.

 

One word that (verb or gerund) that evokes a complex, troubling memory for you

TELLING THE TRUTH

She was going to have to live with it now. She had told the truth and now it was out.  Why did she do it anyway?  Liz really knew better and strictly followed the unwritten rule that women who speak their mind are problematic.  Looking shyly askance, responding with an ambiguous non-committal euphemism, implying but not asking, followed by disclaiming statements were the preferred modes.  Later, you tried your damnedest to get what you wanted without letting on as to what you were doing and said that whatever you had just quietly orchestrated was a coincidence out of nowhere or you had bought those shoes 2 years ago at the sales, or you had just stumbled, a moment ago, over that information about a writing or acting course on internet… She usually told lies. Little white lies, good faith inaccuracies, the careful calculation of details left out, small lies about what she wanted.  She lied about things that were important to her, things that did not infringe on the lives of others except to inconvenience them with the fact that Liz had her desires and thoughts of her own.  Yes, her desires inconvenienced others.  This time she had told the truth though and that would destroy everything.

 

Song title 

DELIRIOUS

The lights lit up the city like daytime.  Traffic, pedestrians, restaurant- and theater-goers all intensified with the onset of darkness.  It was exhilarating.  Tessa wanted to spin around and around, arms outstretched, head back watching the lights fuse into lines of colors circling her.  It would look delirious.  It was not delirious, is was exhilarating, intoxicating, electric, arousing and enticing but Tessa wanted it to be delirious.

 

One adjective and noun combo  

RUSHING WATER

The canal, at this point in the city, dropped over an uneven step in the grading and the rushing water cascaded in a full-bodied surge of indignation, turning angry, white and foamy.  No doubt the water in the city was dirty, but it would push with force against the throat and chest, taking the bobbing head by surprise, pushing it under water where the roar was muted, like being in space.  Water rushing over skin and pulse, the noise cancelling the city.

 

One question

WHAT’S FOR DINNER?

Tofu.

Nooo…

Tofu with-

Really.  Are you kidding?

Tofu with-

With what?

What do you want it with?

Meatballs.

Ok.  I made meatballs.

I wanted tofu.

 

One word or phrase evocative of your childhood 

I’VE NEVER HEARD OF SUCH A THING; getting a job without a degree, leaving with nothing, not answering a question posed, travelling alone because you like your own company, saying you can ride a camel because, you say, you know how to ride a horse, so you will get the job, but you have never ridden on a horse and the camel will be terrifying once you get up there, they spit and bite, smell of excretement and, oh, we didn’t tell you but you need to ride without a saddle or reigns, just hang on to the camel’s neck, so you squeeze your legs until your they cramp and they say, you should look more relaxed, giving it all up and starting over, leaving the only place that has been home, but it hasn’t been home for a long time, you just didn’t realize it until a moment ago.