So this one could go either way… just depends on how you want to read it.
Today’s Prompt:“I like your hair.” He looked her up and down. “Can I have a piece?”
Today’s Story:
Just a Piece
Taking the subway home every night was better than finding parking for her car, but it meant riding with so many strangers. By the time she was able to head home at night, some of the crazies seemed to be the only ones on the train with her. Today was no exception.
Tonight though, he was there again. It seemed like he was there every evening and he spooked her. Not overly tall, yet burly with a presence that seemed to fill the train. He never got too close, but he was always watching. Not just her, but she couldn’t help but feel like he was giving her more attention than anyone else. Maybe that was just paranoia, but… a single girl, out after dark in the city, she needed to be paranoid.
As the train was slowing, she stood to get off, and noticed he stood as well. Moving close to her as she was about to get off the train he leaned close and said “I like your hair.”
“Ummm, thanks…” she croaked out. Her hair was her crowning glory, a beautiful shimmering copper that you could never get from a box.
“Can I have a piece?” He asked, just as the doors opened. There was a glimmer of something, deep in his eyes as she stared at him, her mouth open in shock. She couldn’t even step away, the shock holding her next to him.
After she stands there, frozen in a moment of time she will never forget the doors start to close. She sticks her hand between them, keeping them open long enough to dash through. Stopping on the platform she turns and watches him. He just stands where she had left him, grinning at her through the window on the doors, as the train starts to move once more.
Shuddering, she makes her way home, vowing never to take that train again.
There you have it. What does the prompt bring to mind for you? Please share in the comments below! We love to hear from you! And if you like what you see here, take a moment and check out the anthologies I am published in! The MN Emerging Writers and the National Edition!
Yikes, that prompt. Nice work. I enjoy the challenge of writing a story from a prompt and I like what you’re doing here. I grew up doing this https://powerofthepen.wildapricot.org/
Wow! That is sooooo freakin cool! I wish there would have been competitions like that when I was in school! I don’t think my area has anything like it, but I may just see about sharing that. I did speech my senior year and lettered, I loved it. I also did the one act play competitions. So much fun!
“I like your hair.” He looked her up and down. “Can I have a piece?”
“Well, maybe,” she winked at him. “What have you got for me?”
She was the new girl. Started working in the mail room on Monday.
He was the guy in the corner office. As long as you count the office two doors down from the corner as the corner office.
But, still. He had an office. With a real door. And a window that look out on the parking garage across the street.
She didn’t have any of that. The mail room was in the basement. Aren’t all mail rooms in the basement? The people who work there kind of like gnomes or something, somebody, who thrived in the dark, in the dank corners of the world.
But she, she was not like the rest, but Ginny hadn’t been either when she started. He took Ginny out for a drink after work her second week on the job. She was light and sun and smiles. They hit it off.
But then a few months passed and the dark circles under her eyes started to form and soon Ginny was just like every other mail room geek. Vampire-like. Death warmed over. Barely alive. No hope. No happy.
But “she” … she was special. And he thought that maybe if he kept a piece of her in the light, she would survive.
“All I can offer you is life and happiness.” He shrugged. “Maybe eternally.”
“Yeah, right.” She dropped his mail in the box on the corner of his desk and turned to the door.
He leapt up and beat her to the door, holding it shut. “No, really, give me a piece of your hair.”
“You’re serious.”
“As serious as a heart attack.”
“My god, could you at least avoid the cliches?”
“Your hair.” He held out his hand, palm up, and waited.
“Wow,” she mumbled, “another freak show.” But she found herself unable to resist.
“Here.” She held out two strands of her hair she had plucked from her scalp. “Whatever.”
He waited until she had left his office and then went to close the door. Back at his desk, he pulled the box from one of his drawers and deposited the two strands of hair in with the rest. A few black hairs, a few blond, more red than he thought possible. He was close, So close.
Random Acts of Writing 
Yikes, that prompt. Nice work. I enjoy the challenge of writing a story from a prompt and I like what you’re doing here. I grew up doing this https://powerofthepen.wildapricot.org/
Wow! That is sooooo freakin cool! I wish there would have been competitions like that when I was in school! I don’t think my area has anything like it, but I may just see about sharing that. I did speech my senior year and lettered, I loved it. I also did the one act play competitions. So much fun!
“I like your hair.” He looked her up and down. “Can I have a piece?”
“Well, maybe,” she winked at him. “What have you got for me?”
She was the new girl. Started working in the mail room on Monday.
He was the guy in the corner office. As long as you count the office two doors down from the corner as the corner office.
But, still. He had an office. With a real door. And a window that look out on the parking garage across the street.
She didn’t have any of that. The mail room was in the basement. Aren’t all mail rooms in the basement? The people who work there kind of like gnomes or something, somebody, who thrived in the dark, in the dank corners of the world.
But she, she was not like the rest, but Ginny hadn’t been either when she started. He took Ginny out for a drink after work her second week on the job. She was light and sun and smiles. They hit it off.
But then a few months passed and the dark circles under her eyes started to form and soon Ginny was just like every other mail room geek. Vampire-like. Death warmed over. Barely alive. No hope. No happy.
But “she” … she was special. And he thought that maybe if he kept a piece of her in the light, she would survive.
“All I can offer you is life and happiness.” He shrugged. “Maybe eternally.”
“Yeah, right.” She dropped his mail in the box on the corner of his desk and turned to the door.
He leapt up and beat her to the door, holding it shut. “No, really, give me a piece of your hair.”
“You’re serious.”
“As serious as a heart attack.”
“My god, could you at least avoid the cliches?”
“Your hair.” He held out his hand, palm up, and waited.
“Wow,” she mumbled, “another freak show.” But she found herself unable to resist.
“Here.” She held out two strands of her hair she had plucked from her scalp. “Whatever.”
He waited until she had left his office and then went to close the door. Back at his desk, he pulled the box from one of his drawers and deposited the two strands of hair in with the rest. A few black hairs, a few blond, more red than he thought possible. He was close, So close.
Ohhhhhhhh…. I sooooo wanna know what he is collecting them for! Love it!