more ficspam.
Another prompt from the book: The 3am Epiphany. The prompt is as follows:
The Royal We. Write a first person plural narration of an event from the POV of a very close-knit couple. This means the narrative should sound something like this: We found the body in the outhouse, and Jenny got the can of gasoline from the garage while Benjamin removed all the toilet paper rolls stacked up on the door shelves (no sense wasting them). Jenny and Benjamin are the we at the beginning of this brief narrative. The reader should be unable to discern which of the two is telling the story. Do not use the first person pronoun I in this exercise. 600 words.
Few of my students have ever tried this exercise and I can understand why. But if you accept the challenge, you may learn what it’s like to have two minds in one narration -- an uncommon experience. I’ve known couples who write letters this way, especially since the advent of computers -- no first person pronouns, just this wonderfully eerie we and the names of the individual units of the couple -- the two will trade off writing one section or another and sometimes edit or add material to the other spouse’s section. Science fiction plays with this all the time by means of telepathy or actual joining of consciousnesses. I contend that this is difficult to imagine but useful to do anyway. Narration tempered by two ways of seeing the world -- a schizophrenic worldview -- alters every rule of narration we know instinctively. A lot of our everyday language is a blend of many different voices and languages -- we echo acquaintances, newspaper or television news fragments of thought, advertising, film, fiction, and poetry without knowing it -- often all in one paragraph of speech.
My experimental take under the cut. Oh, it's also a death!fic but safe for katwoman76. Maybe not so safe for ashlified.
We scolded the kids when they started to argue before we even got to the dock.
Sandy told them what we expected of them and once the stewards took us to our rooms, they disappeared.
We didn’t mind.
Kirsten had bought out the lingerie shop the day before and we couldn’t wait to begin.
She didn’t even have time to put on the lingerie before we were naked across the crisp sheets.
We didn’t leave the room until we heard the horn blowing signaling that the liner was leaving port.
Sandy put a fresh seasickness patch on and we started our second round. We knew the kids wouldn’t bother us if the Do Not Disturb sign stayed up.
Later that night, Sandy’s cell phone went off and we got dressed up and met the boys for dinner in the elaborate dining room.
The kids seemed happy and Ryan even ate everything on his plate. He was much better at sea than he was in the air.
Then Seth dragged him off to check out the top deck and we were alone again.
Sandy kissed her neck and his hand was on her thigh.
We went back to the room and Kirsten modeled the black teddy with the garters and Sandy let her tie him to the bed.
We were still exhausted the next morning and we had breakfast on the deck with Seth. He had met a girl and was meeting her at the movie theater and Ryan had opted to sleep in.
We spent the next few hours by the pool and Sandy really liked her new bikini. She liked the way his skin glowed in the sunlight.
We glimpsed the boys a few times, rewarded by a shy smile from Ryan and a shout from Seth.
It was a very nice day.
We took another break before dinner, our skin hot from the sun and we enjoyed each other again with the pink teddy.
We walked with the boys to the upper deck that night and Ryan seemed enthralled by the clear view they had of the constellations.
There wasn’t any land in sight, just ocean and the night sky.
We didn’t see what the cruise liner hit, we just felt the jolt and heard the alarms.
We tried to stay with the boys but we got separated in the crowd.
Kirsten managed not to cry.
The second jolt was harsher and we started yelling out the boys’ names but the chaos was just too loud.
We knew we weren’t close enough to the escape rafts, even though we were right by the railing.
We didn’t even feel the last jolt.
We saw Seth, screaming and Ryan holding him back, his blue eyes wide with panic.
We knew that they had each other.
We didn’t want to go, but the water was too cold and when our legs went numb we just had to let go.
We saw our boys get on the raft, we saw them shivering on the coast guard boat. We saw them go back to the empty house.