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August 6, 2009 Update: My 84 word story was selected to be among the "stories we also liked" and actually got published in the Tucson Weekly. My story was among aboiut 30 also-rans. Not bad, considering that about 400 were submitted. Some of the winners (and others) were fun to read. And, they are all good for anyone who has a short attention span. The papers are already gone, but if you want to take an online look, just have a click. June 12, 2009 Back in the (not too) olden days Tucson Weekly ran a very short fiction feature. It was fun.
Now, the Tucson Weekly is holding a (very) short fiction contest as part of its 25th anniversary celebrations. Because I haven’t tried fiction in about 40 years and because it was short and because a couple of paragraphs came to me on my bicycle about two weeks ago, I decided to enter.
And because I don’t have any chance of winning and getting my entry published in the Tucson Weekly, I decided to publish it here.
But first I want to tell you how I got there.
I was riding my bike, I forgot where, when a scene and some words came into my mind. That happens. I liked what I heard so I pulled over and took my little green memo book out of my back pants pocket and my fountain pen out of my front pocked and wrote some notes.
I pictured a girl, probably about 16, on her first trip out of the country with her parents. I saw her in Jerusalem's old city or perhaps in Istanbul’s grand bazaar. I heard the story in her voice.
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Her words: Instead of going to the beach like I told my parents, I headed toward town. I began to wander and soon I was in a place where no one spoke English. I wandered into the market. At one of the booths I noticed a girl about my age. She was on the floor. In front of her was a chess set. She was playing both sides. I caught her eye and smiled. So did she.
After a moment I pointed at her chess set than at my chest, and noded my head, yes.
She smiled and motioned me over.
She set up the board and motioned for me to sit.
She gave me white and smiled and gestured that I could move.
I decided to take a risk.
I pushed the queen’s pawn two squares forward.
That was the first move, of what for me, began a series of events that changed my life.
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That was what I wrote down, not tightened up or revised or anything. It was 154 words long. 84 words are not many, so that was a problem. I changed nearly everything. I wanted to make the story third person and set it in Tucson. I wanted to develop the girl’s character a little and set up the scene with some sights and smells. I wanted her to be with friends and then leave them for a moment. I gave that a try and ended up with about 275 words. Wrong direction. So I started cutting. Here’s what I ended up with. (I can’t wait to read how other people approached this.) -------------------------------------------
First Move
Emma first noticed the Mexican fruit cart’s bright colors, but behind the stand, a young woman also about 17, sat on the ground in front of a chess board. She played both sides. The chess player looked up, smiled, and gestured, “Play?” Emma nodded.
The woman rearranged the board, opened her hand and offered, “Blanco?”
Emma sat behind white. She closed her eyes for a moment, opened them, and pushed her queen’s pawn two spaces. For Emma, this was a daring first move.
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