I'll admit, it's a rather lengthy title, but I am just so excited!
So I entered another writing competition. I realize that I work best with tight deadlines and I love being given restrictions like prompts, specific vocabulary, or word count. The prompt? I read it in the middle of a busy work day, knowing I wouldn't have time to sit down and start writing until Saturday, knowing that my subconscious would begin its work without me:
"I can't leave her now. She's already gone."
Of course, my first thought was about Death. And then: ick, I don't write about death very well. Too maudlin. Too overdone.
I started thinking about ways of giving a sci-fi/fantasy spin on the idea. Alternate reality? Time travel? But my mind kept returning to the one idea with which I was most uncomfortable. And I remembered a conversation I had with my sister, about how no one chronicled the last times.
So I wrote. And drank coffee. And went out with my family. And wrote. And read. And rewrote. And thought about it. And rewrote some more.
So here's the winning piece of flash fiction, a story under 1000 words entitled First Book of Lasts.