You may enter once each day/once each photo entry.
This is open worldwide, but entries must be in English. The query critique prize must be for a manuscript in English.
I will choose a selection of my favorites and utilize a panel of secret judges to help me choose the winner. The winner gets a query critique from Mollie Glick of Foundry Literary (to be awarded in late June/early July.)
Breathe. Heavy breathing. Heart fluttering. Just breathe. Concentrate. My eyes shut.
ReplyDeleteMy lips begin quivering as the sound of my beating heart rapidly increases. The blood flow rushes through my body, crashing into my fingertips like the waves from the Pacific at sunset.
My heart continues beating faster and louder, drowning out the last bit of surrounding noise. Total silence.
His heart is synchronized with mine. His body is warm. His lips are quivering too. He grabs me. He squeezes me.
Everything will be okay. Our last, first kiss.
Just a quick kiss...
ReplyDeleteYeah, right.
I reached for him and then his hands were on my back, clawing at my shirt, and mine were unbuttoning the button on the shorts he wore, yanking them down past his knees. And then we were both bare. His mouth went to mine and he tasted sweet like the rum and strawberries and yet pungent and foreign. He pulled my body to his and suddenly we fit together in a way I had never fit with anyone, a way I had never imagined fitting with him.
ReplyDeleteTell me the world. Tell me the inside-out chime of stars, the ring and gleam of dawnlight on glass. No. Better - tell me the press of your hips over mine, the words I fumble up against your lips. Shh, you say. Later.
ReplyDeleteSwallow my yesterdays in the curve of your kiss. Burn me down into this one blinding moment, until our edges blur and I can no longer tell where I end and you begin. I can still taste the snap of whisky down my throat.
Later, maybe the roar in my head and the copper in my mouth will reel back the crash, the twisting of metal and road. And I'll crumple your number in my fingers; flatten in out; tear it into tiny pieces. But now is just the slide of your fingers over my chest. The slow burning of your mouth on my skin.
One hour ago, our neighborhood’s summer kick-off block party. I hand out freezing cans of pop until my fingers go numb. He watches me, pretending that he’s not. We both know what happened, what keeps happening. We both know we want it to happen again. His text, low on subtlety: Can you get away?
ReplyDeleteNow, in his room. The house is quiet. Everyone in the streets, outside our protective bubble. For the first time, there’s no need to rush. My fingertips dance across his face. He gasps at the chill, then smiles as he whispers that I’ve never looked more beautiful.
I want to say so much. That I’ve never been so wanted. That I’ve never been so close to anyone. That I’ve never been so happy.
This was supposed to be something different. Hooking up. Our little secret. Everything except what it feels like.
Love.
When his lips touched mine, the world disappeared. It was like there was no-one else but us two. The rest of the stars in the galaxy had faded, leaving us to shine brighter than the sun. Our love may have been new-found but it was just as sweet and perfect as a new-born baby; just as romantic as not a hundred but a million red roses floating across the vast ocean. There is but one more thing to say about our love and it is this: it will never end, not for as long as the two of us shall live.
ReplyDeleteMy fingertips held his silver eyelashes against his cheek. “Don’t open your eyes, for if you do, I shall disappear.”
ReplyDeleteA smile curved up one side of his mouth. “Then how can I know you are real?”
I brushed my lips against his. They were so soft, with an edge of rough stubble that made my skin surge with heat.
His eyelids trembled but did not open. “You feel real. You feel beautiful.”
He exhaled and I allowed his warm essence into my lungs. His breath was all I could keep of him.
Tears prickled the corners of my eyes. I was glad he could not see. “Beauty is in the beholder’s eye, so I shall never be that.”
His fists stayed clenched at his side. “If I reach out to hold you, could I take you in my arms?”
“For a little while.”
Just here to say.....beautiful picture :) And good luck to those participating!
ReplyDelete“I didn’t think we’d fit in here!” he whispers.
ReplyDelete“I didn’t think YOU'D fit in HERE!” she gestures with a gentle stroke.
“You flatter me, miss!” He stifles her giggles with a deep but quiet kiss. They begin to rock. Unable to move more than an inch or two in any direction, she braces her knees against the rough pine while he does tiny toe push-ups. Splinters work into their flesh.
“Someday we’ll have a giant, four-poster bed, with silk sheets.” Sweat drips down her nose into his eye.
“Maybe,” he pants, straining against an intense urge to burst out of the box and move with her the way he really wants to.
She stops. “But will we ever be this close again?”
It’s the first time she’s ever mentioned their future. Any future.
Slowly, they start their small, rhythmic movements again, with an urgency they didn’t believe was possible.