Original image by Raheel Shakeel
I’ve talked about writing coach/author/editor Kate Johnston‘s Team Writer Saturday Sentence Challenge before. Briefly, each week, Kate offers members of the group a boring or grammatically-troubled sentence which we are tasked with sprucing up. The challenge is that we can only push this to two sentences, and we’ve got to make the reader feel something. This particular week, Kate provided a familiar cliche:
The thought passed through his mind.
Now, I’ve got a lot of characters who have a lot of thoughts crossing their minds. Some thoughts are crazy, others romantic, still others devious. For this particular prompt, my brain originally went a different way, with a different character, but the details in that first attempt went way off into deep raunch, I didn’t think it appropriate to share with mixed company. Still, I’ve always liked the idea of forbidden attraction. I just took it in a slightly different direction. Here’s what I wrote, as begun in the image above:
Firelight danced over the mechanic’s face, adding a glow to her smooth brown cheeks and full, glossy lips, and in that moment the hunter wondered how soft that cheek would feel if he stroked it, and how silky those lips if he kissed them. But then her husband sat down between them and, well, that was the end of that.
Of course, that’s not quite the end of that particular story. But sharing the ensuing details to that scene will have to wait for another day.
Did this Saturday Sentence Challenge answer from me make you feel anything? Have you partaken of any writing challenges, lately? Share your thoughts in the comments!
I don’t believe that’s the end of that for one second! A hunter worthy of his title can’t let such a challenging prey escape so easily.
There’s so much in just two sentences, the likes of which I wish I could do. His desire is clear, as is a deeper longing for just some kind of connection at all. I imagine this hunter has been alone for some time.
It’s always a joy to read your challenge responses! Keep them coming!
Thanks, Chase! That’s definitely not the end of this particular story, but it’s a more involved one that must wait for a larger story (which is currently in-progress). I’m glad to hear that the conflicting feelings come through even in this short piece – you nailed all of them!
I really like what you do with your offerings to these challenges, too. You’ve such a gift for descriptive phrasing!
Thanks for stopping by. 🙂
You always do such a nice job with the sentences. A lot of subtext here which could spin the tale in several different directions.
Thanks, Kate! Your talent for providing intriguing fodder for my imagination is one of the best reasons I have for getting up early on Saturdays. 🙂 I always appreciate it when the sentences offered up for the challenge can lead to different scenarios.