This week’s photo prompt is provided by Michelle DeAngelis. Thank you Michelle!
The beachfront’s infested.
I see’em on every slipway, bumping their asses against the fencing. On the beach tangled in fishing nets like red snapper.
I found a pair behind the bar this morning, making out on a crate of Bud Light. Thought it was raccoons going through the trash again.
Meg used to laugh at my bitching, shake her head as she sliced lemons for the evening. ‘Leave ’em in peace. They’re only young once.’
Maybe that’s why I’m angry. Cos that used to be me and Meg rattling beer bottles, slipping into warm, gritty sheets of sand, waking when the sun seared the backs of our necks.
Now I’m here tending bar, slopping out drunks at closing, getting turned over at least once a season by some junkie too glass-eyed to see his way to the register.
And Meg’s in an urn in the back room, my golden girl stored in tarnished plastic.
Written for Priceless Joy’s FFfAW. See the pic and write a tale. Don’t forget to share, read and comment here.
This is a brilliant! He has my sympathy, and yet if I met him I’d probably dislike him the moment he opened his mouth. I’d love to read this story written in the third person. “Look at that bitter old sod…”
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I wondered about the 1st person POV but felt the end worked better that way. I do usually write in 3rd – more comfortable with it I suppose. Thank you Jane. Really glad you liked it. And I suspect if I met the old curmudgeon I’d feel empathy for him … and want to spend as little time in his company as possible 🙂
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I know who people resent the young for the same reason he does. I have no patience with them, but your use of the 3rd person brought out the empathy in me. All the same, I’ll make sure I avoid his pub 🙂
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Ha! Me too – grumpy old devil. 🙂
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A great story. The first person worked for me, here. It’s good to have empathy for your creations, 🙂
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Thank you!
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Jealousy, at young lovers!
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Yes indeed 🙂
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Ah, a sad end to our observations of a curmudgeonly character, but I love that you don’t judge your characters, simply tell their story. Quick proofing check on the word “junkie” but otherwise golden. 🙂
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Thanks for the proofing! All sorted. And thank you for the kind words, Pola and for reading
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I’m finding as I get older my disconnect from the younger generation grows, but then I guess I must have been like that once before! I can understand his state of mind, and only hope I come to live life a bit more in my later years than he seems to be managing! Great story Lynn.
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Thank you, Iain. Yes, it’s hard not to look at young people and wonder what is going on in their heads … But I still have vivid memories of my teen years – not all happy ones either. It’s as tough being young as it easy being old (well, almost!), it’s just different. Thanks for reading
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Very well done, Lynn.
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Thank you Tish
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I love the imagery, though not all of it visual; imagery of a time now gone, now mourned.
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Thank you Crispina. Yes, life seems to be as much about looking back as looking forward, especially as we age and realise we have more time behind us than to come! But all things have their season too and we have to let go of youth once it’s gone or live in regret all our lives
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What! Leave go of our youth? Never. Well, okay, just a little. 🙂
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Haha! I don’t mind leaving it behind – it comes with as many worries as pleasure
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I think I’m Peter Pan. Though my youth was not so wonderful, my 20s were fantastic.
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I was quite happy in my twenties, probably happy in my thirties. Sadly my forties seem to have brought a lot of losses, but I think that’s how life goes, isn’t it? Teens, though? They can bog off 🙂
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No, I can’t say I really enjoyed my teens. Which is probably why I say of Peter Pan now. Because I didn’t have much of a life in my teens. Overcompensation. Though I far past the reckless stage. And then, of course, there are those missing 15 years when I had CFS/ME. Though I did write duruing that period; in fact I started this blog towards the end of if, so I can’t really complain. But I did live a very reclusive life.
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Teens are a rotten time, I think. I never felt so uncomfortable in myself, so alone, so in need of company and yet rejecting most that was offered. So in need of guidance and yet rejecting it all! Total rubbish, rubbish years.
I have someone very close to me who suffers from Fibromyalgia. Rotten, sapping, leech of a condition. So hard to get out and just live a life. I’m so glad it sounds as if the worst is behind you
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This was brilliant.
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Thank you very much Neel
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Hahaha! Great story! Poor Meg is in an urn in the back! LOL! Love the drawl that you used!
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Thanks very much PJ
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What a sad ending, I did not expect it
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Thank you for reading Michael
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Oof that ending, I loved you set up the reader to be a little annoyed at the grumpy narrator only to make us feel sympathy at the end. Well done, Lynn.
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Thanks very much Jade
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Whoa, that was brilliant Lynn. Loved the voice of the crusty old barkeep.
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Thanks so much!
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He’s jealous of what he’s lost, and that’s what’s sad. I knew a barman in Paris who was bitter and resentful because his wife had dementia. But it was pure self-pity. Complained that that wasn’t why he’d married her, to be the one looking after her. He thought is should have been the other way round. First person worked fine for me;
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Wow! Whatever happened to ‘in sickness and in health’? Self pity is never attractive, though sort of fascinating from an author’s viewpoint 🙂
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He was an interesting character from that point of view, a real piece of Old Paris that has gone now, but as a human being…. Not so sure.
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Not a man to get close to!
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He didn’t encourage it.
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Great voice, and then the ending that suddenly explains it all works really well.
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Thanks very much Sarah
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Oh what an ending! I was getting annoyed with this man which turned into sympathy at the end! Great story Lynn!
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Thank you so much 🙂
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Aw, such a killer last line, and what a great set-up for it — wondering why he’s so bitter, what went wrong, and then bam, there it is. I really felt for him. And as always, love your amazing attention to the little details that paint the scene so well!
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Thank you Joy! That’s such a lovely comment – you made my day 🙂
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Brilliant take, so sad, I can understand how trapped he must feel now his beloved has passed, he’s best off out of there, getting a boat and cruising round the med!
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Thank you! Maybe he’ll do just that. Thanks so much for reading
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