Welcome one and all to the third instalment of my new regular feature, Stories That Have Failed To Win The Weekly AdHoc Fiction 150 Word Competition!
In this week’s adventure (word prompt: Stone) we begin with a man digging a hole…
*
“That’s deep enough.”
Ray kept digging anyway and got a gun-butt between the shoulder blades for his trouble.
“I said that’s deep enough. Get on your knees.”
“Please. I’ve got money. I can double anything they’re paying you. I…”
The laughter that followed suited the pig mask but not the situation. “Come on Ray. Seriously? You’ve been in this game so long you’re starting to sound like a contract. You must have known it was going to end like this? The only thing further off limits than Jimmy’s money is his wife and you put your hands on both. And so here we are. You know the rules.”
Ray nodded. “Shallow and n…”
The gunshot choked the word before it could be released.
“And no stone,” muttered pig-mask and picked up the shovel. “Shallow and no stone.”
*
Join us again next week kids for a brand new failure!
Header image: By Carlos Schwabe – Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2054522
Nik Eveleigh 
Oh – shallow and no stone – it’s quite a striking phrase that !
Mind you sounds like he earned it!
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He did Diane, but I agree I really like that phrase. It feels a bit fantasy-novel-esque but was pretty much the catalyst for the story. Thanks for reading and commenting – you really are so generous with your time and your words, thank you 🙂
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Nik, don’t think of it as failure. It’s getting you into a regular writing habit anyway. Do any of them seem to lend themselves to a longer story do you think? This one certainly leaves you wondering more about the backstory. Better luck this week. I’ll try and get around to entering myself as not done so for a few weeks but other things have been keeping me busy! 🙂
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Thanks Rebecca 🙂 I use the failure line fairly humorously as I don’t worry about it at all. Exactly as you pointed out, it’s getting me back into the habit of writing which is key. There might be one or two things in these stories that could expand into longer pieces but generally I don’t think beyond the 150 words with these efforts – I just write them and see what happens. I have been doing a little on the fringes however and have finished an odd little horror piece that is looking for a home and am midway through what will probably be a 2500-3000 word piece so I’m plugging away!
Lovely to hear from you as always and I truly appreciate your encouragement and support 🙂
…and I’m looking forward to reading your next piece whenever it appears 🙂
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Nicely written as always. I love the type of thing where you can fill in the blanks yourself.
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Thanks Lee – these 150 word things are a bit of fun each week as I try to get my brain into longer story mode. Hope all is going well and you are having a good writing week!
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I might have to lower the parameters of what a good writing week looks like
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Your failures Rock!!
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Haha – thanks! Best strap yourself in Mel because there’s plenty more failure in me 🙂
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