Friday, January 06, 2012

A Writing Prompt - What's in the Bag?

(I've always found writing prompts fun and sometimes inspirational. When I taught a writing class a while back, everyone seemed to enjoy them, so I thought, with the new year, that might be an interesting, occasional thing for the blog.)

The Black Bag

You're awakened from a sound sleep by a shrill but hard-to-identify sound. You move to the window to gaze toward the wooded area behind your home. It's bathed in silver moon glow, and through the planks of the tall wooden fence, shadows suggest movement. Perhaps a couple of rickety figures are there, but you can't tell.

Choosing not to go outside, you return to bed for a fitful sleep, rising again only after dawn.

Then you're tugging on a robe and heading outside. When you reach the fence, you curl your fingers over the planks and hoist yourself up to peer over.

Resting on the ground in the woods is a large black bag. It has no markings, and it's cinched closed with a dirty length of rope.

Before you lower yourself back to your feet, something inside the bag moves, and there's an odd sound.

What's in the bag?

5 comments:

Charles Gramlich said...

The first answer that pops into my head is "kittens." But that would make a kind of boring story. So: I figure you open the bag after clearly seeing the movement and there is 'nothing' inside. This gives you a bit of a creepy feeling and you pick up the bag and dump it out to make sure. Nothing falls out but you hear a sound, as if something struck the ground. You drop the bag and back away, and then you see the grass bend s if something is walking toward you across it. you turn and run, and hear footsteps behind you. You run faster, reach the house, jerk open the door and leap inside and lock it. Something hits the door but you can see through the door window that nothing is there. You back away from the door, and...the pet door is pushed open and then falls shut again.

innocentsmith said...

You find in the bag a baby, hoarse from screaming for hours and obviously hungry. Shocked by your discovery, you bring him inside the old family home and care for him as well as a bachelor can. You contact the authorities who finally come and take the crying baby to a suitable hospital. They promise you they will keep you informed as what happens to the little boy.
A few hours later (it's still morning), you sit on your front porch drinking coffee thinking about the crazy events. You look over at the old, beaten black bag that turned out to be an ancient oversize doctor's bag. Your heart tells you nothing will be discovered about the child.
Your family history tells how 80 years earlier your great uncle Ernest disappeared from this very house without a single clue as to what happened to him. Your gut tells you this baby is Uncle Ernest being returned.

Sidney said...

Good ones guys.

It's always fun to see how different imaginations work on an idea.

Rick said...

Actually, I was the one who left the bag.

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