As much as I love playing with words, I’m really a visual person. A candid photo of a stranger’s life, a run-down abandoned building, a snippet of a news story, or the physical gestures between two people I’ve never met are usually the kinds of things that spark an idea for a new story. Yet, sometimes it can be words that inspire new ideas and stretch my imagination like nothing else.
I enjoy writing novel-length stories, but the time between the initial surge of creativity for new storylines and characters never comes quickly enough to please my imagination. In an effort to exercise the creativity of brainstorming new ideas, I’ve started a topic on my blog called three-word scenarios.
The idea came out of an interview I did at author Julie Hayes’s blog. One of the questions she asked was Take these three words and give me a 100 word or less scenario using them: concert, documented, broadcast.
Here’s what I came up with for Julie’s words.
Today, I thought I’d share my next three-word scenario, the first of the new segment I’ll be continuing at my blog. I’ve decided to limit my scenarios to 200 words or less.
My sweetie picked the three words this time around. I don’t think she went easy on me. Since I write contemporary and usually think in those terms, the first one was definitely a challenge. The words are:
Aliens
Candy Canes
Blue
The scenario I came up with is more the start of something, or perhaps the ending of an m/m romance between friends, a sweet moment in time that could lead to more.
Christmas Eve. Out first together in a real home.
Outside it was raining, the ground covered in mud—not the snow I’d always imagined—and Tommy was late getting home from work. I shouldn’t have been this happy. I shouldn’t have been sitting on the floor of the living room staring up at the Christmas tree with its blue twinkling lights and candy canes, smiling like peace on earth really was just a wish away.
I carefully secured the end of the wrapping paper around the 1970’s alien action figure set. A garage-sale find that had taken me four Saturdays of walking through one suburban housing development after another, scouring through boxes of old toys in search of the little plastic green aliens. Tommy’d had the same set as a kid. Since we’d both run away from less-than-stellar homes as teens, neither of us had any childhood mementos to remind us of the few good days we had in our youths.
The smile grew as I imagined his face when he opened the box.
My first gift for him. The first time I’d had money to spend on something this frivolous. Only, to Tommy it wouldn’t be that at all.
Word Count: 200 (just made it!)
Dang, now I have a new story I want to write.
Anyone have any ideas for what three words I can use next time around?
Sloan Parker
www.sloanparker.com
