Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY
IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I
generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family
rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to
write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration
(quote, website, podcast, etc) and then a thought or two that came to mind.
These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat,
irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if
anything comes of them.
Change of pace for a bit – I’m going to
look at elements of EXTREMELY popular SF, F, and H; break them apart and use
each element as a jumping of point for a story idea…
Popular Horror
Story/Series: Goosebumps Books
H Trope: adoring
the pests…
Current Event:
http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/17/cats-are-cute-but-could-we-learn-to-love-the-cockroach-4303071/
It took a while
for Austin Ventura, Carmita Rodriguez Cruz, and Paulina Rodriguez Cruz to make
it back to Austin’s house. Getting the candied-apple red Jeep Cherokee out of
the driveway without starting it was a little tougher than Austin had been
hoping.
He started out
in the driver seat first, but because his driveway sloped up a little, they
couldn’t get it pushed up enough to get it out into the street. Austin jumped
out and whispered, “Paulina – you get behind the wheel!”
“I never drove!”
“Do it! Just
hold the wheel straight while we push you backwards. I’ll come there and turn
the wheel when it’s time!” All around them, was total silence; the dead of
night when even burglars and rapists had gone to bed in order to hide their
horrific shame from the light of day. If he’d tried to start the Cherokee...
“What are you
daydreaming about?” Carmita whispered. “Push!”
Austin did. It
took two rolling backs before the SUV was over the hump and into the street.
Then it started
rolling backwards. “Hit the brakes!” Austin shouted in a whisper.
“She’s never
driven a car, stupid! She doesn’t know what the brakes are!” The two of them
chased the car across the street. But not until it hit a garbage can in front
of the neighbor’s house. The family had a massively giant can because they only
put it out once a month. Most everyone in the neighborhood knew exactly what
day that was because the garbage stank to high heaven. And the can was jammed
full.
Austin covered
his eyes as the can teetered then tipped. There’d been no way to get there fast
enough to stop it. No way to keep the month’s-worth of garbage from spilling
into the street.
Cockroaches and
all. “Ew…” said Carmita, who’d been standing next to him the whole time.
Paulina had
scrambled out of the car and was coming around it when she stopped, transfixed
by the pile of rot that now seethed with the bodies of the roaches, busily
eating. She said abruptly, “Did you know that cockroaches are an important part
of the ecology of Earth?” She took a step closer.
Austin and
Carmita whispered together, “Don’t go any closer! They’re covered with
diseases!”
Paulina looked
up at them, laughed, “Not very often and the family appears to still be alive,
so the cockroaches haven’t killed them yet.”
Austin looked at
Carmita and said, “She LIKES cockroaches?”
Carmita shrugged
and said, “It is our great shame.”
Austin sighed
and went to the car, saying, “We don’t have any more time to waste. We have to
find Carlos.” He hopped in and started it, gesturing for the girls to join him.
Then with a spurt of gas, he sent them rolling and turned off the car. As they
went downhill, picking up speed, none of them had noticed that they had picked
up a few hitchhikers…
Names: ♂ Mexico, Mexico; ♂ Minnesota, Italy (= “baby in the woods”,
“foundling”); ♀ Spanish form
of French name ‘
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