IDEAS ON TUESDAYS 486

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. Regarding Fantasy, this insight was startling: “I see the fantasy genre as an ever-shifting metaphor for life in this world, an innocuous medium that allows the author to examine difficult, even controversial, subjects with impunity. Honor, religion, politics, nobility, integrity, greed—we’ve an endless list of ideals to be dissected and explored. And maybe learned from.” – Melissa McPhail.

F Trope: hunter hunts Humans
Current Event: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/12/AR2011011204703.html

In a world with seven billion people, there aren’t many frontiers left. There aren’t places for people who want to “make their lives meaningful” to go. There’s no ground to break.

This is what Behiye Ozan’s parents think. Emigrated from Turkey, they came to the US to start a new life. It happened, but that life included them living in a crappy apartment in a crappy neighborhood and her going to a crappy school.

She wants something better. She joined the basketball team, but the team is so bad, it’s a city-wide laughingstock. She tried theater and choir with the same result. Now it’s her senior year and the only college she’s liable to go to – despite her straight-A average and being captain of both the basketball team and the lead in the spring play, ANTIGONE, there’s simply no money for her to go. The economy is bad and she’s desperate.

While taking the bus home from school, she gets off at the corner store, a health food and natural food place. She tried to get a job there once, but they weren’t hiring. In front of the door is a wide cylinder with corkboard on it where it seems everyone in the neighborhood staples, tapes, or nails posters.

Waiting for her next bus, she notices a small, white note card near the bottom of the riotously colored cylinder. On it, in block letters, are the words, “Feel Hunted?”

She blinks in surprised – she’s NEVER felt hunted. NEVER had the feeling anyone wanted her, not even her parents. What would it be like to have someone after her, intent on finding her, WANTING to catch her?

She squats down and reads, “FEEL HUNTED? I am a wizard in search of a quarry. To pass into the next level of wizardry, I must find a person whose sole purpose is to hide form me. I will use no black magic, only Earth magic. If you are interested, email me at earthsyoungwizard@gmail.com”

She takes the card from the cylinder. It seems to cling to the surface, but with a tug, it comes free. Behiye pulled out her cellphone as the bus arrived and she absently got on, staring at the cellphone screen. As the doors snapped closed behind her, she sat down in her usual seat, typed, “I’d be interested”, entered the address – and sent it…

Names: ♀ Turkey (both)

Image: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/98/71/e5/9871e52bbc09c525af21b8f6471eab15.jpg