Sept 23, 2016

Dear Diary,

Hello, I guess. Jesus, this is stupid.

I always felt that writing in a diary was pretty much the most self-absorbed, idiotic thing anyone could do, and even more ridiculous to address it as “Diary," but here we are.

Iʼm not sure what Iʼm supposed to put in this thing. I don't know what the weather is like outside.

I smell like a 14-year-old boy whoʼs wearing Brute and forgot to shower this year.

I like puppies and long walks on the beach.

Roses are red

Violets are blue

I love no one

Hell, whatever. At least I have something to do now.

I guess if Iʼm going to sit here and scribble with a crayon, I might as well use the opportunity to its capacity.

So, Diary, my name is James. I live in this chickʼs basement now, unfortunately, and she gave you to me and told me to use you to "think about what I've done and explore myself."

Her name is Amy. I'm pretty sure sheʼs going to read this, so let me emphasize to you now that sheʼs just a swell person. It also just dawned on me that Iʼm writing with a crayon, which means I canʼt edit or erase. I hope she can understand that Iʼm not very good at this diary thing and forgive my frustrations.

I hear her coming. Be right back.

Okay, back. Yep. Sheʼs going to read you everyday and counsel me through my issues because sheʼs a wonderful, caring woman with my best interest at heart, and she knows I need her help.

First assignment is apparently to explain why Iʼm here and "how our actions result in consequences." Due tomorrow night at 6 p.m.

Gonna sleep now, Diary. This should be fun.

• • •

September 24, 2016

Dear Darla,

Diary, I've decided to change your name to Darla because why not. Itʼs better than Diary, and you're hot pink, so I thought Darla would suit you.

"Why Iʼm Here and How Our Actions Result in Consequences"

I am here because Amy thinks Iʼm dangerous. Amy told me that she knew I was going to rape and murder her and dump her body in an empty field somewhere, so Iʼm here to learn to keep my hands to myself.

I need to show Amy that this was not my intention at all. I tried to tell Amy that I think sheʼs an amazing cellist, and that listening to her play at The Vine was one of the most intriguing experiences of my life. I told her she was beautiful, and I meant that. I told her that I wasnʼt stalking her. I swear. I was working up the courage to ask her out.

I told her I was sorry for following her to work and watching her on the bus, but I promise I never meant to scare her.

But she didnʼt believe me, Darla. I understand why, but I need her to realize that I wonʼt hurt her. She doesnʼt have to use the gun when she brings me food. She can stay and talk to me if she wants. Iʼm not going to try to leave. Iʼm not going to harm her in anyway.

Darla, sheʼs a counselor, so I know she'll see that Iʼm not bad. She can read people. Sheʼs obviously a brilliant lady.

Talk tomorrow,

James

• • •

September 25, 2016

All right, then. She doesnʼt like your name, so you no longer have one. Sorry about that.

She also doesnʼt like the fact that I tried to use you to con her, and I can appreciate that. She said I should direct questions or comments meant for her, to her. I didnʼt mean it as a con. I do hope she knows that I was being honest. It doesnʼt help to share with someone if they wonʼt listen to a word you say. Thatʼs why I wrote it here. I thought maybe if she read it, it would be easier for her to hear. I know I scared her. Itʼs hard to listen when you're afraid.

So I have to write feelings in here. And I have to answer the consequences question. I forgot about that yesterday, so I'll do it first.

The only understanding I can share concerning consequences is that when we do something, something else happens to balance the action. If you do a bad thing, bad things happen. If you do a good thing, good things happen. I have no idea how to put it into better words. Thatʼs going to have to be okay.

As far as feelings are concerned,

I feel sorry for what I did.

I feel hungry.

I feel tired.

I feel like Amy misunderstood me.

I feel like I wish I hadnʼt followed her.

I still think sheʼs beautiful.

Good night, hot pink book.

• • •

September 26, 2016

Amy says if I donʼt expose my true intentions, I will never leave. She says she doesnʼt like my thoughts on consequences, and she thinks my understanding of them is probably why I've gotten myself into this situation.

Itʼs been eight days in this basement, and I feel like Iʼm losing my mind. I donʼt even know what time it is. Thereʼs usually a window or something in a cellar, but I donʼt see one. I canʼt search around because of the chain.

Iʼm scared now. Amy isnʼt frightening, but I am afraid I donʼt have the right answers for her. I've tried to explain myself so many times, but I feel like maybe sheʼs still afraid. She doesnʼt have to be.

The casserole she brought me last night was good. It really was. I know I should hate her, but sheʼs a great cook and sheʼs taking the best care of me she can in this situation.

Last night I yelled at her, and I feel sorry for that. Sheʼs not a bitch. My eyes still burn from the mace, and I understand that I deserved it. I shouldnʼt have jumped at her. I shouldnʼt have screamed. I was stupid.

I just need her to believe me. I need her to understand that I mean what I say when I say it. I wasnʼt going to rape her. I wasnʼt going to kill her or torture her or dump her anywhere. I really only wanted to get to know her.

I guess I got what I wanted. I shouldnʼt have been so shy.

• • •

September 27, 2016

Nothing I say hasnʼt any impact on her, Diary. Nothing. She doesnʼt believe me. She says Iʼm in denial. She says Iʼm creating an identity to justify my actions, and I need to look harder.

She says I need to dive deep into my psyche and fish out the demons.

Maybe sheʼs right. Maybe there was part of me that wanted to hurt her. Maybe I did plan to rape her. I would never have killed her, but maybe she was just so out of my league I couldnʼt have asked her out, and it would have been easier just to force myself on her.

Maybe Iʼm sick? I think I did need her help after all.

I wish sheʼd leave the gun upstairs. I wish she wouldnʼt pour cold water on me in the mornings. I wish sheʼd loosen these shackles.

I feel afraid.

I feel pain.

I miss my dog.

I feel disappointed in myself for being a monster.

I feel grateful for Amyʼs help.

• • •

September 28, 2016

Dear Diary,

She wants to know my intentions. I told her. She doesnʼt care.

She wants to know how I got here. She put me here. Thatʼs how I fucking got here.

She thinks Iʼm in denial? Maybe sheʼs in denial. I wonder if sheʼs ever considered that, diary.

If I could just kill myself now and get this over with, I would.

I feel hopeless.

I feel alone.

I feel like I can say or do nothing right.

• • •

Not good enough, not good enough, not good enough.

Fuck you.

• • •

September 30, 2016

Dear Amy,

You know what? You want to know my intentions? You want me to expel my devils onto this ridiculous notebook?

You were right, bitch. I was going to rape you. I followed you into that alley with the sole purpose of slamming your head into the brick wall until you passed out.

I followed you for two weeks, Amy, but Iʼm sure you are aware of that. I knew where you were each second of every day. I watched you undress through your bedroom window. I watched you feed that dumbass cat. I watched you check your mailbox at 5:30 every morning.

I saw it all. I know everything about you. No boyfriend. Dead mom. Runaway father. Pathetic job at the high school. Iʼm sure theyʼd love to know they have a deranged slut chit-chatting with their behaviorally challenged students.

I parked my van around the corner behind the school. I was going to shove you through the back doors and take you for a long ride, you psychotic cunt.

I have this nice little cabin outside the city, and was going to take you there for vacation. Show you a good time. Then when I was done, I was going to cut you up into tiny pieces and feed you to my dogs.

Is that what you want to hear? Huh?

Why?

I donʼt know. Because you looked weak playing your cello. You looked like you needed me. You looked soft. You looked like youʼd been alive for way too long. You're disgusting. Whore.

You want to know what I understand about consequences?

I understand that I should've done it sooner. I should've killed you the first night I saw you.

Your soup last night tasted like horse piss. It made me vomit.

Why donʼt you just go ahead and get rid of me now? Because I promise you when I get free, you're going to regret ever being alive.

I feel NOTHING.

• • •

October 1, 2016

Dear James,

Good job. When you can open a line to your true feelings and understand your intentions, only then will you begin to grow.

I knew about the van, James. I didnʼt know about the cabin, but thank you for being honest with me. I agree with you that the cat is stupid.

I understand that you're angry and frustrated, so I will forgive your rude comment about my soup.

I really think we're getting somewhere, James. Iʼm proud of you.

Your next assignment will be a series, and unit one is:

"Letting Go of the Ego: Who are You?”

See you this evening, James.

Best Wishes,

Amy

These walls hear dreams.

As one goes, white noise follows

Into these rooms, and it reverberates

From ceiling to

Corner and corner and

Back again.

Louder, it grows

As notes add on.

In the bare brush of feet

Along this carpet,

In the faint strains

Of this song or another,

In the cracking of these

Sore knuckles,

In the pre-recorded applause

Of late night with

Insert name here,

In the rustle of weight

Shifting and sheets moving,

In the bangs of falling things

And muffled curses from

Hurting others,

In the clicking of a pen

And the jingle of

Keys,

In the rush of a door

Slam shaking the foundation,

In the scraping of a fork 

And drip of 

A leaky faucet,

In the riotous laughter

Outnumbered by the 

Soft pull of tissues

From a box,

Collectively it is the whole of

An existence.

Decipher the static and

All you will hear

Is a life, in these

Small sounds.

I lay down ready for sleep. Closed eyes. Tucked in. Silence. And then...

Thoughts race through my mind growing louder and louder. An awkward encounter, a typical encounter, with a coworker replays over and over. Alternative versions of conversations and interactions - choose your own adventure. Projects that need to be completed, prioritized, reorganized. Grocery list for the weekend, planing meals. Philosophical thoughts about love, life, happiness and death.

Can silence exist when I feel so loud and chaotic?

Independence is the most sacred myth of our people. We worship the idea that we can transcend the needs of our bodies and souls, transcend each other, depend upon no one and nothing. To be Independent is to be unmoved, unfazed, uncontrolled. Independence is a form of power that relies upon disentanglement and disengagement.

We are a proud people. We are a harsh people. Many of us sacrifice our gentleness in pursuit of this elusive Independence. Empathy dies on the altar of Independence: the price for compromising our supposed escape from suffering.

I come to you today in the hopes that this myth has not polluted your culture as well. Learn from us, and do not follow our example. Do not believe yourselves so grand that you would stand to benefit from our destruction -- for the only true Independence is death. Let us instead revere harmony, solidarity, and the absolute vibrancy of life; our intertwined fates depend upon it.

#ProseChallenge #SciFi #exceptionalism #americanmythos #empathy 

Greetings, Prosers,

As we announced last week, Z is busy with coding more special stuff for the Prose Collections and has been unable to answer the team Tuesday questions.

But fear not! Last week we introduced our new ongoing in-app piece: Two for Tuesday.

What we intend to do is bring two things to your attention each Tuesday, as the name would suggest.

These could be poems, stories, Prosers (new, existing or here from the beginning) or a mixture of all of them. As we get bigger and bigger, we want to keep the communication fluid and the transparency continuous; as well as draw attention to parts of, or people within this lovely writing community of ours.

There is so much talent on Prose, so the more we can draw your collective attention to them, the better. Which is why we have recently launched the Introduction Portal where new Prosers can, well, introduce themselves. This is so that we all get to welcome them and support them. If you haven’t already, step up and say hi. If you’ve already said hi, go and welcome the people who are introducing themselves. You know you want to.

So, without further ado, let’s get to this week’s Two for Tuesday, which is about two things you didn’t know about Prose. Until this very second, these two tidbits were top-secret but ever the transparent bunch, we thought you might like to hear these.

Prose, as I’m sure you have all witnessed is growing at a huge rate, and the time that is spent on the site and app has obviously increased. You guys have collectively spent 417,452 minutes on Prose in the last 28 days. That’s almost seven thousand hours of reading and writing collectively, a huge amount of wordplay there, we’re sure you’ll agree.

We had a Proser ask us which countries Prose is available in so as to help us reach even more word lovers. Prose is available everywhere, there isn’t anywhere we block from accessing our network. We had a look into all of the data we have to find out how many places were accessing Prose, and we were blown away! 160 countries access Prose, which is flipping awesome! Little side note, there are 196 countries (if you include Taiwan, some places don’t) therefore we are 36 countries away from world domination, * evil happy snigger. *

So, the next time you use Prose, remember that your words are being etched all across the world, quite literally.

Until next Tuesday,

Prose.

Good Afternoon, Prosers, 

Most of you will have seen our Copperplate announcement, and no doubt some of you will be left feeling slightly disappointed by the lack of a short fiction result. 

This decision wasn't taken lightly at all. It was one of the most difficult decisions we have had to make as a team, and it was based on the judges' advice. 

However, we want to push you, we want you to strive to keep challenging yourselves harder than ever before as writers. It is with this in mind, that we are rolling over the short fiction challenge and extending it for another two months. All is not lost. At all. 

We had four judging criteria for you, and that was what the judges were marking against when it came to your entries; Fire, form, content, and creative edge. The judges were also looking at the grammatical standards of your pieces, along with formatting. Formatting a piece of fiction correctly is probably one of the biggest challenges a fiction writer has. If you don't get it right, a reader's eyes will be underwhelmed before reading a single word. 

With this being said, here is a new challenge prompt, same prizes as before, and same judging criteria: 

The Copperplate Awards | Short fiction round two. 

As part of our annual writing challenge powered by Prose we are giving the Short Fiction entrants a second chance to wow us. First place winners are blessed with $500 and an iPad, plus bragging rights of being a Copperplate Award Winner! Submissions are evaluated by Prose and a trusted panel of judges based on form, fire, content, and creative edge.

Write a piece of short fiction where a lie is unearthed. Judges will also pay particular attention to grammar, spelling, and formatting.

**For previous challenge entrants: you are welcome to resubmit your previous entry with edits.  

This is your chance to shine, so show us what you're made of. 

Until next time, 

Prose. 

Morning, Prosers! 

We’d like to apologise for our tardiness in dragging our heels when it comes to informing you all; but the judges have now deliberated and we are ready to announce the results. \

First, let’s take a look at the original prompt that we set back in November: 

Write about the subject of TEMPTATION and submit your entry for ONE of the categories to be considered. Tag the category for which you are submitting in your entry (#poetry, #shortfiction, #creativenonfiction).

Submissions will be evaluated by Prose and a trusted panel of judges based on form, content, fire, and creative edge. 

We had a resounding response from all of you, hence the delay in this announcement. We couldn’t be more stoked that so many of you participated. You always do us proud. 

We set this challenge around three writing categories: Poetry, Short Fiction, and Creative Non Fiction. The most popular category being poetry, followed closely by short fiction. 

The judges’ feedback was of their sheer happiness that there were so many entries, with such differing content. New Prosers and old-timers alike.

Winners have been chosen for the Poetry and Non Fiction categories, however the judges felt the entries under the Short Fiction category didn’t quite fulfil the brief. With that being said, the Short Fiction category will roll-over to the next Copperplate challenge. 

Let’s get on with what you have all been waiting for, the winners. 

Poetry:

Some beautiful entries here, with the craft being proven to be undead.

The runner-up for her beautiful poem, “Lucifer,” @paintingskies, congratulations Sam, this is well deserved. Your writerly swag will be sent to you shortly, we will be in touch!

The winner for the poem “| Sollicitatio Venditatae |” is @another_proser, congratulations Remmy, this is your finest piece to date. You are the winner of $500 and an iPad, we will be in touch with you to arrange transfer of winnings. 

Non Fiction:

The judges had a great time reading these pieces, Creative Non Fiction lives on!

The runner-up for their piece “The things you never wanted to learn” is @Fart. Congratulations to you, your writerly swag will be sent your way soon!

The winner, with their piece “Temptation Surrenders to Experience” is @MEsolushospes, congratulations, your piece has won you $500 and an iPad! We will be in touch soon, congratulations! We still want to know if the person in your piece is you, wink wink. 

So, that’s it for the first Copperplate Awards. Congratulations to you all. Stay tuned for the next yearly award. In the meantime, if you fancy a challenge, don’t forget the Prose Challenge of the Week, running every Monday with cash prizes.

Thank you to everyone here who continues to support Prose and its mission to empower readers and writers. Without you guys, we would cease to exist. You all continue to prove to the world that good writing matters more than ever. 

 Until next time, Prosers, keep writing! 

 Prose.