The Fifteen Minute Novel is an attempt to take a single prompt and use the last sentence written each day as a start for the next day. This year I had several prompts circling around a similar story, so I have combined them. However, the story starts the same way each day, with the last line from the day before and a timer set for fifteen minutes. The hope is to end up with a complete, if very rough draft by the end of the year. Some stories are better than others, but I always learn a whole lot about my own writing when I do this so for me it is not only a nice way to work out a story, but it is a tool for helping my writing get better. And so, we continue this story for 2024 with…
Day 245: “That would be nice,” Sophie said. “Thank you for the time off.”
“That would be nice,” Sophie said. “Thank you for the time off.” As much as she appreciated their understanding, Sophie was glad when they left. It would have been awkward having her supervisor and boss in her apartment on any day, but on a morning when her apartment was trashed and she had been up since the wee hours due to the mailbox fire, it was a relief to have them gone.
Alec finished up her door repair and he and the building manager left. She closed and bolted her door and got down to the serious business of cleaning. She scrubbed down the kitchen. Sophie gathered and filled trash bags. She washed laundry and took bags down to the dumpster. When her bed lines were clean she remade the bed and then sat down to do some quick repairs on her couch cushions. Wanting to set everything right before she started sorting through the mess that was her sewing room, Sophie retrieved a small sewing kit and just stitched together the slashes, refilling the cushions as well as she could.
“I’ll make slipcovers later,” she promised herself. “Right now she just needed basic order. The cushions could sport Frankenstein stitches until she got around to the covers, she just couldn’t deal with their stuffing spread out across the living room instead of neatly contained inside them.
Sophie put her last load of laundry in the dryer and returned to the living room. She looked around to see if there was any more tidying to do. She moved to straighten some books when there was a knock at the door. Sophie moved to answer it and found Janine there holding a paper bag.
“I brought sandwiches,” she said. “And I came to see how you were doing.”
Sophie stepped aside and her stomach growled. “I suppose it is that time isn’t it.” She said. Janine walked in and looked around. The kitchen was clean and smelled like disinfectant. Before she sat down with the couch cushions she had scrubbed every surface. It had taken the worst of the condiment attack and had required the most elbow grease. Underneath the smell of the disinfectant there was still the slight smell of pickle brine and Sophie wondered how long that would last.
“I just hope I got all of the glass shards,” she mused. Janine sniffed.
“From the pickles?” she asked placing the bag on the clean and completely bare kitchen table.
Sophie nodded.
“It looks loads better, but a bit…baren?” Janine replied.
Sophie nodded again. All of the containers were broken, pasta, coffee grounds, the coffee pot too actually. Anything that was on the counter. So its clear I guess.”
“Your coffee pot got broken?” Janine asked.
“Yup,” Sophie replied. They both sat down and Janine took out the sandwiches. They both began to eat. “Not only was the glass carafe broken but the base of it was cracked in several places.”
Janine shook her head.
Ten til Midnight 