We’re back for another week of Friday Fictioneers. Thank you, Rochelle! If you’d like to join in, click on the link. And here we go…..
PHOTO PROMPT © Jean L. Hays
The Song of the Living
Someone whistles an almost forgotten song as evening falls in the camp. Gigi wonders how anyone can possess music, much less whistle, here, knowing what they know.
Then she sees it’s him, the smirking one, the one who laughs when the rest cry. She glares at him. He chuckles.
She can’t stand it anymore. “How can you be so happy when the world is dying around us, and we’re stuck behind barbed wire?”
“Is crying the answer? Curling up in a ball? Only if you want to give up.”
“I don’t.”
“Then live confidently, Princess. It confuses the tyrants.”
end
Sascha Darlington
The song being whistled:
It confuses the tyrants……now true. When nothing can solve\alter the situation it is better to adjust and live. good story
https://ideasolsi65.blogspot.com/2019/05/barbed-fence.html
Wonderful first paragraph. It creates setting, mood and intrigue
A valuable lesson in how to show defiance. Nicely done.
Oh yes, the power of positive thought. Excellent.
‘Retribution’, my short story.
Thank you, Keith!
Dry grasslands, ambling wind, not many people or creatures around, whistling; it’s so many art forms coming together to create the most beautiful art: life. 🙂
Thank you for reading! 🙂
Send him my way. He sounds like my kind of guy!
lol…….if I ever meet him in real life, I will do just that. 🙂
Sweet of you…
Of course….I know you’d do the same for me. 😉
Absolutely!
I love the last line. Never let them see you cry
Dear Sascha,
Wonderfully evocative story. I love his attitude and defiance.
Shalom,
Rochelle
Thank you, Rochelle.
I hope that your trip is wonderful! 🙂
He definitely has a point. Maybe their world needs more like him.
Thanks so much!
Easier said than done. Tyrants like to hit people who smirk.
I did not know this. 🙂
thanks for reading!
As Neil says, it’s a brilliant opening sentence. More than that though, it’s a great metaphor for life itself. We don’t (quite) live in a dystopia (yet), but for most people life has a lot of trials and a great deal of drudgery. Song, and music generally, is an excellent antidote, and can certainly represent defiant optimism.
Thank you so much for your comment, Penny. I hope that we never get to find out what it’s like to live in a dystopia.
I love how you first present him as a bit of “cad” then change our minds to show that he is the strong one. A leader. Well done
Thank you so much, Alicia! 🙂
I think he’s right. That’s a good philosophy when there’s nothing else. Surviving is important. A good, well-written story, Sasha. —- Suzanne
Thank you so much, Suzanne! 🙂
Why cry indeed. Lovely write. I love that song, too.
Thank you so much! 🙂
You got it.