Stretch: The Alley
Stretch: The Alley
Writing Exercise #35
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Stretch: I wanted to use “sleazy back alley” as a setting
When his phone buzzed, he almost leapt across the room to check it. New texts in his group chat.
anyone free to hang? T-minus-one week, one last hurrah. whose in???
It was Lenny, he was usually the party-starter. One more week before their senior year of undergrad began. The replies were rolling in from the others in the group before Mark could tap out a “hell yes!”
Mark was out the door in two minutes, in the warm late-summer glow of New Landon. He started walking as all the details trickled in. Meet at the Memorial Park, Lenny’s got his dads car for the weekend, drive around and just hang out. Usually “hang out” meant eventually they would end up at a bar. Mark didn’t mind.
He was lost in thought making his way through the labyrinthine streets. He looked up when his phone buzzed.
Mark where r u
He tapped out a quick “Omw” and then looked around. This was an unfamiliar part of town. How did he get here? He’d lived in New Landon for almost four years and had never gotten lost like this.
He looked around, trying to get his bearings. Across the street, between two buildings, was an alley. The alley was dark—unusually dark for this time of day. Mark was transfixed. Something told him he needed to be there. Something told him it was important.
We comin 2 u send us location
The phone broke his trance, and Mark shook his head. He tapped out the location and looked around. The alley wasn’t there.
= = =
Mark stumbled out of the bar. Lenny and the others stumbled out behind him, laughing. It was 2am. Time had no meaning—from the moment Lenny pulled up in his red convertible, Mark was awash in the tide of life. Laughing, drinking, wandering. Faintly, drunkenly, Mark looked back on his friends and felt something. Happy? He was happy. These would be his friends for the rest of his life. He made a resolution, in his mind. These were his people.
“Hey Mark we’re goin’ back to the Memorial park. You wanna come with?”
“Nah, I gotta get home. I don’t live too far.”
“A’ight man we’ll catch you later bro.”
Mark said his goodbyes and started to walk home. He figured it would help to walk off some of the drinks.
He rounded a corner, and then he had that strange feeling—the feeling of being lost. He looked around. There it was—that strange alley. In the middle of the night, it was now abyssal-dark. That feeling that there was something important about it permeated through him.
He walked towards it, across the empty street. What is this?
In the distance, tires squealed. Bright headlights swerved across the street, careening fast and loud down the city blocks.
A cat ran across the street—the car swerved to avoid it, it careened left, fishtailed right, the headlights started heading towards him.
The last Mark saw was the front of a red convertible.
(506 words)
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Have you ever lived in a big city?
Do you have a favorite memory of college tom-foolery?
What do you like to drink if/when you go to a bar?
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Well, that's unfortunate. Heck of a way to end a party. (or heaven of a way, depending on the state of Mark's soul at time of impact I suppose).
1. Not even close; I've mostly ever lived on the outskirts of medium-sized ones: Louisville and Frankfort Kentucky, mainly. Louisville's the biggest city in Kentucky, and even then it's got a small-big-city feel to it and I've never lived downtown.
2. ... there was the time I went to an academic conference in Kalamazoo and we were at a banquet and the students next to us accidentally set the table on fire. Also I managed to use Rebecca Black's Friday as an extended metaphor for Iceland's relationship and/or involvement with the European Union. TOMFOOLERY.
3. Mello Yello and/or Mountain Dew. .... I don't get out much.
I really liked this response to the prompt- have had a few surreal experiences on strange roads and alleyways over the years-fortunately never as unfortunate as Mark!
1. Only on the outskirts of big cities and in little neighborhoods of medium/small cities. I feel very out of place in big cities though I used to enjoy visiting them.
2. Too much crazy shit to pick just one…in college in the early 70s 🥴
3. Used to like these shots called kamakazies, dark beer, vodka foo-foo drinks that fooled you into thinking they were nothing more than soda pop or fruit smoothies. Ah, the good old days. Pretty much the occasional glass of wine these days.