The Same First Sentence: A Writing Challenge
I’m going to give you all a first sentence. The idea for this prompt came from my friend Pamela Painter, co-author of the classic craft-of-writing book What If?
Here you go:
“The neighbors were at it again.”
Directions: Set a timer for 5 minutes. Launch off with the open-ended first sentence, and see what happens. Don’t think, just write. For over-thinkers, try writing with a black screen or with your eyes closed. Don’t make the story about something obvious, such as hearing the neighbors having sex, as that would be predictable.
For extra points, write 3-5 stories launching off with this same first line. See how each of your stories turns out differently.
Feel free to post a story in the comments section, or else send along to me here (if you don’t want them to appear online). I will not be offering editorial feedback, but will enjoy reading what you came up with!
The neighbors were at it again. He was outside, she was inside, that's what we thought, but we hadn't seen her for months. The only way to know if she was dead or alive was to open their box of a house and look inside; with Schrödingers, you never knew without looking.
The neighbors were at it again, their voices drifting through the open windows of the charming 1950s row houses like the sweet, honeysuckle-scented breeze that stirred the gingham curtains. It was a scene as familiar as the old magnolia tree that stood sentinel in the yard, its branches reaching out to brush against the sunwashed clapboard siding.
"Darlin', that just ain't how Mama taught me to make a bed, I tell you what!" Luanne's voice was like honey poured over hot biscuits, slow and thick with the cadence of the South. She stood there, her hands resting on her hips, surveying the rumpled sheets like they were an unruly child in need of a good talking-to.
Tommy, his military bearing as crisp as his freshly pressed uniform, shook his head. "In the Army, we have a system. Neat corners, tight sheets, everything shipshape and in order."
Luanne let out a sigh that seemed to come from the very soles of her feet. "Shipshape? This look shipshape to you?" She plucked at the corner of the fitted sheet, which had popped free of the mattress like a wild horse breaking loose from its tether.
Tommy rubbed a hand over his face, the gesture of a man who knew he was fighting a losing battle. "Let's start over. I'll show you how it's done, the proper way."
And so began a tutorial in military precision, with Tommy barking out instructions like a drill sergeant facing down a fresh batch of recruits. Luanne, her eyes turned heavenward in a silent plea for patience, endured it all with the grace of a true Southern belle.
"Lordy mercy," she muttered, her voice as soft as the whisper of a breeze through the Spanish moss. "I shoulda known marryin' an Army man would mean takin' orders in my own bedroom."
But even as they bickered, their voices rising and falling like the ebb and flow of the nearby river, there was a tenderness that ran beneath it all. It was there in the way Tommy's eyes crinkled at the corners when Luanne's indignation reached a fever pitch, and in the way Luanne's lips twitched with a suppressed smile when Tom's military precision bordered on the absurd.
The neighbors, sipping their sweet tea on their front porches, just smiled and shook their heads. They knew the dance well, this push and pull between two hearts that beat as one, no matter how much they might quarrel over the state of their marriage bed.
And so it went, the sun climbing high into the cloudless Southern sky as Tommy and Luanne wrangled over hospital corners and the proper amount of fluff for a pillow. In the end, they found their compromise, as they always did - a little bit of military precision tempered by a whole lot of Southern charm.
As the screen door slammed shut behind them, the sound as familiar as the chirping of the crickets in the tall grass, the neighbors settled back into their rocking chairs, content in the knowledge that all was right in their little corner of the world. For in the heart of the South, where the tea was sweet and the love was sweeter still, even the smallest of battles could be won with a smile and a whole lot of grace.