Gateways
A series of story-starters — just a couple sentences each. Come through the gates with me, bring your imagination. I’ll save last gate for you. ~~ FOUR MINUTES
Story-Starters with the prompt “GATEWAYS”
Jerome pushed open the rusting iron gate and found that it opened onto nothing but a solid stone wall with no way out. It called to his mind the never-ending obstruction that was the woman he’d called “Mother”.
Marley stepped through the Wobblewood gate and closed it quietly behind her. She tiptoed across the ragged field, and there she found a vole, a flop-eared rabbit and a hedgehog, all members of her own secret tribe.
They pleaded with her over and over again, to come through their gate, They said it was the only True way. She didn’t believe that nonsense. Turned out she was right.
Jeannie passes through the gate — the cemetery gate, every day on her way to work and back. She feels welcome there, walking among the ghosts and stones, the marble angels and mossy crosses. She’s found a kind of comfort in communing with the restless spirits of her ancestors.
The gate said " PRIVATE”, but he didn’t care; he just jumped over. He took a few steps in, he looked up and he froze. Not turning, he backed out very slowly, retracing his footprints. He had seen his face reflected in a large round mirror that hung from a sky-hook. What could it mean?
“This gate has no purpose whatsoever,” she said. “It’s useless, just like my life…” She’s right about that silly gate, of course, but she is far too young to judge the worth of her one precious life.
I finally made it back again to this Gate. I waited so many years to be given a second chance. It’s exactly as I remember it, but this time, I remembered to bring with me the key.
Just inside the gate are cypress trees, an olive grove, a vineyard. There is a rustic farm house with a bed and a chair. There is no internet. If this is Heaven, then I welcome my death.
Your turn! Please enter this gate and write a short story-starter and put it in the comments.
How sad for them whose way is blocked,
by fence and gate, by rusty lock.
Access denied, forest and stream,
a meadow nap, a summer dream.
Ooo, Sharron. I LOVE number 2 and 5 in particular. Here's my response to your prompt.
It seemed like a playful gate, with its peaked “roof” over the half barrel-shaped lintel, bounded on left and right by wings. There was a road crossing close behind the gate: a choice of two directions, left or right, but brambles with thorns blocked the way straight ahead into the country. Outside the gate, golden trees stood as noble standards, left and right. However, the trees beyond the gate were gray and some bare of leaves. For all its playfulness, it seemed a false invitation to levity. And indeed, the rusty lock on the chain which slithered through the bars of the gate was intended to keep me out. But I in my ghostly form, walked right in.