Hey, let's write a story!
Our results will be better if many people participate.
Here are the rules:
1. Leave a comment with up to five sentences (and no more than five sentences in each comment) to continue the story. Your comment can be shorter than five sentences, too.
2. You can leave as many comments as you like, but someone else must comment in between each of your comments.
3. You cannot end the story.
Let's go! I'll start:
The Secret
Rose and Rita are twin sisters with a terrible secret, which they've sworn to never ever tell.
"I think I'm going to spill the beans, Rita," Rose declared.
"You'd better not!" Rita said. "It was 10 years ago on that cold, clear night that we promised to take the secret to our graves."
There was a knock at the door, and Rose rushed to answer it.
A teenaged boy shifted from foot to foot, two pizza boxes in his outstretched arms.
"Uh that's $20.00 ma'am," he said and rubbed his hands on his dirty jeans after he'd handed the boxes to Rose.
Rita handed him $25.00, anxious to be rid of the boy. She watched him get into a beat-up white Toyota with the Papa John's logo peeling off the passenger door.
She exhaled loudly before turning and shutting the front door softly behind her.
When Rose opened the door, there was no one there.
Rose closed the door and walked back to Rita.
"Who was there?" Rita asked.
"No one." Rose exclaimed.
Just then, the lights started to flicker.
A rush of cold air gusted in as she opened the door, adding to the nervous tension of the room.
For a moment, no one spoke as they all stared at one another.
Then- Rita broke the silence- "Oh, it's you- come on in, you're getting soaked."
woops...we posted at the same time
(we'll just roll with it).
"Who was at the door?" Rita asked.
"I don't know. I'm so confused."
"It's the pizza guy- here, I'll pay for the pizza, and you can get the tip."
As Rose handed over the money, Rita went to the kitchen for plates and sodas.
They sat down to eat, but neither were very hungry.
This was a conversation they had repeated often over the last 10 years.
The secret was getting heavier every year.
How much longer could it last.....the secret....the burden???
It had been long enough.....something had to give!
"Dang it, Rita! You know I hate mushrooms."
"I know," Rose giggled. "That reminds me ..."
"When we were still in college, I used to grow psychedelic mushrooms in my dorm," Rose reminisced.
"I ate some once and the pizza we had recently ordered started talking to me. He told me we could never reveal our secret to anyone, no matter how much it pained us," she continued.
"But this burden is one I doubt I can carry much longer," Rita pleaded.
Just then, Ted walked into the room.
"Are the two of you still here?" he asked nervously. "Remember what we agreed on.. you're supposed to be down at the dock in 10 minutes."
"Don't worry," said Rose. "Relax; it's all under control."
"I will not!" cried Ted, his voice rising. "You are the ones who got me into this. Do you realize what could happen if things go wrong?"
I.. uh... Rose stood up and waved her finger at Ted's nose.
"Don't you even THINK you're going to make this issue about YOU and what might go wrong for YOU," she growled.
"Calm down, you two," said Rita calmly, "we have to go right now, grab a slice of pizza for the road."
Ted locked the door behind them as they stood in the rain in front of the house.
Just then, lightning struck all three of them and killed them instantly!
"Wow! That was a close lightning strike! Rita? Rita!"
"What?" Rita mumbled.
"I thought we were all gonners," Ted whimpered.
"Quick, we better jump in the Mystery Machine and join Scoob and Shaggy over at Manson Mansion," exclaimed Tim.
"Good idea," said Rose as she discarded her lightning-burnt slice of pizza.
Rita thought to herself, "What will happen if the others find out about Shaggy and I?!"
But before they could get into the Mystery Machine, a sleek black limosine screeched to a halt.
Rita, Rose and Ted stared at the car as the rear door opened.
A voice boomed "Get in the car if you want salavation."
Ted looked at Rita and said....
"Should we take the red pill or the blue pill?"
Rita turned to Ted with a longing glance and pleaded with him to stay with her, knowing very well that Shaggy would also be waiting for her.
Rose knew in her heart what it would mean if they decided to join the anonymous one in the limo.
"Is this another one of your tricks?"
Rita only glared at him.
Rose glanced nervously from the limo to her sister and Ted.
"This could be the answer to all of our worries..." she started.
Just then a foot appeared from the limo and...
(Looks like we overlapped, Jeff....*chuckle*)
With a knowing look, Rita and Rose pushed Tim into the van and drove away from the limo.
They knew it would be a matter of seconds before the limo would be on their tail and the sisters had to get to the dock.
A package was arriving on the QE5 at 7:30. A very important package.
The man in the limo would just have to wait.
Rita glanced nervously in the rear-view mirror. "Call me paranoid," she said, "But is that Hummer 2 following us?"
"Damn it!" cried Rose, looking over her shoulder. "It's Rocco." She glared at Ted. "I thought you got rid of that problem yesterday! How did he find us again?"
"I don't know!!" whined Ted. When I left him and the hooker, I thought she'd do the job properly. He must have gotten away from her. I just hope she got rid of the gun before someone traces it."
Rosa and Rita looked at each other, panic rising in both of their chests. Rosa glanced at her watch. Only 2 minutes left to get to the dock...
Suddenly, something exploded beneath their van.
Meanwhile at the dock a tall, thin, greasy and wet looking stranger disembarks from the QE5 and holding what looks to be a rather weather beaten wooden box. Upon reaching the dock, he pushes the brim of his wide, black hat up just enough to peer with beady black eyes toward a set of bright lights coming toward him. Is it who he is expecting or....?
could it be his nemesis?
He glances down at his Hamilton watch and frowns.... 7:35 p.m. His contact is late. He's anxious to get rid of the box. The burden of keeping its contents safe has been exhausting.
The lights grow brighter and the vehicle slows down.
With his free hand he reaches into his pocket for his Glock.
The approaching car skids to the left, plunges off the dock and falls headlong into the water.
She then kicks off her heels and begins to tango with an invisible partner.
Invisble becasue Rita was in that bizarre place somewhere between death and life, a result of an explosion that had destroyed the van and took Rose and Tim's life and sent the van into the dirty harbor water - she was spared only because the bombmaker and been a professional and it took out only the driver and passenger.
The man in the brim hat knew this, and he had feared this would happen. He holstered his Glock, praying that someone had been in the back of the van and knowing that the evil hand of the ticking clock was against him.
"The limo will be here soon," he thought, "and then all of this, the package, the lives expired, the time and preparation will mean nothing."
Rita continued her dance with the muscular latin man of her dreams as her body was overtaken by the cold water and soon she may take that final plunge over the line into death.
Somewhere, off in the cold and dark distance, the man with the box heard a large dog howl.
As the man waited, the incessant howls easing nearer and nearer, he began to feel a familiar nagging sensation. "No, no, no! Not now!" he thought, crossing and uncrossing his legs. But it only became worse and worse. Why had he finished that Venti Latte at Starbucks! Why! Why!
The dog howling meant nothing to the man in the brimmed hat other than creating an ominous atmosphere to the already grim situation in front of him. The box was safe, for now, and he needed to get the sister out of there - Rita's head was visible through the carnage floating in the water.
He dove into the wretched harbor water, at one point a place for kids to swim when this city was nothing more than a pissant colonial outpst, and now a culmination of things he did not want to fathom.
He grabbed Rita as she sank dancing with her man into the murk, he felt the pulse and grabbed her out of there.
The limo was approaching now, and getting out of there with Rita and the box became paramount.
"And speaking of the box," he thought to himself," where did I put it down? I could swear I had it here with me before I dove into the murky water."
an pink plastic rhinocerous leans across to the gingerbread man and asks "are we in this story ?"
"no" comes the reply.
As Rita began to regain consciousness, her first thought was "now that rose is gone, no one will ever know our secret. no one will ever know what happened that night. the night we decided to lie about being homocidal republican lesbian lovers, and pretend to be twin sisters..."
(*disclaimer-not that being republican or a lesbian are bad things )
Rita started to panic and tried her best to cry out into the darkness, "Rose, my sister, where are you?"
She slowly opened her eyes and realized where she was.
After laughing about the mushrooms she used to grow in college, she had bumped her head on the ceiling fan and was knocked out cold.
Rose was slapping her face, trying to help her back into consciousness. Ted was silently reading the paper in the corner.
A ratty old copy of Screw was hardly appropriate reading material for a man of Ted’s means but damn it, where else could he find another hooker assasin; should have gone with a tranny, he grumbled under his breath.
“…..TED are you deaf! I SAID, get me a damp wash cloth, stuff it with ice, she’s startin’ ta bruise” Rose spat. Not one to pass up a legitimate reason to smack her sister/lesbian/lover, Rose took one more good swat, knocking loose a pink plastic rhinoceros barrette which Ted crushed on his way to the kitchen, destroying the hidden micro transmitter within.
“Crap, we lost audio, this could set us back a month” whined the eavesdropping teenager sporting a Papa John’s shirt from the panel van around the corner.
“TED!….grab me another slice while yer at it.”
Suddenly, Rita felt the room spinning and she closed her eyes again.
"She has moments of lucidity," the doctor was saying behind the two-way mirror.
"Does she ever talk about the night of the accident?" the stranger asked.
"No, I don't think she remembers – usually she is babbling on about mushrooms on her pizza."
The stranger smiled, knowing the box, its contents and the dark secret between sisters was safe ... for now.
Darkness is falling upon the foggy-breathed harbor. On the horizon where the choppy waves meet the dying sun, a small shape is silhouetted in the last sherbet orange rays. A solitary black box with contents even Pandora could not fathom begins a new journey...one that could fulfill its destiny.
Meanwhile, as the secret-filled box headed out to sea, Rose – who wasn't sure if her sister Rita and Ted had survived the wreck – was regaining consciousness on a tiny desert island.
The little-known Zamborga Current had swept her from the depths of the harbor and miles from shore.
"That bomb under the van – it came close to killing me ... I bet it was designed to take out the driver and front passenger ... I know Rita was trying to kill me."
Rose looked at her surroundings and saw next to nothing of use. Although she felt like someone was watching her ...
Rose stood behind a thick palm tree and watched Rita cough and stir on the sandy beach. Drat - Rita survived the explosion.
Ten years ago the tall, thin, man with the wide, black hat and beady black eyes cloned Rose with revolutionary technology. Although Rose and Rita are identical twins, Rose carried a specific gene that held secret ingrediant to cure all of the world's ailments.
Rita was born with its antithesis - a gene that, if copied and harvested, could kill the world's mammalian population in 7 days. That's why, although it pains Rose, she and others are trying to kill Rita and eliminate this threat to the world.
But now the beady eyed assassin has confused the sisters... attempting to save Rita because he believes that Rita is Rose and Rose is Rita .....
Whoever she is, the woman on the beach decides to take stock of the island.
There seem to be plenty of coconuts, some pineapples and even a mango tree – that "Under the Mango Tree" song comes to mind – but she's not hungry.
Walking along, looking at the trees, she inadvertently steps into a pit of quicksand and gets stuck. Sweat drips from her forehead, stinging her eyes and making her dizzy.
Will her sister come to her rescue?
Just then, a scantily clad man came swinging on a vine to land right in front of her. He acted like a monkey but looked like an Adonis.
"Please help me!" she cried. "ooo ooo ahhhh," said the hunky mystery man.
As quickly as it had flashed before her eyes, the mirage of a Tarzan-like rescue shimmered and melted into the steamy heat arising from the sun-baked ground. Drawing on all her remaining strength, Rose claws her way towards a jungle vine lying tantalizingly near. Her fingers dig tiny rivlets of water through the sand, desperately seeking a hold. With a final lunge, success is hers!
"Hey, Scoob, do you see Rita – or Rose – or whoever it is? I think Daphne was right, they've got to be here somewhere!"
"(doggy voice) Watch out, Shaggy, it's a Tarzan-man!"
The Tarzan-man looked at them and scowled, sneering "Dang meddling kids, if it weren't for you I'd have gotten away with it." Then he vaporized.