Writing Group: Round Robin 1

I love this book !

I am happy to say I have found a pretty cool local writing group here in Staten Island. We meet a couple of times each month and, even though we are a small group, it has been tons of fun to get together and share our fiction.

This weekend we decided to leap into another project as an experiment to see how we would do writing together. We are doing a "Round Robin" writing project. We picked a writing prompt, a word limit for each of us and gave each other deadlines to complete our part. Here is the general explanation:

The prompt: Your character starts receiving flowers and anonymous gifts. She doesn't know who is sending them. Her husband is suspicious, and the gifts begin to get stranger...

Your addition to the story must be between 100 and 300 words.

When we selected the order of the writers in the round robin, I got picked FIRST! I had the honor of starting this crazy project off.  I just finished my excerpt and shared it with the group, so the next writer can get started sooner rather than later. I am really excited to see where my story goes. I love this project!

I'd like to share my beginning entry with you. I'd also like to invite you to join the round robin on your blog (it would be loads of fun to see the different directions this beginning could take).

If You Want To Join The Fun

If you have a blog and you'd like to continue this story, go ahead. Follow the rules above (limit yourself to 100-300 words) and then post the link in the comments below. If you want to keep it going, ask your blog's readers to do the same in your post! We can follow along with the story as we hop from post to post!
 

The Story Begins Here... 

Lily couldn’t believe her husband was this romantic. She received four deliveries on her sick day, each with a note saying, “You deserve this.” When the lily arrived she was overwhelmed; Benny hadn’t bought her flowers in years. The two gifts that followed were funny. She showed Benny the evil eye pendant on Saturday saying she needed it for work. The watch that followed was a nod to Lily’s tardiness which drove Benny crazy. The last gift was adorable, even if it was confusing. It was a stuffed sheep.

Lily felt like they were dating again. She cuddled the fluff as she signed for it, smiling.

“Mrs. Venti,” the deliveryman stopped her from closing the door, “That’s a ewe.”

“A ewe?” Lily held back a giggle.

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“And?” she asked.

“That’s it,” he said with a shrug.

“Well - uh - thanks,” she said, giving him a sidelong glance while closing the door.

The phone rang. It was Benny, “Tell Miranda I don’t have time for her shit when I’m at work,” he said. Lily’s sister would’ve told her if she was messing with Benny; it was only fun when they were in on it together, but she didn’t want to let Benny in on that secret.

“What did you get today?” he asked.

She described her gifts, wondering what game Benny was playing.

After a moment he said, “Yeah. Well. I don’t get it.”

“Get what?”

“The message,” he said.

“Ben, what are you talking about?” Lily wanted in on his hijinks.

“This letter says your gifts are a message, but ‘Lily pendant watch ewe,’ doesn’t mean anything.”

Lily looked at the table where the gifts were laid out and felt hollow. This wasn’t funny, “The pendant’s an eye, Ben. The message is ‘Lily I watch you.’”

To Be Continued (by YOU!)...