Louise tossed her glasses down on the table and massaged her aching head with tense fingers. How long had she been sitting here, trying to make the words come? Long enough for the tea she had made to be cold and bitter, at least. The rain made watching the passage of the sun impossible, and she had left her phone in her bedroom.
Coming up here to her grandmother’s farmhouse was supposed to solve everything. No distractions, plenty of open spaces and quiet, the perfect place to let the creative springs flow. Except they weren’t. She sighed. Maybe she should just face it; she was a one-hit-wonder. Writers could have hits, too, right? Maybe that one idea was a fluke, and she’d never have another.
She passed her hands over her face and glared at the notebook through splayed fingers. Wait, that key hadn’t been there before. She glanced around suspiciously, and hurriedly rose to check both corners of the porch for intruders. No one was there, and she laughed at herself. No one could have been on the porch without making the old boards creak just like they were doing under her own feet. But that key. Where could it have come from?
She sank back down onto the woven seat of the old straight backed chair. Slowly she picked up the old-fashioned bit of iron and twirled it between thumb and forefinger. An idea trickled into her mind, the barest beginning of something, but it was a beginning. She dropped the key to reach for her pen, then paused in consternation. What was it again? Of course, the one idea she’d had was gone just that fast. She picked up the key again, and her mind flooded with story. She stared with open mouth for a moment, then shoved the key into her other hand and snatched up her pen again. This was going to be a good one.
The Word Worker 