So I visited a different writing group tonight and they gave us a writing prompt.

It had to include two sentences and start with the words “The bloody…” I capitalized those sentences and took some liberties on the second one rearranging its structure though the spirit of it is still there, at least IMO.

Enjoy this twisted mess…

The bloody tampon wouldn’t go down. She flushed it several more times and still, the damn thing kept bobbing back up. Another heavy pounding struck the outside of the restroom. Alisa felt another shiver fizzle down her spine.

She heard a man’s voice calling out from the far side of the door. It was a man’s voice she recognized. “Hey buddy, it looks like she’s going to be a while, I’m sure she’s going to be out soon enough. No need to make a scene.”

A huskier voice answered her mother’s boyfriend. It was sounded in a volume loud enough for everyone to hear, “If she doesn’t get out of there and quickly there’s going to be a scene.”

Alisa looked over and into the toilet again. The used tampon seemed to look back up at her with a sadistic grin on its bloodied face. She contemplated reaching her hand down and plucking the fucker out of the bowl and tossing it into the trash receptacle but the sight of the caked on feces the string had wrapped itself around was still too much for her stomach just yet.

She heard her mother’s boyfriends voice just outside the door, “Hey Alisa, you okay in there?” Not waiting for an answer, “Any chance you can hurry up in there?” He then spoke in a softer tone, “She just turned thirteen last week.”

Alisa’s gaze bounced between the door, the empty paper towel dispenser, and feces covered tampon. She mumbled out, “Almost done.”

The heavy fist of the man needing to relieve himself pounded upon the door once more.

Her eyes darted once more, as if in slow motion, between the tampon and the trashcan. She felt her life being defined by this moment, as if somehow her actions here and now would forever alter her path upon life. She stepped over to the bowl and tried to push the thought of what she was about to do out of her mind.

Her mind thought of the movie she had seen just weeks ago during her history class when they had the substitute teacher. As most subs tend to do, he let them watch a movie, the movie was Saving Private Ryan. She recalled how when the soldiers were on the beach under fire from the German’s, how time seemed to slow down as if everything had extra meaning. She realized in that exact moment how LIFE SEEMS TO SHRINK OR EXPAND IN PROPORTION TO ONES COURAGE.

Thinking no further she thrust her hand down into the bowl. She grabbed the bloodied end of the tampon not caught in the feces and pulled it out of the bowl. As if avoiding gunfire, she bound herself towards the trashcan and dropped the tampon within as if was some grenade being tossed within a German Bunker.

He exhaled and it was then that she noticed the slappy brown mess that had been created against her forearm from the string.

She let out a shriek of terror.

Alan called out, “Alisa! What’s wrong?”

She darted towards the sink and couldn’t turn on the water fast enough. The sink was one of those that had to have pressure put upon it in order to operate so she had a hard time getting water out and washing at the same time.

“Alisa! Are you okay?”

She called out, “Yeah- I-” She answered quickly knowing she had to come up with something. “I saw a bug.”

The man waiting outside pounded even harder, “Just open the fucking door!”

Alisa could hear the desperation in the man’s voice as she found herself stepping back from the sink and unlocking the door. No sooner had she flipped it was she moving towards the sink again. She focused on washing the rest of her hands again as she caught sight of the man through the scratched aluminum surface, which served as the room’s mirror, burst through the door and land upon the seat in record Olympic time. She didn’t even know the man and already knew she knew him if far too intimate of a way. She knew life wasn’t always pretty but on days like today, especially on days like today, you really wished LIFE wasn’t so much of a DRAWING that didn’t include AN ERASER.