What Pegman Saw – Coming of Age

“What Pegman saw” is a weekly challenge based on Google Streetview. Using the location provided, you must write a piece of flash fiction of no more than 150 words. You can read the rules here. You can find today’s location on this page,  from where you can also get the Inlinkz code. This week’s prompt is the Billinudgel Hotel, NSW, Australia.

Billinudgel Hotel, Billinudgel, NSW, Australia, © Cube Online Services Google Maps

Coming of age

The big screen lounge in the Billinudgel Hotel was booked solid throughout the Sydney Olympics.

“Hey, Blue! Sell us your ticket?”

“Not on your life.”

“What’s a wimp like you want with a ticket anyway?”

His dad had said much the same.

“Something to do with your writing? You’ll never make a living at it.”

On October 1^st, he was in the lounge with hours to spare. He drank slowly. “Afraid you’ll be caught drunk in charge of a pencil?” jeered his mates.

There was a rousing cheer as the closing ceremony started.

In Blue’s thoughts, words describing the event coalesced into sentences, into paragraphs, and he knew; this is what he was born to do.

The closing concert began, and a tsunami of triumphant emotion swept out from the stadium, around the world, lifting the hearts of billions. The headline flashed into Blue’s head.

“Australia, you’ve come of age!”

A Writer’s Perspective

Here is another piece of flash fiction. Again, it’s a ‘Drabble’ being 100 words long and having a beginning, middle and end. It was inspired by a scene I saw on holiday, but it’s completely fictional. Rather entertainingly, we subsequently met some of the performers – including the two lads – in a taverna and were able to express our enjoyment of the concert.

A writer’s perspective

Those who were to perform in the Festival concert were in the front rows of the audience. Two young men sat side by side. The compere introduced a piece for solo piano, and both boys stood up. One went to the piano, the other stood at the side, recording a video of the performance.

Were they a gay couple, I wondered? The youth turned, looked at me; I smiled back.

Afterwards, he asked me why I had stared at him, rather than watch his friend performing.

“I am a writer. I have to look where other people are not looking.”