Being trapped under a mattress with dead body on top-a prompt to write

The day started in the usual fashion. I had my coffee and breakfast while looking out the window of my small motel apartment. When finished, I gathered together my cleaning supplies and started knocking on doors to see which were unoccupied and ready for cleaning.

Once a week, today being the day, I would not only change the linens but do a through cleaning in three of the rooms. The first two rooms went smoothly, usual garbage to be picked up that people leave behind and the cleaning done. In addition in rooms one and two, I took the time to flip over the mattresses on the beds. When I got to room three, all was going well until I went to flip the mattress on the first bed.

As I flipped it, I was suddenly knocked over by the mattress and trapped under it. Strange, I do this all the time without a problem and wondered why I had lost control of the mattress this time. I've dropped them at times but just had to work at evening up the edges to the box spring in the past. Never had this occurred before where I was knocked over and ended under the mattress. Well, no big deal, I thought, just pull the darn thing off yourself and start again. But wait, I couldn't push it off! Something was weighing it down. Since I had landed on my stomach, it was difficult to get leverage to push but still I've been slinging these things around for years, so it shouldn't be this hard! Well, it wasn't budging and neither was I. My hands crept up and out from the mattress and when I felt around, I could feel something very cold.

I laid there for what seemed like hours until my boss came looking for me, curious as to why I was not finished and back to the office.

It wasn't until she came in and screamed that I realized it was more than just a mattress gone crazy trapping me.

On top of the mattress was a very dead body!

Now it would be time for me to really become upset, realizing that I had been laying under a dead body for quite some time and time for the police to figure out how this person got there, who he was and of course, why someone had killed him to begin with.

After the rain-a prompt in writing class

As we watched the sky before the storm, we felt great apprehension that perhaps the weekend wasn't the best time to be camping. We had pitched our tent near the creek and out from under the trees. We wondered if the wind become worst then it was now, if the tent would remain up. Also, coming to mind, was if it continued to rain for a period of time (once the rain did start), would the firewood be too wet to start a fire? Would we be able to cook the food we had carried in our backpacks and make the coffee to go along with it or would dinner consist of granola bars and bottled water?

Who knew the creek would quickly spill over it's bank, flooding the tent and sending the firewood moving downstream like toy boats?

Did we ever imagine that we would learn to climb a tree, some of us for the very first time as the ground flooded?

A gift that goes very wrong- a writing excise

I thought I had picked the perfect gift for my sister's twelfth birthday. Since her birthday was May 13th, I bought her a cute little two piece bathing suit with an adorable skirt cover-up to match.

Although we live near the beach, the rule in our household was that we could not go to the beach without
1) permission from a parent
2) having someone with us (sort of a buddy system which was a firmly established system in our household).

Usually there wasn't a problem getting a buddy since there were 10 of us in our family, four boys and six girls. Mom had given permission for the beach outing with the usual part two- take a buddy.

My sister had asked me and I promised her that I'd be her buddy. Just as we finished putting sunscreen on and gathering up our necessities eg. beach bag with book to read, towel to sit on etc., the phone rang. I grabbed the phone and it was my best friend on the other end with some juicy news. We chattered obviously much longer than I realized and when I got off the phone, I couldn't locate my sister. I ran to the beach and found her towel and beach bag along with her flip-flops near the water's edge. No sight of her in immediate vicinity though. I called her name but got no answer. She was not a strong swimmer and although I alerted family members, we could not find her. We waited all night along with neighbors and friends. The next day her body turned up as we all stood by the shore's edge.

For the rest of my life, I would regret taking that phone call but even more, I regretted ever buying her that bathing suit.