And the loser is....

I posted earlier in the month about my latest entry for Three Minute Fiction. The stories I didn't submit are here and here.  Now that they've selected the winning story I figured I would show you the one I did submit.

Reading the winning entry for this month as well as previous month's winners I have sort of come to the conclusion that my writing style isn't a good fit for these sorts of things. I'm kind of fluffy. Now, there is nothing wrong with being fluffy. I like being fluffy. Even when I am writing serious pieces I always try and lighten it up a bit. It's how I am in real life and I think I can't really help but transfer that to the page as well. And I'm not saying I won't keep trying my hand at these things, if for nothing else it's fun to stretch and try and match a prompt. But I am sort of resigning myself to this being a fun exercise instead of a contest.  And they are fun to write.

I hope you enjoy...

The Best Vacation Ever

Stan was showing off his vacation pictures. “Oh and here is one where we went swimming with the sea turtles. You aren't allowed to bother them when they are nesting on the beaches, but sometimes when you are out snorkeling they will swim over to you.”

Julie from accounting who had never before given him the time of day was incredibly impressed, he could tell.

“Here is the view from the room.  Just look at that sunset. I wish I could go back right now.  But I guess if you were always on vacation you couldn't afford to go on vacation, am I right?”

Barry from customer service looked at the photo. “So tell me again how this happened? When you left you said you were just going to be sticking around home, that you were only taking your time off because you had to use it or lose it. How did you end up here?”

“Well, when I got home I decided to check one of those last minute travel sites just to see if there was anything there and boy oh boy was there!”

Barry swiped to the next shot in the album. “Whoa! Who is this?”

Stan grabbed the phone away from Barry quickly. “She’s just someone I met while I was there.”

Julie reached out for the phone, “Let me see. Come one hand it over.” Stan took another look at the current shot and handed the phone to Julie, “Wow, Stan, she’s gorgeous. And the way she’s smiling at the camera I would say she was more than just someone you met there!”

“Well, we didn’t really meet there. We met on the flight over. She was vacationing alone, I was vacationing alone, and well, we just hit it off.”

Julie smiled at Stan, “You know that’s kind of romantic. Two strangers meeting on a plane ride to an exotic vacation and spending a week together.”

Barry tilted his head to side and looked at Stan again, “So how did you spend a week on a beach and end up with no tan at all?”

“Sun screen, Barry, you know what sun screen is right? I burn. I never go out without at least SPF 50.”

“And I would guess you might have spent a little bit of extra time in the room, right?” Stan couldn’t believe it, Julie was teasing him. Was she looking at him differently? He was pretty sure she was. All because he had gone on this vacation and met a girl.

“So tell us all about your mystery woman, Stan, what was she like? Are you going to see her again?” Julie twirled her hair around her finger as she talked.  Stan couldn't believe it. Julie was definitely flirting with him.

“Well, unless she moves here or I move to Texas I don’t think I’ll ever see her again. We had a great week, but we agreed that it was probably just going to be that week. I think that’s part of what made it so special.”

Julie smiled again, “Well I am sure you will find someone else special again soon.” She put her hand on Stan’s shoulder for a second before she walked away.

As Julie was walking away Stan got a text: “I don’t care about getting the phone back, keep it, but please let me get my honeymoon pictures. I've set up an account online where you can upload them anonymously.  Please, you don’t know how important those pictures are.”

As Stan thought about Julie twirling her hair he had to agree. He deleted the text.