And in an unprecedented instance of awesome writing, myself and my judges decided that there will not be one entry published but two.
So today, I am so pleased to announce that Wesley Martin, author of "The Man Eating Hashbrowns" has won #FreeWriteFriday #3! The second place winner - Kit Jackson, whose piece is untitled - will be published later in the month because I and the other judges felt that it has an undeniably spooky Halloween vibe! So without any further ado, here is "The Man Eating Hashbrowns!"
There is a man with me at Denny’s. He is sitting in the corner by the exit that faces the window. He is staring out at the street on which nothing particularly interesting is happening, and eating hash browns. I am not a big fan of Denny’s hash browns. They are kind of moist and don’t taste like anything. But it is not the hash browns that interest me, it was the way the man is eating the hash browns. He is shoving them into his mouth with such a vigor that little bits of hash brown went flying in every direction. I wish I was this passionate about eating at Denny’s.
I almost feel bad for the hash browns. They surely do not want to go in such a horrible way. I can almost hear their screams as they are torn into pieces, defenseless against this massive and powerful adversary.
The Denny’s is completely silent, save for the sound of the man devouring his hash browns and the distant weeping of the old gods. I ponder my pancakes, sitting there so lifelessly on my grime-coated plate at three in the morning at a Denny’s in rural Idaho. I do not know how I got here. No one ever knows how they end up at Denny’s, life just drops us here in the middle of the night. Perhaps it is fate that has brought me too this spot, or perhaps it is because I am completely drunk. Life is truly a mystery.
The man has finished his hash browns now. He gets up and leaves without paying for his food. No one stops him. No one cares enough to try. I finish my pancakes silently, the voices of the old gods serenading me.
