Winterfest Drabble Challenges
~ exactly 100-word stories using 3 given elements ~
WFOL 2025
Devin, Vincent’s Chamber, a Coin
“You tell him!”
“No, you tell him!”
“Come on. I tell him and I’m grounded.”
Vincent laughed.
Devin glared. “What?”
“Grounded,” he chuckled out, sweeping an indicating hand around the stone-walled chamber.
Devin crossed his arms, sending a sour glance his way, one he couldn’t hold for long.
“Well,” Devin heaved. “He needs telling.”
Vincent trotted to the fish bowl on his desk, stirred the pebbles camouflaging their meager stash, brought up a quarter.
“I’ll flip, you call. Loser tells.”
The silver flashed in the candlelight.
“Heads!”
Devin caught the coin, slapped it down.
Both heads bent to the result.
Vincent, the Great Falls, a Broken Lock
He wrangled with the old lock he’d found. Heart-shaped … looking at it with a poetic eye. A key threaded on a leather lacing that fit and turned with no freeing result.
Definitely broken. He thought about flinging it into the water beneath the Great Falls.
But didn’t.
Catherine settled beside him.
“Let me try.”
She rubbed the key with sand.
The shackle responded.
“In Paris there’s a bridge. Lovers close a lock on the rail and throw the key in the Seine.”
“There’s an iron gate just beyond that rock outcrop.”
She rose and held out her hand. “Shall we?”
Joe, His Office, a Phone Message
Where was he?
Catherine paced Joe’s office, pausing only to cross and uncross her arms, to tap one foot. Minutes passed, each of the essence. They’d had a plan. This wasn’t it.
She closed the blinds, locked the door, prowled for clues.
His desk a mess, more so than usual. A bag of chocolate cheese nuggets open but nearly full, only a few spilling out over the blotter.
What’s this??
While You Were Out. A pink rectangle of paper, chocolate-crumbed, the secretary’s handwriting. A phone message.
No name given
2:00. The culvert in the park.
Step inside. I’ll be there.
William, Winterfest, a Hat
William grumbled. Oh, he had a team of young folks clearing away the leftover Winterfest food. There was enough extra for days, but it had to be stored … properly.
“Making a final check.” he announced, pre-disappointment tinging his words.
The newest of the crew held a breath.
He dusted his hands, all business.
But it was the quiet he sought. The memories stored in the Great Hall.
“What’s this?”
On an empty table, a familiar brimmed and feathered hat. Winslow’s!
The tapestries rippled. A laugh shimmered with light.
“Pretty good feed bag you put out this year,” Winslow surely said.
Catherine, Father’s Library, a List
The letter she’d found in the poetry book haunted her. From Grace to her unborn son. The hint of others, written, stashed away somewhere for years.
Devin deserved …
She rose on one elbow. Stared. Stared hard. How could he sleep knowing …
He opened one eye. “Catherine?”
“What are you doing tomorrow?” Her tone demanded only one answer.
“There’s a list” he began, glancing at the paper weighted on his writing desk.
She fought the covers and won, barefooting across the floor, crumpling the list to a throw-away ball.
“Change of plans. You. Me. Father’s Library. And no book left unsearched.”
Cullen, His Workshop, a Cupcake
The memory came in a dream. His grandma’s long table, on it a deep bowl carved from cherrywood, a rim so thin he could almost see through it to the magical forest from which he believed it came.
A great-uncle he’d never known had carved its perpetual bounty. Apples from walnut, bananas of spalted maple, pale pecan pears.
He woke up needing to … hold those things again and set to work.
“What’cha making?” little Samantha asked having wandered in.
“Forever fruit,” he replied, taking a moment to smile down at her.
“Can you make me a cupcake?”
And he did.
Laura, Her Apartment, a Journal
It was neither fair not brave.
But telling seemed impossible and she couldn’t just show him.
He would be home soon.
A baby.
A baby she wouldn’t rear not knowing about Below. About Vincent.
Jerry had to know first.
In the six weeks he’d been at training, she’d written it all down in a journal. From her first memories of being found, growing up, learning to speak. Vincent … her teacher.
She couldn’t watch him read it. What if …
She left it in their apartment with a note of love and to meet her in the park at the doorway home.
Jamie, the Children’s Chamber, a Piece of Jewelry
“Jamie! C’mere, will ya?”
At the sound of her name, she skidded to a stop just past the children’s chamber … sauntered back through the archway.
“You called?”
“Yeah! Look what we found!”
She took the box Eric held out. The blue velvet covering – matted and stained – had surely once been plush. The hinged lid was balky and inside–
Jamie eyes widened … then narrowed.
“Have you been hanging out with Mouse?”
No, just Kipper ‘n me. We found it in an empty chamber.”
The wide, gold bangle untarnished, engraved. *For Grace, on your 18th*
“We better show Father,” Jamie said.
Mary, the Chamber of the Winds, a Map
She’d heard about this place, the Chamber of the Winds, though she couldn’t imagine it.
But now here she was
In the center of the soaring space, stories high, a spiral of archways filled with light above her …
It was dizzying, the choices of ways.
Buffeted by the unusual wind, she scuffed and faltered along, her shuffles revealing a mosaic laid in the floor.
A compass, its pointing arrow confident.
Her few steps hesitant … a sudden singing wind encircled her, whisking Sarah’s map from her hand.
Would she find her way home?
WFOL 2024
Vincent, Central Park, a Snowstorm
“Have you ever seen snow this deep, the park so perfect?”
They stood together, unsheltered, the flurried world before them ice blue, the shadows indigo. A night breath stirred the sparklings.
The measure of time suspended.
Did she shiver? “Are you cold, Catherine?”
“No. Shhh,” she said. “Listen.”
The city beneath its blanket of white surprise had stilled. Noiseless, tranquil, a peaceable kingdom.
Theirs, this night.
“The only other sound’s the sweep of easy wind,” she began.
“And downy flake.” One that lingered in her hair.
He wouldn’t warm it away, its crystal points as magic and singular as she.
Father, the Kitchen Chamber, a Complaint
The bottom drawer was stuck. Father pulled and the handle broke loose. He glared at the dull metal in his hand.
The drawer wouldn’t give, but it wasn’t his only stash. He grumbled over to his private bookcase, its shelves stacked with tomes not for lending. One specifically. Leather-bound, its pages precisely knifed away. Inside, a hollow to cushion exactly eight shortbread fingers.
Empty.
A single treat. That’s all he wanted.
He shuffled to the kitchen, every breath a complaint. There’d better be cookies left from supper. Oatmeal, he recalled, not his favorite.
But what’s a desperate man to do?
Joe, Catherine’s Apartment, a Gift
Where was it?
She’d wrapped it, pulled the scissors along the crinkly ribbon strands to create a curly explosion. It wasn’t a small box; it should be noticeable even if her apartment was a mess.
The dinky couches were going away. A larger sofa coming in their place, one side a long, extra cozy chaise. ‘No excuses, Vincent,’ she imagined saying.
She resumed her search. There it was, under the table by the door. None too soon. Joe would be arriving to help any minute.
A KNOCK!
“Happy birthday, Joe!”
“What’s that, Radcliffe? A basketball?”
How did he know?
Rebecca, the Staten Island Ferry, a Winterfest Candle
Rebecca only took the Staten Island ferry once a year.
A short walk then to Fort Hill Park, to the stone bench in a nestle of ivy-bound trees where she would linger. The house nearby might have been hers now. Possibly was. She’d never know.
Windy, cold, growing colder.
Better go.
She trailed her hand along the bluestone-capped wall to the block loose in its mortar. She’d replace the Winterfest candle there with a new one, bright with color.
But this time, the candle was missing; in its place a ring, loose in a small jar.
The ring she remembered.
Kipper, the Museum of Natural History, a Pair of Ice Skates
His own chamber.
“You’re old enough,” Father said.
Now Kipper looked around at his new digs.
“Kipper?”
Vincent was dripping mud.
“What happened?”
“Long story. Would you take a message to Catherine? Tell her … not tonight.”
He emerged at the Winterdale Arch so he could run past the Museum of Natural History on his way to Catherine’s. Sometimes people left neat stuff on the steps. They were bare though. Not even a paperback book left behind.
Wait! What was that? Draped over a trash bin, glinting in the cold. Ice skates, a pair.
Those pompoms would have to go though.
Pascal, the Underground River, A Bright Light
He was two levels down when he heard it, the tapping. Faint, rhythmic. Not a code he knew.
He didn’t tell his friends. He didn’t leave a note for his dad. He just … went.
The tapping started, stopped, started again. He knew the pipe now, followed it deeper than he’d ever gone before.
Water. A wide, black river.
Now he followed it and the pinging pipe.
Was that torchlight? A bright beacon.
He rounded a bend.
Vincent. Alone. Circles drawn on the pipe like targets. A handful of pebbles that he tossed one after another. A bull’s eye every time.
Catherine, the Chamber of the Winds, a Key
“How many levels are there?” she shouted.
One had to shout in the Chamber of the Winds.
She stopped him. “Why have you waited to long to– I mean, you know–”
“I’ve always known.”
“And you’ve always had the key?”
“No. I discovered and later demanded it.”
He led her up the sweeping staircase to the third level, fourth archway. He raised a torch and the shadows dissipated.
On a table, a small box, crusted with tiny shells, shards of green marble.
“Your mother’s?”
“I only know it was left with me.”
He handed her the key. “Catherine, will you–“
Jamie, Father’s Library, a Flower
Jamie found another one, outside her chamber door. A single stem in an old green pop bottle.
Yesterday, a pink carnation.
The day before a dandelion.
The day before that, a trailing spring of ivy.
Today she didn’t recognize the fuschia-colored blossom.
She carried it to Father’s library. He’d have a book that could tell her exactly what the mystery flower was.
She recalled a class discussion of the language of flowers. Was this delivery some kind of message?
Mouse popped up from behind Father’s desk.
“Bringing Father flowers? Pretty!”
She always could read his face. He wasn’t her admirer
WFOL 2023
Mouse, a Box of Crayons, Father’s Study/Library
“Why did he unwrap every single crayon, Vincent? Now I don’t know what to call the colors,” young Jamie grumped. “And I loved the names.”
“I’m not sure. Have you asked him?”
Jamie glared and tapped her foot and sat down hard in a chair pulled up to the library table in Father’s study. A colorful pile of paper shreds shifted in the breeze of her disgruntlement.
“It was a 64-crayon box too, with copper and silver! And a sharpener!”
“Better names now.” Mouse piped up without raising his head. He tapped his temple and kept on with his work.
Zach, a Halloween Costume, a Classroom Chamber
“I’m not gonna wear that. It’s dumb.”
“Come on, Zach,” Eric pestered. “We’re all picking one.”
The boxes of old Halloween costumes Mouse had found were open and their contents arrayed on the science classroom’s tall experiment tables. Donald Duck, Huckleberry Hound. Vinyl suits that tied in the back and plastic masks with eye holes so small you could barely see.
He watched her from across the room. She was holding a Wonder Woman mask. Nooooo, he almost shouted.
A mask would ruin everything! He wouldn’t wear it, not when he planned, no, hoped to kiss …
Jamie, a Ticket, the Brooklyn Bridge
Where was she? They needed to talk.
He’d seen her in the break room earlier pouring a cup of coffee, but now? He’d popped out of his office a dozen times in the last hour to check, yet her chair was still empty.
He’d just wait for her then, Joe decided, and sat down.
Her desk was cluttered with papers and files and a sandwich half-unwrapped. He couldn’t help himself; he was hungry. He’d buy her another.
What’s this? A note?!
He unfolded it … and shot up out of her chair for the elevator. He knew where she was.
WFOL 2022
Catherine, Bethesda Fountain in Central Park, a Fountain Pen
A suddenly-warm late-winter day. Catherine lingered in the park, gathering in the blue, blue sky, the sweep of clouds, the joy of birds flying free in the more hospitable air. Could she remember it all?
Vincent avowed she brought the sun below, the scent of all seasons. But did she?
If only she could memorialize …
And there, on the concrete rim of Bethesda Fountain, a fountain pen. Vintage, a barrel of azure, white and gold – the colors of all above. The Angel of the Waters seemed to smile in bronzed gift as if sure the right words would come to her.
Vincent, a Balloon, the Mirror Pool
His meditation was interrupted by a brush across his cheek.
Eyes closed, he fanned it away.
Not a bug. Not a bat.
His reverie was broken by an image of Father wrestling through a rush of Chiroptera (a storm-cloud of winged assassins, so he’d claimed).
Vincent laughed, not even softly.
Another brush. He opened his eyes. A purple balloon bobbed overhead, its tailing ribbon corkscrew-curled.
A marvel finding an opening, another journeying through twisting chimneys and rocky points, intact in defiance of probability.
He drew it down. Usually things drifted up from the Mirror pool. Not today.
Anything was possible.
Jamie, a Ticket, the Brooklyn Bridge
Jamie parked her new bicycle at the corner of Front and Dover, hitching the shining chain around the lamp post. The Brooklyn Bridge almost overhead, the ground rattled. Up top was almost too much, but Isaac said meet here, and she was right on time. Even a little early.
“You like your ride?”
She looked up to see her trainer on the fire escape, one floor up. “I sure do. Thanks again.”
“Once is plenty. Get on up here, let’s do the work.”
Two hours later she emerged on the street, sweaty but energized.
“What the heck? A parking ticket?!”
Samantha, a Homework Assignment, the Whispering Gallery
“Samantha! C’mon. Lunch hour’s almost over.”
“Hush, Geoffrey. I’m doing the homework assignment. Pipe down, will ya?”
“It’s not due til Friday. I don’t even get it. This new music teacher has some funny ideas.” He kicked a post on the Whispering Gallery bridge, which made Samantha huff and scoot farther away from the dust he stirred up. Kinda the opposite of what he really wanted to happen.
“The answer my friend, is blowing in the wind,” he muttered. “We’re supposed to ‘interpret’ that? Geez.”
Samantha pointed. “Either out.” She pointed again. “Or beside me. You pick.”
He sat down.
Mouse, Raspberry Jam, the Great Falls
The boy didn’t have the words for this sensation. He knew to hide the shining thing he’d found, scuttle away, find a place where he could see out, but not be seen. Where he could have it in peace, get it all into his mouth fast before … before the growlers came, the snatchers.
Here was good. Big place, lots of shadows. Crouching spots. Lots of water falling down, big roar. Water to drink too, trickle trickle trickle.
He attacked the lid. Stuck. He could fix. His pockets held his treasures.
He sighed at the taste, felt his face stretch wide.
William, a Book of Poetry, the Mirror Pool
Funny nobody ever thinks to come looking for him. Breakfast over, lunch … folks are satisfied, he guesses. Plenty in the pantry for latecomers. Two o’clock every day, he just … slips away.
The Mirror Pool. He settles down to a chiseled bench, opens his satchel. Pulls out his manuscript. Looks over the pages he’s already written.
He chuckles. Folk’s would think he’s writing recipes. And he is, but more than that. Memories of tastes and moments. Who first made him blueberry pancakes, how a bowl of blueberries now brings back *that* kitchen, *that* voice.
For every recipe, he writes a poem.
Father, a Candy Bar, Catherine’s Apartment
Vincent strode through the open balcony doors of Catherine’s apartment. Her smile was beacon enough, but she held something in her hands.
“You found one! And with a photograph of an English garden on it,” he said, not completely surprised. “Where?”
“At the flea market on West 77th. I kicked over a stack of metal pans and there it was on the shelf behind them.”
“And inside?”
“Not 1940s chocolates, obviously, but what Cadbury’s calls a Milk Tray now.”
“A rare treat, he said. His favorite, back then.”
“I hope still his favorite.”
The doorbell buzzed.
“Father’s here!” Vincent whispered.
Rebecca, a Letter, Central Park
Rebecca touched the letter in her pocket. Sebastien had brought it down, the only person who knew everything. She couldn’t open it Below. It seemed a Pandora’s Box, like she’d been studying in class before she had to leave. She didn’t want to unleash anything ugly.
She headed into the Central Park Ramble. Vincent and Devin went to Turtle Rock at night, but she’d need the light of day to read whatever was inside the envelope. The path was deserted, all the benches empty. She slit the flap with the little knife she carried now.
A newspaper cutting drifted out.
WFOL 2021
Edie, a manilla envelope, Catherine’s apartment
Catherine handed her guest a beer. Too late, she saw the manilla envelope stuffed behind the sofa pillow Edie fussed with.
She should’ve shown her to another seat. She’d been sitting right there when the doorbell rang, Vincent’s chin resting on her shoulder. Now …
Edie pulled the envelope free. Of course, it was upside down. Of course, Kristopher’s new drawing slipped out.
“Look at you!” Edie crowed. “And, oh baby, look at him!”
Vincent’s muffled laugh was undeniable. And so he stepped from the bedroom into the light, into the silence …
Edie gulped. “Do you … do you have a brother?”
Devin, Father’s Fedora, the Crystal Cavern
“Believing Narcissa’s tales will lead you into dangerous territory.”
He picked up his pen, applied it where he’d left off. The subject was closed.
Wasn’t it?
“Mind me, now. There’s no crystal cavern. Even if there were, it would be far, far from here. You could get hurt, lost–”
“Or worse,” Devin finished. “O–kay.”
“Off you go. You may believe the rumors of chocolate cake.”
Alone, he opened his armoire, reached deep to the corner of the shelf. Lifted the brim of his old fedora. Still there: the crystal he’d chosen from the glittering cave, lit with hope … for Margaret.
Kristopher, Vincent’s toy carousel, the ice skating rink in Central Park
“What’s in the trunk?” He eased back the domed lid.
A toy carousel, the ice skates worn once one moonless midnight in Central Park, a tin bank still rattling with coins. He pulled the memories from the the chest, arranging them in a collage beside it. Now and then, he’d consider the design. A shift of angle, a quarter-turn. Whatever it took to please his artist’s eye …
Next out, a stack of slim books. He shuffled them like cards.
“Hey, look! Harold and the Purple Crayon. That’s what got me started.”
“Started … what, Kristopher?”
“You know … coloring outside the lines.”
Vincent, the scent of warm chocolate, the Whispering Bridge
“Is he sleepwalking?”
“I think he’s sleep listening.”
“We can’t wake him up. It’s too dangerous.”
Devin stood awfully close to the one rickety board on the Whispering Bridge, his glazed gaze on something far away.
“I’ll get him,” Vincent said. “I’m the littlest. I won’t cause much sway.”
“Well, technically …” Pascal began.
Vincent took a step and steadied. Took another. And another.
Closer, closer …
His voice as wispy, he hoped, as the voices heard in this place, Vincent called his brother’s name.
“Smell that, little brother?”
Surprised, Vincent had to grab the rope rail.
“Warm chocolate. Mary’s making brownies.”
Vincent, a Face Mask, Above
“You’re allowed the hour of dusk Above,” Father said. “A helper will go with you.”
They had their candy bags, brown paper ones they’d smoothed out. For costumes … with a little soot on their faces they could go in their normal clothes, be The Lost Boys, like in Peter Pan.
Vincent though …
His friends called from the corridor. “Come on, Devin! If we don’t hurry, Father won’t let us go!”
And there he was was, pushing through the crowd wearing a plastic Cowardly Lion face mask. Grinning behind it, he could tell.
One ear was broken, but it would do.
Narcissa, a Candle, the Great Hall
“Narcissa’s here!”
The news whispered through the Great Hall. No one expected her.
Jacob frowned. His job was to parcel out the mead. Hard to pour and keep his eye on the woman.
What’s she doing, crouching down in front of Vincent. She has him by the shoulders, filling his head, no doubt.
What’s that in her hand? A blob of white wax. Vincent has it now! They’re leaving!
“Devin! Where?” He called him over, pointed with his chin.
“Dunno. Vincent’s mother’s got something to tell him. The candle’s magic.” Devin kicked the table leg. “I want to go too.”
~~~ ~~~ ~~~
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