Writing Prompt: Tell Us About a Time You Dodged a Bullet
Have you ever had one of those whew, close call! moments in which you (very) narrowly escaped something dangerous or even just mildly alarming? Perhaps your camping trip ended right before that group of black bears invaded the park? Or you slipped in the back door seconds before your parents arrived home and realized you’d left while grounded? We want to hear about it here! And we hope it gets you writing off the page, too — even if it sparks a related idea and you run with it, or conjures a distant memory that gets your fingers typing away, whatever it may be…
In last week’s writing prompt, we asked you tell us about a time you broke the rules, and that garnered some great responses. Like the one from Cathy de la Cruz in which she shared all the things she could have written about before landing on the one that was last on her list but might have been the most radical of all. Because it received so much love, Cathy won a free year-long subscription to Narratively Academy, and you can win one this week if your comment gets the most likes. So, tell us below about a time you dodged a bullet — and share this with a friend who you think might want to do the same. (Length is up to you, but the sweet spot tends to be somewhere between two lines and two paragraphs. )
P.S. While we try to hone in on what works best for everyone, please tell us if you have a preferred day to receive writing prompts: Saturdays, Sundays, a weekday? Let us know in the comments!
I was newly divorced and still figuring out dating at 40. While chatting with a very nice man on Match, we decided to meet up at a local restaurant. His photos were unusually small on the website but I told myself not to be so judgy and be more trusting. When I arrived at the bar I expected to see a guy in his mid-40s with a full head of hair, a trim body, and tall-ish. Looking around the place I guessed I was early because no one fit that description. And then he caught my eye. Oh God, I thought. It can’t be him. He recognized me right away because I looked EXACTLY like my profile picture.
This man was clearly in his sixties. He had a bad toupee which was a bit lopsided. His body was not at all as he described. He had a big belly and a soft, jowly face. And he was short - at least three inches shorter than me which was not what he wrote on his profile. While we nibbled appetizers (which he scarfed down, leaving me two tiny pieces of calamari), he admitted he was currently unemployed, living in his ex-wife’s basement, and would I mind buying dinner and he’d pay me back the next time? When I got up to use the restroom he patted his lap and said, “C’mon, give Daddy a little kiss.” Shortly after that comment I faked a stomach ache and begged off from the rest of the evening. He asked when we could have another date. I said, “Have a nice night,” and sped away in my mini-van, never to see him again.
Drop it here? Not a bullet exactly - an excerpt from a longer piece about not dying
It wasn’t that my parents were neglectful monsters. We had guns, but both my brother and I had taken a gun safety course and had been taught good gun handling techniques by my ex-marine father since we had been able to walk. We did it because we were children and didn’t give a shit. Nothing mattered, everything was doable and firing big fucking guns in the woods is about the best thing a redneck adolescence boy could imagine.
It was late in the fall or early winter, the trees were leafless and it was cold enough to be exhaling vapor but not so much for country boys to be in heavy clothes. We wore sweat shirts and blaze orange vests. My brother had recently grown six inches in as many months so we might have appeared almost like father and son trodding across the farrow fields, nearly frozen for the winter, that surrounded that big wooded swamp.
At some point my brother fired his gun at an old TV or lone bird or whatever we had come across. There was the dry click of the firing pin striking the shell but nothing else. He pulled the gun up and looked puzzled at the stock. The barrall was just level with the side of my face. Having graduated from a gun safety course I knew this was improper gun handling practice.
I pushed the barrel away just before the shell went off. Shot blasted out about a foot in front of my face instead of into the side of my head as it would have a mili -second earlier. The kickback from the unexpected explosion knocked my brother on his ass as he stared at me in shock. It was a rimfire, that is the firing pin struck the shell but the primer hadn’t been perfectly centered or the shell was old or had gotten damp at some point delaying the detonation for just a potentially deadly moment. This is a story not so often told and even today I don’t know if my parents have ever heard it.