Creative Challenge
This is my first prompt out of book made for challenging writers to write something new every day. I don’t know if, with my medications, I’ll be able to write every day, but I’m going to try as often as I can. The prompt is in red
Book of Matches: No.1
“Well, if you could accuse anybody of being downright evil, it would be him.”
“Becky, I didn’t say he was ‘evil.’ You know I don’t believe people are –“
“Yeah, yeah,” Becky interrupted, “only their actions. Question: At what point does someone continually demonstrating evil characteristic become evil? I mean, is the plan to wait for the fuck head to kill someone? How many more women is he going to rape before he’s considered evil?”
Angela sighed.
“I can’t talk to you about this. Does ‘attorney-client privilege’ ring a bell?”
“Sure. He can confess all his evil actions to you, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it. The system is seriously flawed.”
“Everyone has the right to a defense. I defend. Innocent until proven guilty; it wasn’t my screw-up that contaminated the DNA. I have an obligation to defend him. Even fuck head rapists enjoy the fruit of the constitution.”
Angela slipped off the kitchen counter and set her bowl of green grapes on the marble. Her brow pulled together in concentration, but her nose wrinkled as if she’d smelled something rotting.
It did seem like an injustice. The fuck head’s DNA was a perfect match to eight rapes in Central Park; and he was only twenty-four years old. But the samples from all of the cases had been compromised, less one. The one DNA match that could convict fuck head matched an illegal alien who refused to press charges or testify. No testimony; no proof of rape. And fuck head actually tried to high-five Angela when the evidence was thrown out.
She scooted the papers and folders to one side of her bed and plopped down, as discussed as Becky. But Angela had walked into this eyes wide open. She had known working for the Public Defender’s Office would require her trust in the law and the system to outweigh person thoughts and beliefs. But her coveted law books were not helping her tonight.
Angela could hear Becky rummaging around in the refrigerator. After a few minutes, with her head still in behind the door, Becky called out in her sometimes annoying perky voice.
“Chinese?”
“Communist bastards,” Angela replied.
“Italian?”
“Vatican fascists”
“All-American burger and fries”
“Don’t even get me started…” Angela said as she sat up in her bed.
“What about Mexican?”
“Tequila?”
Angela rolled off her bed and met Becky in the kitchen.
“You order,” Angela directed, “I’ll get the booze.”
Angela grabbed her coat, keys, and purse before heading down the third floor walk up. When she reached the door, a cold gust of wind slapped her face turning her cheeks an instant shade of red. Bundling her coat tightly, she started to cross the street to the all night liquor store on the corner. Before she’d taken more than three steps, she bumped into a man. A tall man, a man with perfect teeth and sparkling blue eyes, a man no one would fear at first sight. But Angela knew better; she knew behind his boy-next-door meets GQ good looks was a fuck head, her fuck head.
In that moment, Angela knew the answer to Becky’s question: just one more.