Good morning everyone. I was woken out of a delicious dream about finding a lost city that was built inside a series of caverns deep below ground. The alarm went off and one of my party screamed “Rock Slide” as I woke up. I took the first twenty minutes I was awake to write down details of the hidden city. By then my bladder insisted i take a moment for other things and I set the notebook aside to heed the call. It was an interesting way to wake up. But now, as the coffee is brewing and the day is really getting stated, let’s see what we can come up with for today’s prompt. Ready those timers because off we go.
I like this one. I half expected it to roll into my dream but I kind of like this as a story. No clue where in a story this would fit but it is a nice little scene.
Tuesday, March 21st: There are clearly bears in the area.
“There are clearly bears in the area,” he said. Cheryl looked at him.
“Bears,” she repeated. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a real bear,” she added. She looked around him, peering at the tree line as though a bear was going to come shambling out as if called by Phil’s observation.
“What not even in a zoo or a circus,” Phil asked.
Cheryl shrugged. “I’ve never been to a zoo and the only circus I saw had elephants, monkeys and clowns.” Seeing nothing more than a couple of yellow butterflies near the edge of the forest, she looked back towards Phil. “Do they even have bears in circuses anymore? I thought that wasn’t allowed.”
“I don’t know,” he said. The two of them though about it trying to figure out if either heard about regulations involving bears in the circus. Footsteps crunched over leaves and they both turned. Rick was smiling at them.
“What are you two thinking about so hard?” He asked.
“Bears and if they are still allowed to be part of circuses,” Cheryl told him.
“Why would you be th9inking about bears?”
“Phil says there are some in the woods,” she replied.
Rick laughed. It was more of a nervous bray than a true laugh and his eyes slid to the tree line. “Bears?” he said. “Why would you say that? There aren’t bears here. There can’t be bears here. They let people camp here. Why would they let people camp wear bears are? There are no bears,” he said. “None.”
“There are,” Phil said.
“No there aren’t if there were then people wouldn’t be allowed to camp here.”
“There are warning signs at the edge of the campground saying to watch out for bears and they gave us a pamphlet telling us what to do if we saw any,” Cheryl said. “I haven’t seen any, but if they gave us the information there must be bears about somewhere.”
“But it is a camp ground,” Rick said. “Camp, for people, not bears.”
“I don’t think anyone told the bears that,” Phil said.
“There aren’t any,” Rick insisted. “Why would you say there are bears anyway?”
“There is bear scat on the ground,” Phil said.
“And bears are into jazz now?” Rick said.
“What?” Phil asked.
“Scat,” Rick said.
“Scat as in bear poop, not a jazz riff,” Phil clarified. “Why would there be jazz musicians lurking in the undergrowth?”
“Why would bears?”
“Because bears live in the woods?” Cheryl said. “Although I’m not entirely sure they lurk.”
“”they don’t live in these woods,” Rick declared.
“They just come here to poop?” Phil asked. “We’ve decided to camp in the bear’s latrine?”
“where is this bear poop?” Rick asked. Phil pointed to a dark mound on the ground.
“There is more over there, closer to the woods.”
Rick stared at the mound for a moment and then nodded to himself. He turned and walked back to the car. He climbed into the car. The lights flashed as he pressed the button to lock himself inside.
“Do you think he’ll spend the entire weekend in there?” Cheryl asked.
Phil shrugged. “No clue.”
Ten til Midnight 