Micro Fiction Challenge: Malinger
Posted by David Duhr in 
Someone has really been slacking on the job; our last Micro Fiction Challenge was “duende,” posted way back in November. (And, of course, won with a penis joke.)
You might even say we at WriteByNight have been malingering. Which is a verb meaning “to pretend illness, especially in order to shirk one’s duty, avoid work, etc.” It can also be a noun for someone prone to malingering.
Your challenge, should you choose to shrug off your feigned illness and accept it, is to write a piece of flash fiction using any form of the word malinger. As always, keep your story to 25 words or less, write it out in the comments section below, click “Notify” to keep abreast of your competition, and feel free to use a pseudonym if you’re shy. We’ll announce the winner in this space next week (maybe), and we’ll give a shout-out to our favorites on Facebook and Twitter.
“Billy Shakespeare” never stepped up to collect his/her duende prize, so our offer is the same as last time: a two-hour block of time at WriteByNight all to yourself, to be scheduled according to your convenience (and ours, of course). That’s right, gang–free use of our space for two hours with no other writers around to hog any of the WBN duende; not even us! If you choose to be upstairs, we’ll go downstairs, and vice versa.
And catch up on past Micro Fiction Challenges to see what we’re looking for in a winner.
“Where did you get your inspiration for that song?” I asked Dolores O’Riordan, the beautiful lead singer of The Cranberries.
“From Ma Linger,” she replied.
Knock knock.
Who’s there?
Malinger.
Malinger who?
Ma’ linger ’round these parts a little bit, to check out who won that darn contest.
Awright guys. I’m gonna quit ma’ lingering around your website, ’cause I’m afraid that ma’ resources might duende’l down to nothing.
Despite concerns that the end of the world was nigh, Billy Shakespeare decided not to risk taking another sick day. Instead, he malingered around the office, faking coughs whenever anyone approached him with rush requests. Unfortunately when the asteroid hit, the joke was on him!
Sure, he was malingering, right up to the point when the doctor took out his scalpel just to check.
Teetering on the cliff as the earth shook, beyond malingering any further, I groped below the edge for my wallet laying on the ledge below.
“It ain’t easy to hit that last syllable in ‘malingerer,’ innit?” he said.
“Don’t say ‘ain’t,’ ya idjit,” she said. “And get outta bed.”
His job, specifically, was to follow clients to see if they were malingerers. Fakers of whiplash, sprains, chronic fatigue syndrome. Today he called in sick.
“Whatsup with the contest?”
“Didn’t you hear”
“Hear what?”
“Justine was at Yosemite last week and suffered some kinda maling.”
“Maling?”
“Er, something like that.”
[…] get to the results of the most recent Micro Fiction Challenge, which was to write a 25-word story using […]
For you good folks following along in the comments section here, the results of this particular Micro Fiction Challenge are in:
https://www.writebynight.net/news-events/malinger-results/
[…] The Micro Fiction Challenge has proven a fun and creative writing game. Prizes have ranged from cold hard cash to mini golf to the current giveaway, two free hours of solitude at WriteByNight (still up-for-grabs). […]