Photo by Jorge Hernandez Valinani

I don’t want to set off widespread panic across the blogosphere, but the Flash Fiction contest for June ends at the close of business on Sunday June 30. Yep–take a deep breath–that’s less than a week away, and yep–now exhale–here at bryanhilson.com we’re open on Sundays until midnight. Don’t worry about us, however, we get to wear sweatpants and eat Skittles out of a giant fishbowl.

And at the moment, with only two entries, our competition workload is not so taxing. It’s true, the Flash Fiction contest hasn’t quite caught fire just yet, but hey, Alfred Nobel didn’t invent dynamite in a day; i.e., your chances of winning are still pretty darn good. But only if you enter this week.

To reiterate the rules: Write a short short story in three sentences based on a theme, and the winner of all eligible entries receives a dedicated blog post from yours truly with a glowing three sentence celebration of his or her all-around awesomeness.

June’s theme is “Happy Returns” and this is the example I gave:

“The father returned home a year after going out to buy some liquid plumber for the kitchen drain. He started in about a bright light, a ditch, amnesia, but his story was beat out by all the hugs and kisses and laughter. That night while his family slept soundly, the father was in the bathroom having been awakened by a terrible itch along his hairline, and scratching it he peeled off the latex mask disguising a different face.”

You can interpret “Happy Returns” in any way you’d like. Have a good time, go nutty, go sad, go funny, whatever sparks your imagination. As always, thanks for reading, thanks for playing.