Writing Prompt Wednesday # 3 ~ The Trouble with Clowns

This week's writing prompt was inspired by the "Creepy Clown" problem that has hit the media in the U.S. As a hypnotherapist and life coach, I've worked with many people over different fears. Fears often make for great stories. In my Ghost Connection series, I published a mystery which touched on the fear of dentists in "Dentist's Burial Ground". I created a series called Paranormal Hypnotherapy Files so I could touch on other fears through the world of fiction. Cherished Gift, the first in this series focused more on night terrors and past lives, but the second book which should come out in 2017 will touch on another fear and coulrophobia or fear of clowns might be the one I work on in that story.

So with all this in mind, I thought it would be fun to create this week's writing prompt around the "Creepy Clown" challenge hitting the streets. So get your timer set for one hour, stretch out your fingers, and engage your imagination. Remember, the writing prompt exercise isn't about creating a masterpiece, it is about getting into the habit of writing on a daily basis. It doesn't have to be perfect as you'll see in the sample I'll be sharing below. Editing takes care of that after the story is written.

Week three's writing prompt.... 

Clowns, clowns, clowns, begin a story, or write a scene about clowns...

I rubbed my face and eyes to bring the blood back into circulation and re-focus on the words that were becoming a jumbled mess that resembled alphabet soup in front of me. There comes a time when a person must walk away from file reviews, and I was in that moment. I needed a break. My fear was that if I took the much needed time away from the case details that another child would wind up dead. It didn't sit well with me, so I foraged on. There had to be something I missed. Some clue that would break open the case and set us on the right path.

Tyler Jacobs, chronologically he was the first victim. Witnesses saw nothing, well nothing but a creepy clown lurking around the playground. The words creepy and clown didn't go well together, but it is what they saw. It gave us a lead that went no where. The image of his broken body dumped in the woods behind the park was something I wouldn't forget for years to come. Not many murders stuck with me, it was part of the job as a homicide detective, but the ones in this case stayed in my mind like stone statues, never leaving, always haunting me awake or asleep.

I sipped some more of my coffee as I pulled out the case file for Aimee Johnson. She was found dead, her fingers wrapped around a Chatty Catherine doll. The only clue to her death was the face of a clown painted on the popular doll's face and her screams that played out on the mini recorder inside the toy.

Kris Johansson was next in the string of deaths. No witnesses. No leads. Nothing until the Medical Examiner found a plastic clown toy stuffed down his esophagus. The way he died made us think we had a copy cat killer or a new murderer on the loose because the cause of death was suffocation instead of blunt force trauma, but it was Lindie Jackson's death that connected them all.

Lindie had the face of a clown drawn on the back of her neck. Something we found on all the children's bodies. We also noticed that every child that was killed by the "Crazed Clown", a name given by the media to the killer, had a last name that started with J. Our profiler had decided that the other signatures were tests, the killer was finding his groove and getting progressively more intent and aggressive in his process. It was becoming painfully obvious that he wouldn't stop until we stopped him.

My fingers landed on the note we received last month. It was addressed to me. He had singled me out as his nemesis, pulling me deeper into the rabbit hole that was his insane mind.

Copyright 2016 Jami Brumfield. All rights reserved.

The story will continue in 2017. I've decided this will be part of a new series I am working on. Now it is your turn. See what you can create with the writing prompt. Have an enjoyable week.