Prompt: Yield
A part of me wants to yield to the pain, to let the burn take me under. But I know that’s what Mara wants. If I let my guard down for a even a second, if my strength wavers and I lose consciousness, she’ll win. And I’m not about to give in to her. After all, I’d made it this far, and if Death himself couldn’t reign me in, I wasn’t about to give his sister that pleasure, either.
So I clutch the book and force myself to my feet. Rather than try to ignore the way the marks on my skin burn, I let the pain keep me moving, keep me awake and aware of my surroundings.
“Arius!” I don’t know if Death can hear me, but I keep calling his name. The canyon that’s opened between us is an endless void, and I can’t even see him in the distance anymore. Above, the sky has darkened, the only source of light left the twinkling stars.
He can’t hear you. And even if he did-
“Stop!” I hit the heel of my hand against my forehead. “Shutupshutupshutup.”
How dare-
“I said stop!” My voice resounds around me, deep with a power that I’m sure comes from the etchings. A ringing silence lingers after, and for the first time since she started speaking to me, Mara is silent. Maybe even absent.
Behind me, on the other side of small stand that once held the book, a door materializes. Well, it’s less a door and more of a portal, or opening. There’s only just enough space for me to walk through it. I look back in the direction of the chasm, where somewhere in the distance, Arius might be.
But there’s no way for me to get to him, and nothing I can do from here. Clutching the book tight in both arms, I make my way through the portal, hoping it’ll lead somewhere Death will find me.
Meant to get this up yesterday, but the day got away from me.
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Fiction Trials 
Yield, by Terry Brewer
My mother. My father. My aunts and most of my uncles. I would not yield to them. I would not wait at the altar for someone I did not and could not ever love walk down the aisle to be with me forever. I tried to let them know. Too many times to let them know. They wouldn’t hear of it.
“It’s a phase.”
“You haven’t met the right girl yet.”
“It’s unnatural.”
That last one was becoming more frequent since it became clear that the first two were wrong. I was way too old for it to be a phase. And I had met more than enough women— old/young, thin/fat, rich/poor—to know the right one wasn’t out there somewhere.
He and I sat in a small coffeeshop in the neighborhood. The one where the waitress didn’t always try to sit you way in the back. By the kitchen.
“You have to tune it out.”
“Easy for you to say. Your family’s on the West Coast. Mine are four stops across the Nassau border on the Long Island Railroad.”
“Have they changed one iota since you came out to them?”
“You know they haven’t. I knew they wouldn’t.”
“Exactly. So fuck ‘em.”
“Again, easy—”
“I get it. ‘Easy for me to say.’ Look, you haven’t been to your . . . to their house in a couple of years. No Thanksgiving. No Christmas. Your folks won’t even drop off your birthday present. They let UPS do it. And when you call them—and they never call you—I see how tense you are and how much you want to get off the phone.”
“I’d rather get off with—”
“Focus. Let’s just do it. Let’s pick a date and a location. We have more than enough friends here to fill the room. Invite them. If they come, they come. If they don’t, you’re no worse off.”
“Are you, like, proposing.”
“Well, not the most romantic and a bit spur-of-the-moment but I guess I am.”
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YES! Always happy to see new snippets from this story. The last line is so extra great.
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Thanks! I keep feeling like I’m getting close to the end but every prompt just keeps it going lol
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