New Year's Eve Writer's Roulette! Red Riding Hood, OH MY!

You all know the drill by now! Raw and unedited, the results from today's drawing or published below. Would love to hear your thoughts, what this particular combination inspires in you and whether or not you had fun reading today's edition because I had an absolute BLAST writing it.

Genres

Dark Fantasy

Parody

Tropes, Elements and Themes

Man Vs Environment

Butterfly Effect (or Domino Effect)

Trapped/Stranded

  

“Mathew?” Red exclaimed, dropping the basket of food she’d brought for her grandmother.

“Um, no,” came a falsely high pitched reply. “No, no Mathew here, just your dear sick grandmother. Come here and let me pinch your cheeks.”

“Mathew,” Red said, stamping her foot. Her red hoodie made her eyes seem to flash. “What are you doing here? No, forget that, what the hell are you doing in my Granny’s clothes?”

Mathew stood at least six and half feet tall, but was stuck looking up piteously at the five foot four Red from the comfort of her grandmother’s flannel sheeted bed.

“It’s not what it looks like,” he said, yanking the covers up over his chin.

“And what the hell is it supposed to look like? Huh?” Red demanded, hands on her hips. Her shoe slid on something wet as she repositioned it and she looked down. The bright green kale shake she’d mixed earlier that morning and packed away in a thermos had spilled when the basket dropped and was leaking all over her new shoes.

She swore and stepped out of the mess, bending over to yank the basket off the floor. “Look what you made me do. Get out of Granny’s bed and help me clean already.”

Mathew pulled the covers higher up over his snout.

“Don’t make me come over there and yank you out of bed Mathew Conaway,” Red snapped.

Face burning beneath his fur, Mathew eased himself out of the bed, painted toe claws sinking into the rug around the bed before clicking on the wooden floor as he stepped closer. The flannel night gown was much too small for him and the hem swirled around his thighs. Painted clawed hands tried to tug it lower as he daintily made his way across the cabin’s only bedroom, ears tucked low in shame.

Red sighed and shook her head as they crouched down together to clean up the spilled basket. “I swear you have got to be the most messed up werewolf I have ever met.”

“Look, Red,” Mathew said, dabbing up the spilled shake with the blanket from the picnic basket. “It really isn’t what it looks like?”

Red picked up a squished sandwich and baggie of broken cookies and threw them into the basket. “Really? ‘Cause it looks like you dressed up in Granny’s nightgown to get your rocks off.”

If looks could kill Mathew would have already been in the icy grip of rigor mortis. “No!” he said quickly. Too quickly. “I’m not…I’m not…I’m the alpha’s son. It doesn’t…I don’t…”

Red yanked the soggy blanket out of his hands and hurled it into the basket with the ruined lunch. “Oh give it a freaking rest, Mathew! I caught you trying on my skirts years ago when you thought I wasn’t home.”

His ears perked up in surprise. “You did?”

“Why’d you think my door was always unlocked when you came by?” Red rose to her feet, taking up the basket and all its contents.

“I…just thought I was lucky.”

She snorted, letting her freckled face wrinkle in derision. “Yeah, you were. I figured you’d tell me when you were ready. I thought you liked…” her face burned crimson for a moment before her eyes narrowed to dagger sharp slits. “And then I find you here! Wearing my sick grandmother’s clothes!”

Mathew hung his head in shame. His ears wilted and his tail curled between his legs. “You thought I liked you.”

Red’s hand was halfway to slapping him when she caught herself. Mathew might be the gentlest werewolf she knew but slapping a werewolf was just plain stupid no matter how freaking mad he made her or how badly he deserved it.

“I. Did. Not.” She bit off each word like a stale cracker.

Mathew stayed crouched on the floor. Some of his fur was pushing through the cloth where the pajamas were too tight for his barrel chest. “Red, it’s not that I don’t like you. I think you’re great. It’s just…”

“Just what?” Red shouted. “Just what? What can you possibly say that will make this whole situation any better?”

“You’re gorgeous,” Mathew said.

Red dropped the basket again. Kale shake spilled anew over her shoes.

“You always have the most stylish clothes,” he went on, raising up to his full height to tower over her. 

“Always know what best to wear to compliment your figure and even make that hoodie look like Prada.”

Red’s lower lip quivered.

“But your grandmother…she is SO FINE.”