a million shades of gray: It's story time . . .

So, I've been a tad slow in responding to Anne's tag. But she raises the excellent point that the meme writing will contribute to my ultimate and perpetual goal of procrastination. So here goes . . .

The original prompt:
Here's what I would like to do. I want to create a story that branches out in a variety of different, unexpected ways. I don't know how realistic it is, but that's what I'm aiming for. Hopefully, at least one thread of the story can make a decent number of hops before it dies out.

The story:
I woke up hungry. I pulled my bedroom curtain to the side and looked out on a hazy morning. I dragged myself into the kitchen, in search of something to eat. I reached for a jar of applesauce sitting next to the sink, and found it very cold to the touch. I opened the jar and realized it was frozen. (Splotchy)

"That's strange," I said out loud to no one in particular. My fingers slowly reached towards the jar again. My body experienced a wave of apprehension as weighted blanket covering me as I did so. The jar was completely frozen.

I picked it up and stared at it, my fingers stung with little knives of chill. "What the..." again I spoke aloud. Then I realized what had happened with a shock. Suddenly the jar flew from my hand. It shattered creating a collage-like mixture of frozen applesauce and glass shards on my kitchen floor, the lid lazily rolling to a stop across the room.(FranIam)

I stood for a moment considering what all this meant. Oh, I knew what it meant, I didn’t need to waste time thinking about it. He was back. And he was mad.

I ran down the hallway and flung open the door at the end. I was immediately hit with a blast of cold. I took a step back as I tried to catch my breath. I bent over, hands on my knees panting. He always had this remarkable effect on me. After so much time, it no longer scared me, but it was a shock nonetheless……

“You know,” I panted, “There’s no need to break things to get my attention.” (DCup)

I woke up hungry. I rolled out of bed smacking my alarm clock that was singing Carly Simon and thinking to myself I have to stop eating pizza right before bed and then sleeping till noon. I must remember to change that station to something that will actually wake me.

Stubbing my toe on my boots on my way to the kitchen, I glanced sideways down the hall and caught the dead body out of the corner of my eye. (Wyldth1ng)

As I limped along, slipping on the melting applesauce and jumping when a shard of glass gouged my foot, I wondered what to do. I could scream or I could call for help or I could clean up the mess. Might as well yell: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Then there was a knock on the door. Why would someone knock so early in the morning? And so quickly after I yelled? (Jan)

I limped over to the door and looked through the peephole. 'Not again,' I thought, as I saw my annoying neighbor from across the street.

I opened the door and before I could say a word, she walked past me as though she owned the place. Immediately she began talking about what her precious son had done at school yesterday and how cute and precocious he was. "He's gifted, you know!" She exclaimed for the millionth time and then she turned to me and without pausing, said, "You know, you really shouldn't live all alone in a big house like this. It's creepy and look at this mess. You can't even keep it clean. You should think about getting married or at least hiring a maid." She looked down at my foot disdainfully. "And you're bleeding, too. You can't even take care of yourself."

She never lets me get a word in edgewise, so I really don't know why she always comes over. Maybe there's a good reason why her husband stays at work so late every night. 'He'd go deaf or crazy if he was around her all the time,' and with that thought I let out a short laugh.

Upon hearing that, she looked at me as if I'm the crazy one and said, "Do you think bleeding all over the floor is funny? And what is that smell? Did you leave apples lying around to rot? You're going to end up with an infection or worse and I'll find you dead on the floor one day, smelling worse than those apples."

I rolled my eyes and just as she was about to open her mouth again, a loud crash came from the kitchen. (Infinity^2 a.k.a. Garlic)

She made a beeline toward my kitchen and I trailed behind her. 'It really doesn't phase her that someone might want to investigate their own household commotions without her nosing around, does it?' I'd have preferred that she didn't see the day old applesauce and broken jar on the floor but there wasn't any avoiding it now.

"This is awful! I mean, it's practically a sty! How long has this mess been here? And you really shouldn't put your dishes down so close to the edge of the counter. Otherwise it's just a matter of time before you break all of your dishes. This is why you need to get a maid or a man."

'Oooh! She makes me irate! IRATE! I find her presence distasteful but her man-or-maid solution to life drives me bonkers! I could just reach quickly into the pantry and grab an extra-large jar of pickles and break it over her head. The headline of "Death by pickles" would almost be worth it.'

I push past her to look at the broken shards of plates on the floor. 'Why did he have to go for the nice dishes? I liked them. And I'll never be able to reassemble a set like this again . . . but then again he knows that and probably picked to break these ones on purpose.' Defeatedly, I sigh. "Well, I suppose I was a little careless in putting them down. Um, I'm going to clean this up now. Why don't you come back later." (Jen)