Phrase Prompt, Short Story, Writing Prompts

The Missus

Nancy's Notes 🖊️♬

Written for Fandango’s Story Starter
and TN’s OLWG #411; all the prompts are
shown below. Here’s where they took me.

Image by Me & Copilot

The train station clock read half past midnight when Gregory found the envelope tucked beneath his coffee cup. No postage, no return address. Just his name, written in a hand he recognized immediately …. the same elegant cursive that had been quietly dismantling his composure for the past three months.

He was at a crossroads, and whichever path he chose would ruin someone’s life.

The note inside contained only coordinates. Due north. Platform 7. Tonight.

He already knew what this was. What it had been building toward since that accidental collision  in the hotel corridor, the spilled champagne, the laughing apology that lasted twenty minutes longer than it should have. She was brilliant, magnetic, and completely unavailable.

They were introduced at a dinner party hours earlier …. an encounter that should have ended everything before it began. Mrs. Marcella de Simone: The name of another man’s wife.

He’d told himself it was innocent. Conversation, friendship, even. Just in case you missed it, his conscience had whispered repeatedly, this is how these things begin.

Now he stood at Platform 7, fog curling around the iron pillars, and there she was, luggage at her feet, eyes bright with something between terror and determination.

“He knows,” she said simply. “About everything.”

Gregory looked at her luggage. Then at the departures board. Then back at her.

One train. Two tickets, if he wanted.

The clock ticked.

NAR©2026
#FSS

Fandango’s Prompt: He was at a crossroads, and whichever path he chose would ruin someone’s life.

TN Kerr’s Prompts: 1. Due north; 2. Just in case you missed it; 3. The name of another man’s wife.

This is  “Two Tickets to Paradise” by Eddie Money

Fandango’s Story Starter #242
OLWG# 411- The Cartographer

Everything on The Elephant’s Trunk was created by me, unless otherwise indicated. Thanks for your consideration. NAR©2017-present.

26 thoughts on “The Missus”

    1. I’m so glad you said that, Fan, and I’ll tell you why; my original choice was “Me & Mrs. Jones” but then, as I was rereading the story before publishing, the words “two tickets” popped out at me like spotlights. And there you have it! Thanks very much; I’m glad you enjoyed both story and song. You gave us a great line to work with.

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