I found a rejection waiting in my inbox when I got home.  It was from Every Day Fiction.

Honestly, I’m glad the story got the boot.  It was more of a scene from a teen horror movie than it was a real story.  I wrote it and felt like I needed to do something with it.  They were right to reject it.  Drivel.

I seldom feel like this when reading over a rejected story.  I sometimes think, “That could be better; I’ll fix it before I send it anywhere.”  But it is rare that I turn my nose up like this.

It was a themed contest entry and it rolled out of my head.  I will keep it in my what-was-I-thinking file along with the story about the doctor that turns into a horseman of the apocalypse, the one with sprites that make you stumble in the woods, and other ideas that were picked too green or perhaps even should have been composted.

I’ve run short of finished stories to submit places. “Poison Inside the Walls” has a new version up at Baen’s and will likely be my next WotF submission (unpleasant subjects aside).  I need to do something with “The Will of Roshambo” but I’m not sure what.  I may try to cut it to flash length; it may work better.  My untitled sound story needs an ending and a deep-tissue rewrite.  I have that Festival of the Naked Man story to start.  Time and I just aren’t getting together well this summer.