Title: Red Morn
Source:  Thursday photo prompt: Renewal #writephoto
Word count: 404 words

My alarm buzzed, and I swatted the snooze button missing it several times before my fingers found their target. I groaned, pulling the covers over my head. Five more minutes was all I needed. I heard Granddad whistling in the kitchen and I pulled the pillow around my head, hoping to silence him. How was anyone that happy in the morning I wondered?

I drifted, welcoming blissful sleep until my bedroom door burst open and ricocheted off the doorstop. The pine door vibrated from the blow. I didn’t have to peek to know who had ended my quest to delay the start of the day.

“Once more the ruby-colour’d portal open’d, Which to his speech did honey passage yield,” Granddad quoted as I listened to him move across the room to my window.

His voice dropped, to a whisper as he continued, “Like a red morn, that ever yet betoken’d.”

He yanked the first curtain panel open, “Wrack to the seaman,” his voice rose, and his words punctuated his moments. “Tempest to the field,” he flung the second curtain panel open and sunlight streamed into my room.

“Sorrow to shepherds,” he intoned in his most pitiful voice and he crossed the room to my bed.

“Woe unto the birds,” he giggled as he shook me, tugging my covers.

“Gusts and foul flaws to herdmen and to herds,” he ended as the blankets escaped my grasp and flew to the end of the bed leaving me and my puppy dog pajamas exposed. It was hard to tell which of us laughed more.

“Granddad you’re insane. What was that?”

“What?” Grandad’s eyes bulged, and his jaw dropped as he right hand clutched his heart. “Surely no grandchild of mine is ignorant of the words of the Great William Shakespeare?” The giant man stood at the foot of my bed, laughter creased his eyes, and he attempted to frown his disapproval.

“Oh,” I stammered and tried to remember something from the bard my granddad loved. “What light through yonder window breaks?” I managed but couldn’t remember the next line.

“By Jove. It is the east, and you, my fair Juliet, are the sun,” Granddad took a step back, and with a grand flourish bowed low over his extended leg.  He stood, smiled at me, then turned to leave the room.

“Pancakes, in five. Don’t miss your cue,” he called over his shoulder and I scrambled to comply.

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Keep on writing.

Jo Hawk The Writer