We’ve all known someone who is lonely. It could have been a parent, isolated due to age, inability to get about or having outlived all other relatives.

It might be a coworker, who appears on time, every day, puts in a full day’s work, completes tasks without complaint, but yet doesn’t socialize with others. It does not mean that the person is narcissistic, but rather that the individual doesn’t know how to initialize conversations or feels that he has nothing to contribute. Or maybe no one has every approached him and invited him to come along on an evening’s jaunt.

Walk into any classroom and you will find one lonely child. Sadness covers her face, which she keeps pointing down toward her desk. She never works with others on projects, never plays with others on the playground and always eats alone in the cafeteria.

Our stories are usually peopled with the more socially adjusted. Why? It makes for a happier read. We cannot just write romances or fairy tales in which everyone lives happily ever after. Our stories need to be about those on the margins of society. The left-out. The lonely.

Your task is to write a short series of scenes in which the main character has no friends, no family, to close coworker to turn to. Figure out whether or not others reach out to this individual, and if they do, what is the reaction. Decide how this character feels about the situation and if she takes any steps to rectify it. What happens if she does? Is she turned away or welcomed?

Good luck with this one.

Have fun.