It was difficult to pick a winner.  Many of the submissions were excellent critiques of the photograph, especially Adam R’s Life is awesome and Darby’s Jesus Christ looks down and Larry and JImmy briefly…  Jereme managed to draw some human interest to the pink-dress character as a professional tree-kicker.  She’s almost forgivable in that light.  Almost.  Really, you are all winners in my eyes, but since I have to choose one, I think the winner is Mark:

[Here is the original photo, and the winning prose – JT]

Come in and eat something. It’s all free for me. It’s all free from me. Do the dodododo. What’s new pussycat?

My chest is elevator globules. I’m less bouncing than freighting. I can’t say where my car was parked.

In retrospect, maybe this was a ridiculous idea.

This story’s richly detailed prose on vapidity validates the initial project: truthfully, a shallow one.  I appreciate the ominous voice and its multiple perspectives, artfully equal in number to the characters in the photograph and at the same time also the subtle voice of the reader/viewer/narrator.  I’m wondering, whose ridiculous idea was this in the first place?  And which ridiculous idea are we speaking about?  The jumping on the bed, the request for a story, my continual feelings of inadequacy?  Artfully and well done, Mark–congratulations and thank you.

The prize for HTMLGiant’s first-ever literary contest is a bottle of homemade linen spray.

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MARK, to collect your prize, contact me via my website with your address and I’ll fwd the info to our anonymous contest-runner, who will mail you the homemade linen spray.

WINNER.