Young Writers Society

I sighed and signed my name at the bottom of the page. Making it a beautiful display. I re-read the note again, just for good measure.

"Robby,

I don't know what to say to you other than I miss you. I do. It's all my fault; it always has been. I thought before when you cheated on me with her it was bad. This is worse, far worse. I'm a mess. I was so depressed I got sick, I never thought that could happen, I never thought I was weak. I am. I'm sorry I'm so weak. This is different, it's been days. Weeks. The ever growing space between us wasn't like before. Then I tried to talk to you. We tried. There is so much tension in the air around me. So much anger and self loathing.

I'm so weak, everywhere. I yell all the time, fight, argue,as if I could do it to get you back. I want to tell you "I love you" so badly. I can't, I'm not worth your time right now. It's so hard pretending your here and then knowing your not. I was wrong. You were right and I was wrong. I want to make it up to you. I miss you in every way.

I know you want everything to be okay. You want me to say "Good" when you say "How are you?" Everything is not good. Everything is not okay.

I don't know why I'm telling you this. I probably shouldn't. I should just save it away forever in some file in my mind. Never being spoken of again. But as the person I love, I believe you have a right to know. I've lied before and used you. Comparing it to my past, that's so much darker than you even know.This is proof that I'm not good enough. I know you cheated on me. We have been together for almost three years, I have given you everything. I gave you my life, my love, my heart, and my future.

You Promised me I would be your one and only.

You promised.

I guess you lied.

I guess I lied too.

I said I would rather die with you than live without you. Don't you remember those days when I was young and I swore to you like it was out of a romance novel? I promised you that I would make you happy. You have been with others, other than her. I know, you told me. She told me. The numbers mean nothing. Whether it was one or five or fifty. You refuse to tell me. Maybe that's for the better and you were meant to be with some other who could stand to look at you the way I do and pretend that when you look back your looking at me. I don't know. I don't know what to say. I'm speaking to a brick wall...a broken wall. I'm telling it to put itself back together. Impossible for something that can't be moved. I would give up almost anything for you to believe me. But lets face it, I lied. More than half a year ago. So our anniversary will come and go and I will celebrate in Hell that we are together still. And you will grieve that you left your 'angel' broken.

It's all my fault, isn't it? I've caught you bluffing again.

I've lied to.

I'm not your angel.

I've been infected.

With incurable jealously.

I am a monster.

~Cami"


I left the lonely note on the table. I picked up the nine millimeter. I inhaled. My chest expanded as I looked ahead to the door. It wasn't locked. What was the point? My eyes watered as I looked at what I would leave. My pencil, my source of joy. My escape. Silly things. I felt like a monster. I would hurt everyone by leaving, I was the kind that if people saw me they would run in fear. That's the joy of lies. I was the kind that only a bullet could kill. Then I closed my eyes. My fingers were happy to rest on the trigger as I lifted the gun to my temple it was heavier than I expected. I smiled.

"Cami!" I looked up at my love. The utter shock covering his face. Good. Be shocked to see what I really am.

"What are you doing?" He stepped forward and I pointed to the table that held the last thing I would write.

"Read that and you'll understand." A tear splashed down my face, I shook my head. Clasping the handgun to my head with both hands. I wanted to make this work.

"Its on 'safety'."

"What?" I expected him to show more concern. But I guess he realized my death was necessary. I lowered it to examine the safety. I was sure I had checked that. Then a force knocked me to the ground. I looked to see that Robby had tackled me. His teeth were clenched and I knew that his eyes were on the weapon in my hands. I gripped the gun. Unwilling to let go. He yanked my hand way and held my wrist. I attempted to turn my hand that still held. I wanted it in my direction. I wanted to look it in its dirty face. I could just end everything now. What was the point in living with a traitor?

"Give me that." He grunted.

"No." I screamed and kicked at him. He laid on top of me as I struggled. I tried to turn my body to squirm away. His elbow hit the gun and it flew across the room, sliding on the wood floors. It hit the table and my message landed softy. He grabbed both of my wrists.

"What were you thinking?" He shouted, shaking me. "Why would you leave me?" I closed my eyes and turned away. Tears spilling into my mouth, tasting of saltwater.

"Why would you leave me?" I countered, looking him in the eyes, "Don't you love me?" My voice broke and my body grew limp. He let go and sat up cradling me in his arms.

"Oh, Cami." He held me as I cried. "You know I love you." I shook my head and looked at him, my eyes brimming with tears.

"I don't know that. Kristy said you were cheating on me with her. Kristy said that you were a womanizing pig."

"And you believed her? She made it sound a lot worse than it was." I just started. Why was I in his arms again? Why don't I just reach for the gun. I wouldn't have to deal with it.

"You don't have to doubt me anymore." He continued, "I know your afraid of losing me. You don't need to be afraid." He stroked my hair down my back and kissed the top of my head.

"I need to hear you say it."

"Say what?" I looked away. It was pointless. I looked in the direction of the sliver bullet that would set me free.

"If your hurting you can tell me." He coaxed. I tried to tell you. I tried.

"I love you." He promised. I looked at him. As he nodded. "Your safe now. I'll take care of you. Just breathe."

I nodded. I could feel the bright emotion of of happiness eclipsing the darkness of jealously and depression.
The moon will be full again. I can feel it. I looked at the note blanketing the unfired sliver bullet.
This will be needed later. For the cure to the curse.

I like this a lot! Great job!

A suggestion though:

Your second paragraph where you begin the letter is a little...choppy. Your punctuation is something that could be differently arranged. My opinion is below, if you care for it. I'll highlight what i change in blue. Just remember, it's an opinion...I'd also make it two paragraphs instead of one maybe?

BerlynnRae wrote:I don't know what to say to you. I miss you, I do. I'm sorry. It's all my fault; always has been. I thought before when you cheated on me with her it was bad. This, this is worse. Far worse. I'm a mess. I was so depressed I got sick. I never thought that could happen; I never thought I was weak. But I am and I'm sorry I'm so weak.

This time it's different. It's been days, weeks[/color]. The ever growing space between us wasn't like when I was grounded. Then I tried to talk to you. We tried. There is so much tension in the air around me. So much anger and self loathing. I usually shower when I'm upset. As if the warm water would wash away the misery. Well let's be honest. There are only so many showers you can take before the warm numbing isn't enough.

I don't understand the whole thing about being grounded and the shower and stuff. Well, I understand it, but I think it dims the piece. If it's necessary to have, keep it. But maybe you should change around somethings there to make it fit more? I didn't change anything about that because I didn't feel right doing so since I hardly understand the reason it's there.

That's my opinion of it all. Sorry if it's confusing :/ If it is, PM me and I'll go through it more clearly.
But do you see what I mean? Short sentences are always great to have. Add so much depth to a piece believe it or not. But when you use them every other sentence, it makes the read choppy. Try to make it flow more smoothly by lengthening some of those short sentences every now and again.

Great story and good luck! I hope you do awesome and get 1st.
Pleasure to read ,
-Brie

(p.s. Don't take that up there too harsh if it did hurt a bit to read. Just opinions. Wait for a few more and see if they notice the same. It really was a great piece. Don't want my review to come across you as if I didn't like it...)

The structure of this piece was amazing!!!!! I love the way you kept building up the tention. At first i thought it was just going to be a depressing love story with a predictible ending, but when she pulled out the hand gun, i was hooked. (That sounds really twisted...) Then once he comes in, it escalated again, and the way you said she would need her silver bullet to cure her curse later, just leaves me thinking whats going to happen. Very well done, I can't quite pick out anything i would change, and it looks like you have gone through and edited it, and you did a magnificent job!

Nice. I like it. The whole emotional mess. Thinking that they didn't love each other. The build up to suicide and everything was great. I also liked the way he distracted her so he could get the gun. And the ending with the cure for the curse thing really leaves you thinking. Have you thought about continuing the story? Making it bigger? really good.

Hey Berlynn! I'm going through and reviewing the entries from the Capture That Emotion contest. Sorry it's taken so long!

All right, so for starters I think you had a good idea here; you definitely had a very emotion-filled piece and I could feel myself getting caught up in the narrator's desperation. I'm not quite sure which emotion you were assigned, however, and I could see it going between jealousy, despair-like depression, or anger. One of the rules of the contest was to specify which emotion you got, and since that wasn't given, it was hard for us to tell whether you stuck to that emotion or not.

Now, as for the story itself, I think you could have used a little more buildup with Cami -- yes, I understand that she feels betrayed and hopeless, crushed at the fact that she's been cheated on. I'd like to know why she was pushed to the point of feeling like she had to kill herself, though -- maybe if you gave some more detail on how she had put so much stock into her relationship with Robby that now everything is hopeless and she can't see a future now. Normally, the thoughts would be going in a break-up direction, that she doesn't want to have anything else to do with him. Why has she skipped that thought process and gone right to the final, last "resort"? It seems very extreme and there's not a lot that explains it.

I also found it a little odd that she'd be so ready to kill herself, and then after a few consoling "I love you's" from Robby, she's ready to move on and she's actually feeling happy. That seems like a very strange, inconsistent switch in emotions and given the circumstances, it feels too soon, like there wasn't an explanation why she should suddenly change feelings.

I do really like the last sentence -- it bears the promise of something dark to come, and I like being given that tantalizing ending. There's just enough information there to make me wonder what she's going to do, but without revealing anything too much to give it an air of mystery.

One last thing I'd like to mention is your spelling and grammar -- there were a lot of instances where you used the wrong version of "your." Take a look at this post about the right version to use, written by the lovely canislupis. I think it could really help clear up any confusion about that word.

All right, so that's all I've got to say. Thank you once again for entering the contest, and thanks for all your patience. Please let me know if you have any questions or whatnot!

Cheers!
~Hawk