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Young Writers Society


Ghosts



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Sat Aug 06, 2011 6:10 pm
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alissende says...



“It would have to be a full moon,” Luke muttered to himself as he slipped through the gap in the cemetery gates, and paused to get his bearings.
I must be mad, he thought, creeping around the cemetery at night. On Halloween too. Yet he didn’t make any move to leave. Passing through the cemetery was the quickest way to get back home. He would just go straight through, sticking to the path, and exit through the small gate on the other side. He could then scale the garden fence, slip in the back door, and go to bed, and nobody would be any the wiser. He could that way avoid running into Darren and his gang again. In theory, a brilliant plan. In practice, crossing a graveyard, in the dark, on Halloween, when the moon was full, wasn’t so easy.
“It’s just a commercial holiday. It means nothing. Nothing at all.” He whispered to himself. He squared his shoulders and set off across the grass towards the opposite wall.
Why did this stupid place have to be so big? He asked himself as he walked across the grass. There were no lights in the cemetery, the only illumination coming from the moon. As he walked, he tried to keep his eyes on the ground in front of him, but he couldn’t prevent his eyes from wandering. The tombstones were dim shapes in the moonlight. Suddenly, he froze. He thought he saw movement under one of the trees.
“Don’t go there,” he said to himself “Just keep on walking.”
But still he found himself veering off to the right. The trees were growing next to the fence. And there was nobody there, only two graves with recent tombstones, a few wilted flowers lying on top of then. He was leaning down to read the inscriptions, when somebody spoke behind him.
“Come to flower our graves? How sweet.”
Luke spun round so fast he almost fell over. Two girls were standing just behind him. They were probably a few years older than he was, and looked as if they were on their way to a party. One of them was tall, with wild, fiery red curls, and wearing a black dress with a corset, a long, floaty skirt, and silly little puffy sleeves. The other was shorter, with wavy blond hair. She was dressed in a very short green shift that ended mid thighs. The ragged edges on the sheer material looked as if it had been ripped. She was barefoot, yet she didn’t seem cold at all.
“Don’t do that to people!” snapped Luke “I almost had a heart attack”
“Oh, in that case we’ll never do it again.” the blond one said.
“Never, ever, ever” the redhead agreed “Ever. We wouldn’t want you to have a heart attack, would we, Nora?”
“Of course not” The blond, Nora, shook her head. “We don’t want any harm to come to you, Ali and me. None at all. ”
“I mean” The redhead, Ali, said, looking at Nora “It’s not as if he ever hurt anyone, is it?”
“Well, even if he did, that no reason for us to hurt him. Us or anyone else, for that matter.”
“Of course not. Even though, I don’t think anyone has ever died following a scare. Well, if you’re under 80 that is.”
“Well he is under 80. So he’s quite safe. At least of I think” Nora looked puzzled
“I think we can be pretty sure that he’s safe. He doesn’t look as if he’s over 80. No wrinkles or grey hairs.”
“No, you’re quite right”
Luke stared from one to the other. Their dialogue was making his head spin. He couldn’t work out whether they were taking the piss or not.
“So we can scare him as much as we like then” Nora continued.
“Oh absolutely. It won’t kill him. All it will do is make his heart beat a little faster. It won’t harm him all.” Luke felt a chill as Ali said this. Her voice was cold and slightly sinister. Her earlier light and jovial tone had vanished. Her eyes were boring holes into him. Nora had also moved so she was blocking the way back to the path.
“Yes” Nora said “Not like what he did to us, is it?”
“No. He scared us. A lot. But he didn’t stop there, did he?”
“No, he didn’t. He then hurt us. A lot. But that wasn’t enough for him, was it?”
“No, he couldn’t have stopped there. He had to go on and kill us.” Ali turned to face him as she said this, and Luke backed away from her. Her eyes were filled with such hatred.
“What are you talking about?” he stammered.
“What, don’t you remember?” Nora sneered
“No!” he backed up against the gravestones. The girls were advancing upon him.
“So the two girls you killed weren’t even worthy of being remembered?”Ali jeered
“They were just things to be played with then tossed away?”
“I really don’t know what you are talking about!” Luke screamed, almost hysterical.
“Oh you don’t?” Nora raised an eyebrow.
“I’ve never killed anyone!” Luke’s back was now pressed up against the fence.
“Never? Anyone?” Ali sounded surprised.
“Nobody, I swear”
“So last Halloween, you didn’t meet two girls and….”Nora was lost for words
“Kill them?” Ali finished for her.
“No!! I’ve never killed anyone or anything bigger than a fly in my life”
“Oh” Ali took a step back, and turned towards Nora. “I don’t think it’s him” she whispered
“Are you sure?” Nora whispered back “I could have sworn it was him”
“Think about it. We could have made a mistake.”
“Well there’s one way to find out” She turned to Luke and said “What’s your name kid?”
“Luke” he stuttered
“You see?” Ali sounded pleased “I told you earlier it wasn’t him. Roland was taller”
“Well he looks like Roland. And it’s dark” Nora muttered
Ali turned to face Luke and smiled at him. It was a warm and kind smile, and it scared the pants off him.
“Sorry kid” she said “We thought you were someone else”
“A murderer” Nora completed
“Anyway, we’re sorry if we frightened you.”
“Very very very sorry. A thousand times sorry”
Luke finally managed to detach himself from the fence.
“Why?”
“Because we frightened you”
“No, why did you think I was a murderer?”
“Because you have shifty eyes” Ali snapped sarcastically
“Because, in the dark, from far away, you looked bit like a murderer we know. Or knew” Nora explained
“And you didn’t bother to check?”
“No” Nora mumbled. She looked a bit embarrassed.
“We didn’t really bother to check that carefully….” Ali’s voice trailed off.
“We were just amazed that he, the murderer, was coming through the cemetery on Halloween”
“Never look a gift horse in the mouth and everything.”
“So you just saw somebody wandering through the graveyard and immediately jumped to the conclusion that he was this, what’s his name, Roland?
“Well no” Nora said
“We jumped to that conclusion when we saw someone wandering through the cemetery, who looked vaguely like Roland, and who came over to see these graves”
“In that case, all is alright.” Luke laughed bitterly. “So you thought you would just come over and, what, kill him?”
“Kill him?” Ali screeched “Of course not”
“We mean it when we said we weren’t going to hurt you” Nora said, outraged.
“At least not physically” Ali amended
“We were just going to scare you a bit”
“Or a lot. We’re not that picky”
“What are you even doing here? Normal people don’t hang around in cemetery at night” Luke asked
“We’re not exactly normal” Nora murmured
“We could stay the same thing about you. Why are you wandering about here for?”
“I was trying to avoid Darren and his gang.” Luke yelled at them. “Of course, if I’d known the place was infested with crazy girls, I would have taken my chances with him”
“What makes you think we’re crazy?” Nora asked, sounding offended. Luke ignored her
“What was your plan anyway?” he said. “Hang around here all night and hope that this Roland would show up?”
“No” Ali said casually. “Roland showing up was just a bonus”
“Who is this Roland, anyway?”
“We told you, he’s a murderer” Nora snapped
“Who did he murder? Two of your friends? So you thought you would scare him into confessing his crimes?”
“No, we just thought we’d give him a scare.” Ali shrugged.
“Who did he murder? Friends of yours?”
”No, just us” Nora said.
“What!”Luke backed into the fence again “You’re dead?”
“Oh, did we forget to mention this?” Ali smirked, obviously delighted.
“Yeah, we were murdered” Nora explained.
“By Roland”
“A year ago”
“These are our graves” Ali pointed at the tombstones in front of Luke. “That’s why we thought you were Roland. Who else would come and visit the scene of the crime, exactly a year afterwards?”
“You were killed in here?” Luke asked, curious despite himself.
“Maybe. Somewhere around” Nora answered vaguely
“Ok. Sure. Whatever. I’m talking to dead people. Happens every day. To everybody.”
“Are you alright?”Ali sounded concerned. She took a step closer.
“Stay away from me!”Luke screamed. She stopped, taken aback.
“We’re not going to hurt you” she said
“Even we wanted to, we couldn’t” Nora said
“It’s part of the terms and agreements you have to sign before you’re allowed corporal form”
“One of the conditions is that you can’t physically harm a living being”
“You can scare the pants of them”
“And mess their heads up for life”
“But we can’t physically harm a living person”
“Or a fellow dead one, but that’s another set of rules”
“Okay. No problem” Luke nodded, but he didn’t move from the fence.
“If we did, we wouldn’t be able to “come out” for a while.”Ali continued
“As is it, we’re only allowed to come out at Halloween”
“Yeah, as murder victims, we’re only allowed out twice a year. On Halloween, when everybody can come out…”
“And on the day we died” Nora finished
“I thought you said you could only come out on Halloween.”
“Well we died on Halloween.” Ali explained
“We kind of got screwed over on that”
“We appealed to the big-wigs about that”
“It’s stated that we get two occasions a year”
“We asked to have midsummer’s night, or even the spring equinox, but we haven’t heard back yet.”
“So what’s it like when you’re not, you know, in corporal form?”
“Sorry, can’t talk about that” Nora said immediately “In the contract”
“We’ll get our comeuppance if we did. That is the most sacred rule”
“We’re already going to get into trouble for talking to you”
“Strictly speaking, we’re not allowed to interacting with living creatures”
“However, they’ll close their eyes for murder victims. If we interact with our killer”
“If we don’t do it so often.”
“And if we’re discreet about it” Nora’s brow creased in thought “I think that’s all”
“Oh well, can’t be changed” Ali shrugged “No use crying over spilt milk, as they say”
“I don’t think we’ll get into too much trouble anyway” Nora said
“We’ll be fine” Ali said as if to reassure Luke. She looked at the sky “It’s almost dawn. We better get going” she looked at Nora
“Well it was nice talking to you, Luke” Nora said. Ali nodded in agreement.
“Very nice”
“Take care”
“We probably won’t see you again, so have a nice life”
“If you run into Roland, tell him that Ali Rennings and Nora Trenner say hi”
“Just to keep him on his toes”
“Is that all?”Luke asked
“Of course that’s all.” Nora snapped “What were you going to do? Bring justice to the world? Solve the crime, get Roland accused of murder, so that we can move on?”She continued mockingly. Luke frowned at her.
“What she means” Ali explained “is just pass on our message if you see Roland. That’s all.”
“Is there nothing I can do?”
“That’s very sweet of you, but no.” Ali said kindly. “There is no proof and anyway, we’re not allowed to interfere in the affairs of the living”
“We’d be in the soup if you did that.”
“Understand?”
“Sure.”
“Just give him our message, please?”
“No problem” Luke nodded
“We’ll be going then” Nora turned and walked away, Ali following. They soon vanished into the trees.
It was almost fully light before Luke detached himself from the fence, and stumbled the rest of the way across the cemetery. He climbed the wall, walked down the road, climbed the fence into his garden, and finally collapsed on the back steps. He started laughing. He had been such an idiot. He had let himself be taken in by some crazy girls, who had played some sort of prank on him. He couldn’t believe how stupid he had been. Those two were clever. Very clever. They had completely fooled him. He was still sitting there ten minutes later when his older brother, Mark came out and sat down next to him.
“Where were you last night?” He asked “I couldn’t find you. I thought maybe Darren and his gang had got you.”
“No, I was fine. Tell me, Mark, do you know Ali Rennings and Nora Trenner?” Mark went completely still.
“Why do you asked?” he looked alarmed
“Just wondering, that’s all”
“Never heard of them, Luke” he replied tersely.
“Never?”
“Never.” Luke stared at him
“Are you sure?”
“Of course I am” he retorted. He stood up and stormed off into the house. Luke watched him go in amazement. What had gotten into him?
“That is the last time I smoke dodgy pot” he said, shaking his head, before following Mark into the house.
  





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Sat Aug 06, 2011 6:53 pm
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Gryffindor13 says...



That was great! It was funny, intriguing and fantastical! I loved it. For me, it could have gone on forever! That's the sign of a really good story :D
I only have on little criticism:

alissende wrote:He could that way avoid running into Darren and his gang again.

This sentance didn't flow the way a sentence should...Wouldn't it make more sense if you said "He could avoid running into Darren and his gang that way"

I thought it was really quite good. Nicely done! Keep on writing!!
  





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Sat Aug 06, 2011 9:05 pm
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Writersdomain says...



Hey there alissende!

First of all, welcome to YWS! Great to see you around here, posting already. I enjoyed reading this; the dialogue was snappy in parts which really caught my attention. I always like a good bit of dialogue and this had a great deal of it. Ali and Nora are fun characters; I like their whimsical attitude and their severe changes in tone and mood when they think Luke is Roland. I would say they are most developed, if only because of their snappy dialogue.

However, I feel that, despite the great bits of dialogue in this, the piece relies a little too heavily on speech. As I've said, Ali and Nora have somewhat distinct voices, but Luke's dialogue doesn't do much for his characterization and even Ali and Nora fall a bit short character development-wise in my opinion. I get an idea of how they speak from this, but there is little insight into their emotions and character. Due to the lack of body language, the lack of context in which the dialogue is being spoken, it feels like disembodied voices more so than actual characters. I would suggest trying to visualize the conversation that is taking place here; how do Ali and Nora move, being dead and all? How do they interact with their surroundings? How is Luke feeling about all of this? What reaction is he having? Further about Luke, why is he even there? You mention that he's trying to get back to his house to avoid bullies, but why is he out in the first place? Where is he coming from? You don't have to necessarily specify all of this, but it's good to keep these things in mind and write about characters in the context of who they are and where they are, whether the reader knows the answers to those questions or not. That is when characters begin to come alive.

So I would suggest slowing down. Take your time and envision what is happening. You don't have to be over-descriptive and lay out every detail. The snappy dialogue would suffer if you did that, but don't be afraid to flesh things out. In fact, fleshing out Luke's emotions and perception will make Ali and Nora's dialogue seem even more rapid. Right now everything about this is rapid, so Ali and Nora don't really stand out.

I could nit pick, but I'll leave you with that for now. If you edit this and want me to take a second look at it, just let me know!

I hope this helps! Great job! Keep writing, and feel free to PM me if you have any questions.
~ WD
If you desire a review from WD, post here

"All I know, all I'm saying, is that a story finds a storyteller. Not the other way around." ~Neverwas
  





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Tue Aug 09, 2011 9:20 pm
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Froggy4224 says...



I thought that the storyline was pretty good it was humorous, flowed greatly, and had a mysterious/suspenceful air to it.
I loved the two girls and their constant chattering and the way they completed each other. Luke is to baffeled to do anything so he just makes the story all the more entertaining by just going with it and saying a sarcastic comment or two.

However i did see two mistakes:

“Well he is under 80. So he’s quite safe. At least of I think”
when you wrote this i think you ment - "At least I think

Also:
"Luke stared from one to the other. Their dialogue was making his head spin. "He couldn’t work out whether they were taking the piss or not.
I think you ment - He couldn't work out whether they were talking the past or not. - or at least it would make a little more sense this way.

Great story, hoped this helped, and can't wait to read more by you.
You got it, You got it, Some kind of magic, Hypnotic, Hypnotic, You're leaving me breathless
-Paramore, I Caught Myself
  








There is nothing more radical or counter-cultural, at the moment, than laying down one’s cynicism in favour of tender vulnerability.
— John Green