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She the Skeleton



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Tue Jan 03, 2012 7:47 am
Lavvie says...



Spoiler! :
Sort of... something. I'm not sure. But I just wrote with no ideas, no thoughts. May be slightly disturbing to some? I'm not sure. You can think how you want when reading this.



She can’t get past the crows; they’re blocking her in. She’s pressed herself up against the wall, grimy with dirt and life and death. The crows are closing in, little feet tapping across the metal floor. The fear in her eyes is plain, desperate, pleading. They’re too green, almost artificially so, from the shining tears illuminating their colour. One crow flies in at last, beak opened slightly to utter a shrill cry and she closes her eyes. She hides.

*

Now she’s standing in a street, in nothing but a nightgown. The moon’s light is not shining, but hidden instead behind clouds. There’s no light to guide her way, let alone to help. She moves one dainty, skeletal foot forward. Heel then toes fall onto the cool pavement. But, no, it’s not cool nor is it the harshness of pavement. Instead she is now stepping on hot, roiling liquid fire, red and orange and yellow. It wraps around her foot, burning, scalding, until nothing is left but clean white bones. It fires its way up her leg, detaching the skin from her skeletal figure. And she just peels away, like there was nothing there in the first place.

*

It’s dark and quiet now. She can feel nothing except for her weightlessness. Why is she so light? Her arms, she moves down to her side and then run from her head, over her waist, her hips, her legs, down to the very tip of her toes. She is nothing. She is just bone and marrow; there is no flesh. And suddenly there is bright light, warm like the sun. It’s no sun, though, and instead the hanging sphere is a deep, blood red in a place of blinding white. It drips and the red droplet falls, feeling like eternity, before dropping down onto the white. More red falls until it forms a river with violent speed and it runs down toward her. She screams and begins to run, but somewhere she trips and falls and she breaks into a million bones and pieces. Right before her eyes is her skeleton hand and its index finger is tapping on the white. It’s impatient.

*

She can feel teeth. They scrape and grate and dig down into the center. It’s painful, a hot, white pain that sears into her very center. And then it multiplies by two, three, four and five. She realizes it is not she actually being bitten, but her bones. She cannot see, but she can feel now, unlike when in the white world. They bite deeper and she feels a snap, and then she is nothing again but just a pile of clean, white bones.

*

White and black all over. There is pain, there is blood, there is calm and there is senselessness. In all honesty, she can’t feel a thing. She loathes that.


What is to give light must endure burning. – Viktor Frankl
  





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Tue Jan 03, 2012 10:23 am
Demeter says...



Hi, Lav-Lav!

This was rather intense. I really liked the beginning; it was creepy, which I like, and sucked me in, which is obviously what you want.

I think that the beginning was perhaps the strongest part of this story and I'd like to say that the credit goes to the crows. Somehow I found the crows more interesting than almost anything else here, and I found myself wanting to read about them rather than the lights and colours in the middle part.

The ending paragraphs were also pretty good, which makes the two middle ones the weakest. Actually I have to say that I didn't... really have a consistent idea of what this was about (more like many vague thoughts of what it could have been), so I'm basing my opinions on the overall style of the paragraphs.

I think that this might be even stronger if you included some less intense scenes in between the intense ones, which you write very well by the way! I just think that adding some contrast would create more... contrast? xD I have a point, I swear. I just can't seem to be able to make it.

What I mean is, when you have something good, it's only that good to some extent. When there's too much of it, it becomes almost tedious, and you start wishing there was something different. And "good" is perhaps the wrong word, because you can never wish for less "good" and more "not good", that doesn't make sense. Perhaps I should've said "a certain style" or something -- I'm going to shut up now. Please PM me if you have any questions, because I really don't blame you if you do.


Demeter
x
"Your jokes are scarier than your earrings." -Twit

"14. Pretend like you would want him even if he wasn't a prince. (Yeah, right.)" -How to Make a Guy Like You - Disney Princess Style

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Tue Jan 03, 2012 2:45 pm
AngerManagement says...



Yo :D

I like this, but then again it confuses me. I adore the way it's broken up into paragraph and it has the feel of dream sequences, but at the same time this is its undoing. The short paragraphs make it so nothing is really revealed making this plotless, there is no point to it. The character is simply traumatised, nothing but bone, she feels pain and yet she does not, but that's all that is known. She's never more than a skeleton --if you get what I mean. There is no depth.

My favourite bits of this are the second and last paragraphs, there's something about them that hits the right consistency of imagery and feeling, they strike some resonance within me. I care more about them and they're extremely well written. But in some of the others it's just Lady Skeleton -my new name for her- being in pain, running from something, and a lot of morbid imagery. It could get boring.

One crow flies in at last
I thought the crows were inside already so this kinda threw me off xD

Er, what else do I have to say. I liked this, like really liked this. The imagery was good as was the idea behind it.

Hope this helped

Anger :D
Dont tell me the moon is shining, show me the glint of light on broken glass.

Anton Chekov
  





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Tue Jan 03, 2012 4:40 pm
Ranger Hawk says...



Hey Lavvie! Your title caught my eye and once I started reading, I couldn't stop!

As an overall impression, I really really like this. Your descriptions were fantastic; I could clearly picture the scenes you were depicting, and the imagery was very vivid and believable (insofar as much as it could be with this story setting). I felt like I was reading a series of paintings, if that makes sense, and I loved it.

Now, as far as this goes story-wise, there really isn't anything substantial. I have no idea if this is supposed to be a series of dreams, or if it's a metaphorical description of some inward issues that this woman has. I personally don't feel like it matters too much what the storyline behind this is, because I think the descriptions are strong enough to hold their own. Some people might require clarification as to the background and main point of this tale, in which case it'd be nice to have a little more information about the woman. But that's just a matter of opinion of your readers.

Right before her eyes is her skeleton hand and its index finger is tapping on the white. It’s impatient.

As much as I love this part, with the tapping finger, I found it a little odd to imagine that somehow, despite her being in a million pieces, she can still see. Does she have eyeballs that had rolled out and somehow still relay images to her brain? Is her skull intact just a fragment of it, a part of which contains her eyes? And come to think of it, how is the hand still intact, if she's supposedly shattered? Forgive me for being so nitpicky; it's the science part of me coming out, I suppose. :P

She can feel teeth. They scrape and grate and dig down into the center. It’s painful, a hot, white pain that sears into her very center. And then it multiplies by two, three, four and five. She realizes it is not she actually being bitten, but her bones. She cannot see, but she can feel now, unlike when in the white world. They bite deeper and she feels a snap, and then she is nothing again but just a pile of clean, white bones.

This was the paragraph I had a hard time with. I had an image of rats scraping away at the bone, trying to get to the marrow inside, but it got rather confusing, especially towards the end. It didn't make sense that she'd think she's being bitten, but her bones are; they're essentially her, or at least a part of her, right? I just feel like it doesn't quite flow as far as sense-wise. I also don't get what you mean by "she is a pile of bones again"; do you mean that the rats, or whatever, somehow made her whole again?

Aside from those few nitpicks, I really had no problem at all with the piece. I think you did a great job; it's exactly the sort of story and imagery I love to read and see. I really enjoyed this. Keep up the great work! And let me know if you have any questions or whatnot about anything I've said.

Cheers!
~Hawk
There are two kinds of folks who sit around thinking about how to kill people:
psychopaths and mystery writers.

I'm the kind that pays better.
~Rick Castle
  








I exist as I am, that is enough
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