On the first of November, midnight, I was a flower withering in the wind. This is the day I figured out that my friend had died without reason. His death is the moon behind the clouds of the night sky, and it is something I yearn for. He has been my one and only, and I will not allow him to disappear in a haze. A clown must’ve trapped him in his hat and turned him into a crow.
We do not live in a house because we are too poor to afford one. We are 12-year-old bastards that wander around places. We ran away from our orphanage due to the fact that our keeper beat us up multiple times in the night. Last night, we slept in between the maple trees at the park. As early as 2 in the morning, he left without question. This morning I went on a search for him. He wasn’t where we or he would usually go.
He wasn’t at the abandoned garden at the back of the mall. He wasn’t in the playground in the outskirts of town. He surely wasn’t on the rooftop of the mall where we used to climb on and run around. He wasn’t in the coffee shop that gave us free food. Neither was he in front of the television and record store. I do not want to give up on searching for him yet my body asks for sleep. “This isn’t over yet! I need my friend!”
I step into places that I am not supposed to be in. Behind the factory, I climbed over the barricades that had a sign that said “HAZARD, DO NOT CROSS!!!” I go in between two poles that seem to have electricity fueled by them. I ran into the dark forests to find him. A flashlight that I stole from the drug store was clicked by me to see. I shine around the forest. I cough at the distasteful scent of chemicals, consuming my lungs.
The smell made me fall at my feet. My vision was blurry. I support myself by standing and holding on to a tree. I blink slowly, my vision was rainbows in darker hues that match the evergreen saplings. “Woah.” I see a poster stuck to the tree, saying my friend is missing, with his name, his face in it. My face was in confusion. He is a stray in the wind. This is collusion or an illusion. Why would he?
I cry in frustration. He must’ve walked through the forest.
Suddenly, wind gushes from a direction then I fall into a closed dark place. A gasp went out of my mouth. My flashlight wasn’t present. I tried searching around but my eyes were dreaded, bathing in the darkness.
"Hello, hello." I say as it echoes around this place. My hands reached to grab something, but there was nothing.
I run. "Hello, hello!"
A boom of laughter echoes as I stop.
"You can't escape." A whisper runs in my ear as I flinch.
Mirrors surround me, left to right. I don't know what to do.
"It's endless right?" The mysterious voice talked to me again.
Black smoke clouds up in the air. It suffocates me. A cough went out of my throat, breathing slowly, blurring in my eyesight. I grunt and silently weep out of fear. My heart pounds on my chest in panic. “Help!”
“There is no help needed.” The voice merges and subtly then vaguely sounds like my friend. “You’re just a foolish and worthless kid!”
He seems to growl at me as I wince. “This isn’t you.”
"You will just die slowly and painfully." His voice switches up to the monster I face every time I try to go to bed. "I will tear you up slowly."
“Please!” I sob. “I want my friend back!”
A flicker of red lights shine in the hallways of the maze. Spiders crawl up the walls and turn their path towards me. They crawl on me. Their legs tickle my skin and their mouths pinch it while they enter my body. I look up, seeing a light as it wanders behind two big doors. The monster holds my friend, who is trying to escape. His bones seem to crack at the grip of the monster. He is struggling like…me.
"Please." I shiver in fear as a tear trickles down from my eye. "Find me."
The mirrors crack as the maze quakes. The floor breaks into ashes, the eternal pain has left my body. I fell into the graveyard. As I fall, I hear my friend calling me. “Cupcake, wait!”
Thick blood runs down from my mouth as my ear rings a sound. I scream but it's muffled. My head flashes my memories with him fighting reality.
I feel a fallen leaf in my right hand on an autumn morning. The bright sun right in front of my eyes and a sharp sound run through the air. Suddenly everything is alright.
I see my dear friend's gravestone in front of me and the forest behind it burning. When I touch the stone, I feel more warmth.
"It's alright." His voice tells me something. "I have died the night of October 31, 2022. I am sorry you have no one by your side, but I am sure someone is willing to be physically there for you. Because you are a kind girl. Like they used to say, a pearl in the ocean.”
My tears and saliva bounce off my face as I sob. “Why did you leave me? I want to be yours.”
“I never left you, cupcake.” He chuckled as I felt his hand hold my face, though I didn’t see. “I am yours and only yours. Up in the skies, every morning and night, I watch you. Just look up, you will find me in the stars up in the heavens. Don't shiver in fear, I have found you now wake, my dear friend. I love you."
The warmth disappeared. It's just me and myself in an autumn forest. No fire, no graveyard, no pain. He floats away in the river of my tears. The river I have cried for him. If I could talk to him again, I would say thank you for the hope, and thank you for finding me and living in this cruel world. Rest in heaven, one day, I will meet you again. You and I will be happy together. I love you too.
I wake in my world, all I thought was nothing will ever tear us apart. Let our world collide.
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125,021 Literary Works • 672,738 Reviews
Hello! Here to review!
Is this the whole piece or just a part of a bigger story? If its the whole piece, there needs to be more context for it to evoke any sort of emotion from your reader.
' I sleep in the midnight with the full moon' - 'in the midnight' is weird phrasing. and
'with the full moon' sounds like they're cradling the moon. Maybe 'I sleep under the full moon one October night.'
The jumping around scenery gives a dreamlike quality to the piece but, again, without real context its just a jumble of random stuff.
What's the meaning of the maze and mirrors? Is it about them looking into themselves? Do they feel trapped by something in life? Does the maze signify that they're lost?
It's clear that the narrator is mourning this dear friend but because we have no idea what their relationship was, who this friend is, how they died, anything. Again, it's just a snapshot of a scene that feels like it has no relevance.
'I wake in my world, all I thought was nothing will ever tear us apart.' - you've jumped into past tense here, I don't know if that's intentional. You did it a few other times throughout the piece. Is the piece set in present or past tense?
If you build on the piece, flesh it out a bit, it could be really interesting.
Hope this helps
Thank you for your review. I would like to work out on this story more. And the meaning of the maze and the mirror is that the main character is lost and just wants to meet their friend again. This character is having a nightmare about their dead best friend and it occurs many nights. The line: "I wake in my world, all I thought was nothing will ever tear us apart." Is saying that she wakes up from her dream and thought that when she meets her friend again, nothing will separate them from each other. I hope you understand now. Thabm you again for your review!
I understand that she misses her friend, what I was saying was that the reader doesn't feel anything because we don't know these people. Who are they? Who is the narrator? Who is the friend? What was their friendship like? How did the friend die? How old are they? That sort of fleshing out of the story will add more layers and make your story feel more like a snapshot of a person's life rather than a vague dream and a stranger missing a dead stranger.
Oh, okay. Got it! I will try to write out new stories, or even chapters making it a novel already related to this when I find the words to explain how the friendship went like and how the dead friend died.
Hi Jisrahinav.
I'd like to share some thoughts after reading your story.
Overall impression:
You employ a surreal use of immersive prose. The story is enigmatic with limited context on the setting and the characters, namely the protagonist and his deceased friend.
However, there is a beauty to the mystery, with the dream not clearly defined as such until the protagonist wakes up from it. This makes the nightmare feel all the more real, all the more terrifying.
I like how you jump straight into the conflict, though at first I was at a loss for what all was transpiring within the scene. The sentences read like flurries of madness, one thought varying from the next. This created an immersive experience by disorienting the reader just as the protagonist was disoriented within the nightmare dreamscape.
There is a malevolent entity present within the nightmare that isn’t clearly defined and I would have loved to have seen more context into what it symbolized to add an extra layer to your story. This description wouldn’t necessarily need to be explained in the midst of the action, it could come after the protagonist wakes up.
This context would provide even more depth to your story, especially since from what I understand, the dominating fear emanates from losing his friend. Perhaps, the entity represents fear itself, or loss? That’s some food for thought.
Specific impressions:
“I sleep in the midnight with the full moon on one October night.” (I like the way you personify the moon here. I imagine the protagonist sleeping beside the moon in the night sky as though they share the same bed, which sets an ethereal tone for your story.)
There is a shift in tone within the first paragraph, and suddenly there is a tension that I don’t fully understand. I can see how you might be withholding certain details to provide dramatic effect, but without context for where the character is or who they are running from, I am feel unable to connect with the story.
“An gasp went out of my mouth.” (This is one of a few instances where an “an” is used where an “a” should be to make the sentence grammatically correct. I would recommend reading through your story again to correct these.)
“A flicker of red lights shine in the hallways of the maze. Spiders crawl up the walls and turn their path towards me.” (This is great imagery and evokes a chilling tone.)
“‘Please.’ I shiver in fear as a tear trickled down from my eye. ‘Find me.’" (Remember to keep your tense consistent throughout the story. I noticed you slipped into past-tense here when up to this point your story has been written in present-tense. Correcting this will help maintain consistency and clarity in your style.)
I was shocked at the end when the protagonist’s deceased friend spoke to him beyond the grave. Is his voice speaking directly from the grave or reverberating in the protagonist’s mind?
Did his friend wake him from the nightmare? Was he the one the protagonist was crying out to for help when he was running from the mysterious entity? This added element brings a whole new layer to the story because the nightmare could then serve as a symbol for loss or fear of living without his friend.
You also described a forest burning in the background and I’m not sure what purpose that served in the story. It seemed to distract more than add to the scene without having a defined relevance. If anything it evokes a heavy tone of trees dying while the protagonist gets a final goodbye from his dead friend.
All in all, this story felt more like an experience than a read. I really enjoyed your use of imagery and an immersive style that brought your writing to life.
Thanks for sharing!
Poetry Misfit
Thank you for your review!
First of all, it's a girl narrating and the guy who was speaking to her in the maze was not her friend, it was a another guy who always speaks to her in these type of nightmares. Her friend wasn't waking her up from the nightmare, he's part of the dream. Her friend's voice is speaking directly from the grave.
Also, thank you for helping me find errors because I felt like their was something incorrect in my grammar. I hope you have a good day and merry Christmas!
Hi Jisrahinav.
I appreciate your response to my review of your story, and I apologize for assuming the gender of your protagonist. I'm curious to know what inspired this story?
Merry Christmas to you as well!
Hi again!
Oh, it's okay. An actual dream inspired me and a guy from a K-pop group, Tomorrow X Together.
Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),
Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!
First Impression: This is a lovely little piece here. You draw us in quite beautifully from the start and then towards the end it really ends up going an entire emotional rollercoaster there. I really loved the way this went about doing that.
Anyway let's get right to it,
This is a lovely start here. Very eerie and the somewhat low description almost works in its favor here because we have our character almost in this dark void of sorts with just these vague spooky descriptors to guide us on and it really sets a powerful and rather dark stage for the rest of this piece to play out.
The dialogue definitely isn't cutting any corners about being as terrifying as possible here and once again that minimal sort of imagery that's not really grounded in anything central makes for a powerful combination to really immerse us right into the danger of this situation and I love it.
Oooh well this is an interesting one, we get the sense of perhaps just one singular moment of comfort amidst all the darkness trying so hard to engulf this all. That's pretty nicely placed I think. You establish all the right emotions quite nicely before we see this one little flicker of hope and we realize a little more clearly what exactly is going on here.
This is a beautiful little moment to end on here I think. You really managed to come in a bit of a full circle on that I think, starting off with the danger of it, the moment of clarity where we realize exactly what's happening and then that powerful message there before we end up here.
Aaaaand that's it for this one.
Overall: Overall, I think you did a pretty solid job on this one. Even though I'm not particularly familiar with what fandom this is from I still found myself very much enjoying this as a piece.
As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.
Stay Safe
Harry
Thank you for your review!
You're Welcome!!