z

Young Writers Society


16+

Frostbite

by Elfboy


Warning: This work has been rated 16+.

It didn't come with a bang. It didn't come in threatening waves, either. In fact, we didn't even really notice that it came at all until it refused to leave. This was all very disappointing to me-- If the world was going to end, I wanted at least to get a good show out of it! But alas, the Frost didn't much care what I thought of it.

It hadn't been a frightening ordeal, just a snow like any other. It came, the weather stations predicted it like they always do, life went on. We didn't start worrying when it kept getting lower, either-- just one of those crazy storms we all get every so often, right?

We had a good when Texas ended up with a pile of snow a foot deep, the poor blokes there didn't know what to do with the cold-- I swear, they thought they were about to die of the cold! The rest of us mocked them for it, but that was before we realized they might be right.

After a week of negative temperatures, even in the midwest we knew something was wrong. Nobody really said anything, but we all wanted the warmth back, as well as a refund from that fraud of a weatherhog, Puncxutawny Phil. It was almost Spring after all, and it was high time we saw some blossoms. Besides that, the roads were all frozen over, and those of us living away from the cities were running out of food.

The day the pipes froze was a bad one for us. Without running water, we had to melt snow to drink, and we could barely cook any of the food we had left. It was all dried goods, beans and rice and such, and it took so much effort just to feed my family two meals a day. But we all persevered, 'it's all going to be over soon' we told eachother. You may pause here to appreciate our timely use of dramatic irony.

We all continued on for another week like normal. We kept in touch on the internet, and social media was full of jokes and memes mocking the unseasonable temperatures as they kept dropping, by now getting below highs of negative fifteen where I lived. Everyone's favorite joke became 'how's the weather?'

It took us another two weeks to stop chuckling about it. The ice wasn't going away, and it began growing too thick on the power lines-- everyone I knew kept vanishing from the internet as their electricity got cut off. Some of them, the ones with data plans, kept in touch for a day or two with their phones, laughing it off and telling us that the power company was on its way, they'd fix it soon. They didn't. Sooner or later they died-- the batteries I mean-- and I never saw them again.

Eventually, of course, our lines got torn down by the cold too. I still had my phone, but that was the least of our concern now, as our only heat in the house was electric, and so was our stove. We put blankets over the windows and doors, and only opened them up when we ran out of melted snow to gather more. We couldn't actually melt the snow anymore, or cook our food, so we ended up having to eat the ice like dry cereal, usually with uncooked beans mixed in. We weren't quite starving, but we were close to it.

The power company promised to restore electricity soon, but we weren't terribly surprised when we heard the repair truck crash in the valley below us. Me and my father went out to try to help the driver, but he was dead before we got there. We buried him in our back yard, my father giving him a rudimentary funeral blessing. We stripped the truck of everything useful, and took the man's phone and coat, and we rejoiced when we discovered it held a hand warmer in the left pocket.

We used the warmer to melt ice to drink and thaw our hands after the digging left them cold and nearly frostbitten. The phone-- ours had all died days ago-- wasn't much good to us, but it did tell us the new forecast; Negative thirty-four degrees. We no longer thought it would get better soon.

Six days and the last of the dried food ran out. It was far too cold to survive the ten-mile walk to town, and for a few days we all tried to survive without anything, hoping vainly something would change. It didn't. On the fourth day of hunger, my father unburied the body.

The pocket warmer is dead now, and one of my sisters has been unconscious for almost twenty-four hours. We're all huddling around her with every blanket in the house, but we're not much warmer than her... I deny it with every bone in my body, but I know she's dying. We're all dying. I'm so cold. My fingers are blackening. I'm starving, and I haven't had fluid in days. All I have the strength left to do is hold her frigid body tight in my arms and let the droplets freeze on my cheeks.

I'm cold.


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1232 Reviews


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Wed Jan 12, 2022 9:20 am
MailicedeNamedy wrote a review...



Hi Elfboy,

Mailice here with a short review! :D

This is a very dramatic and well-written story (if you can call it that) that you have written down here. I like how you've developed a kind of structure here, and how everything gets worse from section to section. It seems like a kind of report you've written without jumping too much into a side of good or bad, but writing something with a certain neutrality here.

I think the structure is very good and I also like the writing style. I'm probably a bit late to review your work here, but it was a very topical work when it was published, due to the special weather events. I think your descriptions are good and realistic and it's easier for the reader to get into the story than a documentary or news report. You go into the small details and create a direct link between the reader and the writer who experienced it. Above all, you manage to give the reader a little moment of shock with expressive words and sometimes just short comments.

One thing I just noticed and I have no idea if it's right or not:

We had a good when Texas ended up with a pile of snow a foot deep


Shouldn't the "a" here be replaced by an "it" or isn't "time" missing after the "good"? The sentence itself reads as if something is missing.

In summary, it was a very realistic and detailed narrative. I especially like how this tension builds and builds the further you read.

Have fun writing!

Mailice




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26 Reviews


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Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:23 am
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TheOffBroadwayAuthor wrote a review...



You had me on the edge of my seat. Reminds me of "To Build a Fire", but I was much more invested in this protagonist. Despite knowing nothing about them, the story was so real and detailed that I just wanted someone to save this family from the horrors they were facing. Just... thank you for this experience.




Elfboy says...


I'm glad you liked it! Thanks for reading!



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12 Reviews


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Fri Feb 19, 2021 3:51 am
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5h4d0W wrote a review...



Well first of all, im not good with writing reviews of literature works because i was never teached to do so. But here goes nothing. At the first paragraph, my initial thoughts are wow this might be good stuff to read but as i dived deeper into the story, it starts to became a dark story with a very sad ending incoming. But in case you haven't realize (or maybe you did, idk) the story here actually perfectly reflects how humanity have been going with the current pandemic we are dealing with (of course, its not as dark as yours).

Remember when covid 19 is finally annouced last year? Truth is, it already started since december 2019 (from a source that i read,its from a pdf file from WHO website btw) so the first paragraph perfectly depicts how it just came out of nowhere, without any warning.

As we dive into the story, you also write about how the people in the story are not taking the current situation seriously, just like how we make memes about covid (i still laugh to those memes though). And that's pretty much what i can say about this story as a whole, about how you unconsciously (or you are conscious about it) wrote a perfect depiction how we are dealing with this pandemic.

So keep up the good work and stay safe ok?




5h4d0W says...


I forgot to add another point about how the people in this story are forced to stay home due to the weather, just like how we are forced to stay home due to the pandemic so that's my lost for not adding that up in my review. LOL.



Elfboy says...


Thank you so much for the review! Yeah I was definitely conscious to the parallels between the story and COVID, as well as the environmental crisis we've been going through for decades, I'm glad to see you caught that! I was trying to do my best to paint a very small picture of a very large topic, it's nice to see it's not too muddled. Thanks for the review, and for your time!



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Wed Feb 17, 2021 10:28 pm
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spiral wrote a review...



All I have to say is wow.
This is really good, it's written really nicely and taking inspiration from real life events and making them horror oriented is awful, but in a good way. And it works really well!
The slow progression from how something simple turns into something awfully horrific is really nice, and keeps the reader on edge.

A few things I really liked :

"Sooner or later they died-- the batteries I mean..."
i love the way you worded this, you start off almost worrying the reader, then quickly clear it up. it works really well.

"On the fourth day of hunger, my father unburied the body."
this is really simple, but is really interesting.

and also just the way you ended it. it was simple and gets the point across, and overall is just really nice.

The only actually critique i have here is this sentence,
"Eventually, of course, our lines got torn down the cold too."
it should probably be "...torn down by the cold too."


but overall, i really like this !




Elfboy says...


Thank you so much! I'm really glad you liked it! And whoops, thanks for catching that typo, I made the edit.

Thank you again, Spiral!



nightshadows says...


Elfboy you are such a talented writer! Continue writing because your stories are ones that will forever be in my heart!



Elfboy says...


@V@nightshade thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed it, thanks for reading!




you should no this
— Hijinks