A/N: Edited this majorly.
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The names on your walls are all you have beside the screaming victims of your father. You think about the choices you have to make your final decision. But you're trapped and you cannot escape.
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Cling. I shivered as the metal of the blade hit the rapidly spinning mechanic.
"Don't rush it." Father always told me, and I would I steady myself and continued to sharpen the blades that were the murderous weapons father used to terminate.
"You use swift movements to sharpen. To kill. To run."
To kill... I shivered again. The screams of all his victims echoed in a muffled basement. Their souls seeming to linger within the room, never able to leave. They're trapped.
"Jasper, how many knives have you sharpened?" Father came down the stairs and rounded the corner to see me holding his blades up for him. I looked at Father, handing all of them to him as the nervous chills poked at my spine. I never spoke to Father. I can’t speak. He grinned at me and nodded in approval as if I needed it.
“Thank you, dear.” Do not call me dear, Father.
I wish I could tell him he’s insane, that killing people is not how you make a living. But he can’t hear me.
Father turned away, setting his knives upon a table. I turned off the blade sharpener and crept next to him. He turned to me and raised an eyebrow. "Interested in my work, are you?" I glared at him and backed away, fiddling with my fingers as I clasped my hands. Father looked back at me and motioned for me to leave. It was time for him to bring someone new in. A new soul added to our basement. A new name added to my wall.
I turned to twirl on the heels of my feet and began to walk to my room, running my finger against my wall as I stumbled to my bed. Amy. Rico. Grace. Rodger. Kevin. I stared at the names as I settled on my bed, pulling my legs to my chest and pressing my back to my wall. There were hundreds of names, and every night I added a new one. Two years worth of names and the only nights he never killed was my birthday and Mellany's. A name in red was a name in vain. Father would come to my room and tell me their name and age just so I could know. He demanded I stop writing the names, but I don't. It's a reminder to me that I cannot escape the horror I live upon. He traps me and I cannot escape.
These whispers turn to screams in my head. They scream and plead for any help they can get and I sit there in silence. I cannot help them. They are the voice of the shadows that scream my name and I am the silence that cannot speak.
My mother's name stared me in the face as I drew blank. Mellany. Everything was silent as I stared at her name, remembering her death, until a scream came from the basement and I cringed. I fought the noise like it was a battle. It comes to this point every night. My heart pounds like a little drummer boy pounding on his drum, overpowering the gun shots in a war zone. Then it's like time stops and everything freezes. Everything goes silent and there's absolutely no sound.
The sound of the creaking floor echos and my door swings open. "Henry. Age 15." I looked at father with sorrow. Not because he was nearly saddened, but because the kid was 15. My age. I pushed my legs forward and got up, grabbing my marker. I slowly wrote Henry on my wall and I sighed as I did so. The name so defiant from the others because it was fresh. I dropped the marker and slipped out of my room, creeping downstairs to see Henry. I saw the bloodstains from father dragging the body. He must've taken it away quicker than normal. I walked over to his table and grabbed his biggest knife. I walked up stairs, watching my every move as I inched toward the side of the front door. It was time someone put an end to this.
I waited. I waited for my father to open the front door but time slowed and everything became dead silent. The front door flew open and I lunged the knife forward and rammed straight into the door. Father stared at me in disbelief as he watched his daughter try to kill him. His bloody hands flung toward me and grabbed my neck, squeezing it. My hands flung up to his, trying to pull his hands away. I tugged and tried to pull away. His grip only got harder and I choked. He ripped the knife from the door and impaled my stomach with the sharpened blade.
"That was a mistake, Jasper." he growled, his eyes flaming with glory and pain as he strangled his only daughter that he had hoped wouldn't be like this.
Please, leave the names, father. It's your reminder from me. I choked, grasping my stomach now. Blood poured from my mouth and I felt pain rush over my entire body.
"Goodbye, Jasper Eve." Father growled. Pain masked his words and I looked at him.
You think about the choices you have to make your final decision. This is yours. It was always yours.
I guess I cannot escape...
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125,008 Literary Works • 672,832 Reviews
Heya, babe. Casanova here to do a review for you!
I would switch the second father to,"he," because it just plain sounds weird to repeat it in one sentence. Onward.
In this short span you use father three times. I would suggest against it, and start using pronouns like,"he,"him," or,"his," or just Father's name. Anyway, onward.
I think I'll do an overall thing now. Anyway, I find that this short story goes by a little too quickly. Your details are there, but it just seems in a rushed way. I would say take a step back and taking a look at what you're writing. What else can you add? Is there anything else you can add to the middle, between the beginning and the end? Is there anything that would make sense, or anything that you rushed? I find that these are really good questions and something I would think on if I were you.
The next thing would be your dialogue. It just seems really stiff, and I would suggest evening it out. What I mean is just let it flow naturally if you add it all. It might really help my first point out as well.
Anyway, overall I find that this is an interesting short story that could use some work done.
I think that's all I have to say on this one and I hope it helped.
Keep on doing what you're doing and keep on keeping on.
Love, Matt
.........creepy, but overall a good read. I really felt the pain and agony that poor baby went through. You remind me of my friend up here who also writes these kind of stories. It definitely sent chills down my spine. I would like to say at this time you missed a couple of key punctuation, but besides that you wrote pretty neat and clear. I understood the story and its plot. keep on writing.
Hey, sunshine!
Woah! This is incredible, and I love it(not the killing! the writing!!).
I found quite a few spelling and grammatical errors, which I have corrected below, such as:
"continued to sharpen the blades that were the murderous weaponS"
"I wish I could tell him that he’s insane, that killing people is not how you make a living."
"walked nearer" ; "I walked into my room" - Always proofread before publishing!
"never being able to leave"
I'm just going to give some stylistic advice here! Whenever you're finished writing a piece, highlight all of the general verbs (ran, walked, talked) and change them (raced, creeped, blurted out)! I like to use Thesaurus.com to help me with that. In the quote above, I would change it to "never able to leave," or just saying, "trapped" right there!
In the beginning of the piece, I feel that there is an over-repetition of "swift movements". All right, we got it, Jasper has to be swift when he's moving, but there's no need to say it three times! Sometimes, repetition can be used to emphasize a recurring point or theme, but in this case, once would be fine.
Also, it would be super helpful to the reader if you provided a little more background to the father. We're still left with so many questions! Why must he kill for a living? What is his living?? Why did he have to kill his wife? Why does he always tell Jasper the name and age of each victim if he knows Jasper always writes their names on the wall (especially when the father doesn't like Jasper doing so?).
Just a suggestion: Maybe you could craft the father into some top-secret super-spy agent who requires his mute daughter to log each and every victim onto a chart. AAaaaand maybe Mellany betrayed them?
Overall, this piece stood out to me because of its descriptive imagery. I loved your use of the words in italics. They really added to the mood/atmosphere of the work.
Keep writing, beautiful!
If possible, don’t tell the reader about what her father does until later in the story. It keeps them interested!
“my father used to kill the victims he took in” This is a bit long, don’t you think? It would be easier to read if you stopped the sentence after the word “kill”.
“Swift movements. That was always what father said.” Why is this here? You’ve already said that he’s told you that.
How long has she been living with her father? Depending on that, she should either have become numb or figured out how to block out the screams.
What was he doing upstairs? You made it seem like he was killing people in the basement.
You might want to elaborate on why she can’t speak. Did her father sew her mouth closed or removed her tongue? Is she a mute? Or can she speak but just does not want to?
You said he makes a living doing this? I’m assuming he’s a mercenary then?
Again, you should elaborate. Is her dad deaf or does he just chooses to ignore her? If he’s just ignoring her, why would he ask how many knives she had sharpened? It would be more in character for him to just take the knives without talking to her.
What gave him an idea that she was interested? Did she look at the knives in awe or something? Details please.
If she really hates what he’s doing, the last thing she’d want to do is write the names of the victims on her wall. She’d be trying to forget about those people and maybe even convince her self that everything is okay.
Why would she write the name while her dad is watching? I thought he hated her doing it.
If he’s a mercenary there has to be a reason why someone paid him to kill. So what did a 15 year old kid do?
Why she want to see the body? You character sounds like a masochist who enjoys hurting herself.
He’s killed, what? 6 people now? She should’ve known she couldn’t defeat him without a well thought out plan, if that. Not only does he has way more fighting experience than she does, he’s also got a height and weight advantage as well.
I agree with the dad on this one. That was a very bad mistake.
Definitely needs some reworking, but it has potential! I'd love to read it again after you've fixed some things!
Happy writing!