Callie was on the couch, watching TV and struggling to breathe. Abe would be home with her medicine in a little under an hour, right? She sat up, hoping it would help her catch her breath. But her effort was in vain. If anything, the small movement exhausted her and made it even more difficult to breathe.
The weird thing was, Callie and her doctors had no idea how she even got pneumonia. At first she thought it was just a cold, and the doctors said that had she waited another two days to get checked out, her case would’ve become even more severe than it already was. But she couldn’t remember being out in the cold, or even leaving the house all that much. She had been so preoccupied with getting the house ready for family, her home was spotless. Wyatt certainly hadn’t brought home pneumonia from school, the yearly school epidemics hadn’t even begun. And Wyatt was always so vibrant, she was so healthy.
As Callie pondered this, she struggled even further to breathe. She started to panic, remembering words said to her long ago. She knew this would happen. Her breathing became more and more ragged, her breaths fewer and further in between. She’d forgotten about her asthma, the attacks had stopped years prior. Her inhaler was in a box in the attic somewhere, useless and inaccessible. The temperature of the room seemed to drop and her lungs felt numb. She couldn’t breathe… couldn’t brea… couldn’t…
The house laid still. At least, until Abe walked in the room. Seeing his wife cold and dead on the couch made him stop. The blood in his veins froze until he rushed over. Could he revive her? As he took Callie’s hand in his, he knew it was too late. He wasn’t thinking of anything. Not of Wyatt, not of his job or his life, just how ridden with grief he was that his beloved Callie would no longer be with him.
So with sure, steady hands, he got up and walked to the closet where they kept a gun hidden away, Just In Case. The jingle of keys barely registered in his ears as he turned the lock on the door and picked up the solitary gun lying cold and menacing in the middle of the floor.
Abe picked up the gun but didn’t bother shutting the door. Why would he? Who cared about the stupid door when this was the last time he’d ever see it again? Listening to the blood pounding in his ears and the faint thuds of his slushy boots on the floor, he stepped towards his beautiful wife, laying peacefully on the couch. The noise of the TV was faint, and with her blue eyes wide open, still staring at the screen, this could have been any other day. But it wasn’t.
He took Callie’s hand once again, shutting off the TV and looking into the beautiful blue eyes that once belonged to the love of his life. His last thought was that he hoped to see her in heaven as he fought every survival instinct he had, lifted the gun to his temple, and squeezed the trigger.
End of chapter
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139,496 Literary Works • 672,584 Reviews
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: Well...this was a very powerful little scene here, it certainly wasn't pulling any punches whatsoever there with how it jut got right to a very bad situation there...its hard to even imagine what the aftermath of a thing like that could be.
Anyway let's get right to it,
Well this isn't off to a great start there, it looks like someone is on the verge of something potentially terrible happening there...and well, certainly makes us readers take notice right away which is a great sign for a prologue so far....although well, it appears we just might be off to a bit of a sad start here judging by the situation this person appears to be in.
Well, that's certainly a mysterious way for pneumonia to appear, and I wonder if that is perhaps going to tie into the mystery of the story itself here..well..at any rate, things are off to quite a start here. It is an interesting series of thoughts to have at that moment too...it seems to be bordering on sounding forced but it manages to sneak through for the moment.
Oh wow, well, that is a pretty sever attack here, as a result of what appear a horrible combination there with the asthma coming together to either knock her out or even worse here. The fact that she struggles for breath and the story just cuts out seems to suggest the worst has in fact happened here. You've done a great job here really bringing across a picture of helplessness as this person succumbs to the diseases here.
Yup...well the worst possible outcome has indeed happen and it looks like understandably this person is quite upset but hmm...it does seem kind of fast here...the way this part is narrated is a little bit on the fast side and just sorta states that he's upset and thinking only the pain of losing his wife...while I feel like there should probably be more of a reaction described here. This currently doesn't seem to show too much of the emotional impact here...it just feels like its been spelled out a bit too fast here.
Well, that's not a good sign at all, putting aside the lack of reaction in terms of emotional turmoil, well, his reaction as far as actions go is certainly very concerning, it appears something even worse than what happened earlier is about to happen now...which makes me wonder what the actual story might be about here...
Well...that's certainly quite an image there...you can sense the finality that comes with his declaration of the door being opened not being an issue. The descriptions of the blood pounding and how his boots sound faint do a great job of depicting just how single minded he has become in his grief here....well...this is certainly not headed towards any sort of pleasant conclusion here.
Well...that's definitely not ending well...and well...considering this is the prologue I assume the child's story is potentially what we might follow considering that both parents just died here...well...this is definitely a very powerful prologue here.
Aaaaand that's it for this one.
Overall: Overall a pretty powerful start for a story here...I'd still say that the reaction by the man could be drawn out to be a little bit more powerful here...in the initial stages rather than going straight to the ending here....but yeah...other than that, a pretty solid prologue here.
As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.
Stay Safe
Harry
Whoa. That's a tragic ending. For a second, I thought he was going to bury the body or something deranged like that so nobody would think that he had anything to do with it. Poor Callie though. So sad that she died. But this was a very intriguing story and I'm glad I stumbled upon in the All Literary section. Nice work my friend. It is a very good read. -IceWinifredd
Timmy here
I don't know how much time I have to write this review, but here's hoping I can get it finished in the few minutes I have left on here.
Let's jelly.
People with pneumonia aren't in hospitals?So, coming from a perspective that knows nothing about your book (that's what I am going to pretend as, since I know something about it right now), this starts off with a surprising bang. Good. The readers will be a tad confused, and I think their curiosity will keep them going. That's why a strong beginning is so important. They have no love for your characters, since they just met them. The only thing that can keep them going is their curiosity for the upcoming moments. And you dealt that out wonderfully. Tons of things to ponder about.
I think I will just head through this piece and nitpick/talk as I go, okay?
technical nitpick. Reads as two sentences, but is formatted as one.
in-between should be hyphenated.
One thing I will touch on here is your paragraphs. They seem the proper length, but many of them contain separate ideas, of which should have been in there own separate paragraphs. Like this one. The part I pulled out I think should have been taken and given its own paragraph. It is certainly a big enough deal to merit one, and since it's a separate idea, it should have one. Especially when you consider that it's really one of the most powerful paragraphs in the entire piece (her death and Wyatt's). So I think you should pull it out, make it a separate paragraph, and then extrapolate on it a bit more. I honestly had to read the piece twice to understand that she was dead. And I don't know if that's just me, or the piece itself. But I think if you pulled apart this idea and spent more time on it, the paragraph and piece would dramatically improve. This character doesn't have much to give us, so let's have her give us all she can while she is able to, eh?
One thing I think you could have done better were the characters. Okay, that isn't true. With the short time you had them, you developed the characters well. But with the names and that you just casually introduced them by throwing their names in there. I had difficulty separating them and giving them their own separate entities. Especially Wyatt. Who is he (I know it's a she, but from a new reader's perspective) and what does she have to do with Callie? Really, the two characters that muddled together and made it difficult to separate were Wyatt and Abe because you were talking about Abe the entire time, saying what he was doing and all that, and then you mentioned Wyatt and I was like, "whaaa?" I think you could just give them the smallest of introductions - like say who Wyatt is. She is her daughter. So you could give us some small tidbit of what kind of a person she is, or maybe her mother could say something about her grades and how her father, Abe, was proud of her or something. Just some way we can distinguish them and place them where they truly belong in the story.
I think this piece could have benefited from just the smallest bit of more description. And when I mean descriptions, I don't mean grandiose, prosish descriptions of the window curtains. I mean like the parts above. What told him it was too late? I would think the coldness of her hand. How it felt to his touch. In fact, many people (especially those in war) can just feel death when walking into a room. So I think you could add more sensory description in these parts, which would add a lot to the visual side of things for us, too.
Where is his despair? He is going about this like he is on his way to McDonalds. Except for the part where he pulled the gun from the closet, I couldn't really feel his emotions or despair flooding through his actions and plot like I thought they would be. I think perhaps more tears and angry words, and perhaps a bit of language (not too much. xD) would benefit this situation. Especially his tears. And his anger. Really show his emotions in this scene and show us he is truly despairing of life. Because shooting one's self demands something that only those despairing of life have.
This was a wonderful beginning, Rose. It asked me a lot of questions, and really sucked me in to the story.
The first characters we know, and they had to die.I think this is a beginning that will really pull all readers in, because there is tragedy and sadness immediately, and admit if or not, readers live for that. It's why we continue - because we're curious about what'll happen next. And if you continue to thrust your characters down, that is what will happen.Keep it up. I think this was an amazing beginning.
<3
~Darth Timmyjake