The small child glanced nervously at the blank sheet of paper in front of him. He studied it cautiously. It scared him a little-the possibilities.
The potential.
In the wrong hands, this blank sheet of paper could crumble the foundations of the modern world. The mousy –haired boy swallowed hard.
Then he made his move.
He reached over for the colouring pencils and picked up the black. Slowly, undecidedly, he etched.
Carefully, he replaced it, and picked up a white.
Gently, he added and dotted. After repeatedly swapping colours, figures began to appear. Scribbled, yet legible. Understandable, but incomprehensible.
The boy smiled.
Finally.
Finally, they would understand what was happening. That he wasn’t just a medical mystery splashed across the news. That he wasn’t a hero and he wasn’t brave. Brave people smile through the worst. Brave people sacrifice themselves-‘Never mind! As long as it’s me in this excruciating pain and not Mrs Jones across the street.’.
Red exploded across the page.
Do they think I WANTED this? Do they think I wished this on myself?
As the anger erupted inside him, the colours did too, screaming across the page.
Soon, a story unfolded: the lives, the deaths, and the confusion. The floor began to tremble. The walls began to shake. The modern world was collapsing--
“Cody?”
Cody stopped, arm suspended over the drawing, fingers poised, twitching slightly, ready to pick up the next colour.
The woman called again until she saw him sitting at the table, drawing again.
She walked across the room, disinfected from the outside world- blank and white and cold. She sat next to him, her blonde hair falling in front of her long face.
The woman waited a while as Cody continued to colour carefully.
He was so close to breaking the world…time to fix it.
Eventually, she plucked up the courage to break the hypnotic, scribbling silence.
“Hi, Cody.”
Cody stopped and replaced the pencil before turning in his seat to face her.
“Hello.”
“Are you drawing again?”
The boy in front of her nodded with a dreamy look on his face.
He was God.
The woman took a deep breath before carrying on but, before she could speak, Cody was already colouring again, lost in his own world once more.
“Cody?”
He stopped and replaced the colour before returning to face his visitor.
“Cody, do you know where you are?”
“No.”
“You’re at St. Anthony’s care home.” The child looked confused but, on the whole, not overly concerned.
Why does God have to care? He is everything.
“Do you know why you’re here, Cody?”
The woman paused, almost expecting an answer. Then she remembered and continued, feeling foolish for dashing her own hopes.
“You’re in St. Anthony’s care home because we couldn’t look after you any more.” The woman sounded bitter, as if the decision to put the child here had not been hers.
She felt foolish but…brave. She decided to have a shot.
“Cody…do you know who I am?”
“No.”
The bullet ripped through her, leaving her heart in pieces. She felt like shaking him, as if maybe, if she shook him hard enough, his brain would just magically fix itself, like a neurological jigsaw. But that was wishful thinking. He was just a child and he is already as bad as some 70 year olds.
But there was no time for thinking-Cody was already returning to his work.
Hurriedly she blurted the first thing that came to her head.
“Are you sure you don’t know who I am, Cody?”
The boy shook his head again. His visitor sighed inwardly, her blue eyes glittering.
“I’m your mother, Cody.”
But Cody didn’t hear her. He was colouring again…
Jenna turned to look back for the hundredth time. But Cody just didn’t notice. He was too busy scribbling. So, she turned and, with a heavy heart, closed the door on her lost son.
She walked, trance-like, to her usual café and the sun streamed through the window as she drowned her sorrows in the muddy water. Staring into the nothing, she let her tears leave her sleep-deprived eyes.
Her mind drifted back. Back to when Cody first got diagnosed, that hated word echoing round her head like a death sentence.
Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer’s.
How could this be happening? Why did it have to be HER son? There are seven billion people in the world-why did her son have to be that one? But there were worse things to come…
Mummy…the other kids all laughed at me today because I couldn’t remember how to play football.
Why couldn’t I remember, Mummy? What’s wrong with me?
Jenna could hear herself replying.
Remember that story I told you, Cody? About those naughty pixies that made everyone else do silly things? Well…Mr Al Zheimers is a very naughty pixie who is making you forget things, Sweetheart. But everything will be fine…I promise.
But then the thoughts became too painful, and the pain became too real and the reality was too painful.
She shook herself awake and realised that everyone else in the café was looking at her. She had been talking to Cody out loud. She got up and ran out, cheeks burning. The next thing she knew, she was in Doctor Colson’s office.
She sat and he looked. The look he gives her, when she turns up everyday, asking the questions that no-one can answer.
“I’m sorry, Jenna. We still don’t know. We’ve seen thousands of cases like this before…but in 70 year olds. It’s a mystery. There’s nothing we can do.”
With her heart broken again, she leaves and returns home where she collapses in despair onto the bed she no longer shares with her husband and cries herself to a restless sleep, until the alarm tells her it’s time to go see Cody again.
Everyday she did this. Like a never ending cycle that nothing could break.
That was-until the letter came.
Jenna sat at the kitchen table, the sun bleaching the room. She sat there for an eternity, just gazing at the envelope in front of her. Just gazing at the beauty of the scrawl on the front of it.
Mum x
Dare she touch it? Surely it’s not real. Perhaps it’s just a beautiful dream and, if she touches it, it will disappear in a puff of smoke…
Don’t be ridiculous!
Tenderly, she prodded it with her finger. It didn’t move. Suddenly, she was savage, fiddling clumsily, drinking in this gift from the child who, everyday, she watched forget a little bit more.
Tearing it open she devoured the untidy scrawl.
To Mummy,
Hello! I’m thinking you’re probably kind of freaking right now. Am I right? I knew it!
Jenna laughed, her melody echoing through the empty house.
So I had better explain myself! Remember that day you told me about Mr Al Zheimers? Well I asked the doctors about him up and I’ve found out that he’s not a very nice pixie at all is he? I knew he made you forget things but I didn’t think that I will forget EVERYTHING!
But I’m not scared. I’m your big boy!
So if I’m not you shouldn’t be either. But I knew you would be. So I wrote you this letter. You know just saying hi. The doctors said I might not remember stuff for long so…you know. And I know that pretty soon I won’t remember anything anymore. Not even you! And I want you to know that I’m really happy at St Anthony’s and that the people here are really nice. Some are just like me. You never know maybe we can forget things together!
That was a joke Mummy. I may be forgetting things but I’ll never forget how to be funny!
You always say there’s a silver lining to everything and believe it or not I’ve found one for this- I might get better at drawing!
Tell Daddy that it’s ok if he don’t want to visit. I won’t know who he is anyway!
And you have to promise me something Mummy. And you don’t break promises! You have to be happy. You have to laugh and play with friends. You are not allowed to sit around being grumpy about me when I won’t even remember to care.
Thank you for being the worlds best mummy.
Love you always,
Cody xxxxxx
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125,020 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Hello Woozey!
First, the technical stuff. 70-year-old actually needs to be spelled out, like "seventy-year-old". If a number can be written with only one or two words, go ahead and spell it out.
Next, the actual events. I'm confused, honestly. The idea is really profound, and I love the theme of coloring somehow tying in with everything, but I don't really understand what these characters mean. How does destroying the world relate to the coloring? Why is he a hero, or not a hero, in his mind? What does he hope to achieve with the art? Because I feel like you're on the brink of some great psychological metaphor, but it's not explored deeply enough.
Lastly, style. This is the kind of piece that can be good anyway, written in clean, easy prose, but can really shine and be extremely effective when a more stylistic tone is used. I'm going to give you a very vague suggestion-- find a style. Develop a tone of writing that you can use for atmosphere- and emotion-heavy pieces like this. Stream-of-consciousness includes long run-ons used to create a dreamy, hazy feel. Writing with lots of short choppy sentences and fragments creates a quick, urgent, slightly discombobulated feel. Writing with lots of personification, giving non-human things human traits and actions, makes the inanimate objects in your piece come alive, and gives the writing another dimension.
This is very well-written, and has the potential to be a really moving and powerful piece. I felt a lot of that already-- but there's even more you can do to really bring out the emotion in this piece, to show the pain of the mother and explain the motives of the child. You have an incredibly interesting and unique plot line to work with.
Next, for the letter part, I think it would be best if you put it in italics and separate it a bit from the rest of the prose, perhaps with a cluster of *** or something like that. Also, fix the little grammar errors in the letter, like spelling out "ok" and "okay" and the apostrophe in "worlds best mummy" at the end. If you're trying to make it seem juvenile, it's not really necessary.
I also don't get the line where the mother says he's God. I'd understand if you said something like, "He was her own personal sun, around which her world revolved" but saying he's God seems so extreme, and I'm not following the train of thought she uses to justify that. So, basically-- clarify.
These are all styles of writing used to build up a certain atmosphere. This story, although well-written now, could be really striking and memorable if you added a signature tone to it.
^_^ Good job, and keep writing. You can PM me for anything!
~Evi
Wow. Very well done. An interesting plot and premise, good dialogue, and descriptions. There's only one problem that I can even see, even though you do it numerous times.
That should have a hyphen in between 70 and year. Truly makes you think. I was good friends with a man who had alzheimer's, so this truly speaks to me.