The doctor gave her the news in the slowest voice possible. It was humble, yet concerned, and he managed to stare at her with old, strong, grey eyes. But no matter how comfortable she felt in his presence, the girl could barely hold herself together. It was quite obvious that this was the end. The tragic end, without any warning. No three days notice, or two weeks grace. No complete and full final goodbyes, just what was left before the light was gone.
She wrapped her arms tightly around herself, trying to force the growing lump in her throat back down to where it came from. Her eyes stung, threatening tears, and her chest became sore, promising heart-ache. Her mind began to swarm with thoughts, causing dizziness, but she managed to push herself out of the waiting room before the doctor could hold her back from doing so. The hallways around her seemed to grow longer and thinner, and even though they were nearly full, the people around her only seemed to be ghosts in her eyes. It was as if they were not even there.
Hushed voices and the sounds of her own footsteps began to fade behind the fuzzy noise which grew loud in her head. She could feel eyes drawing into her back, and sometimes she even heard the quiet whisper of her name as patients and nurses gossiped. This for sure wasn’t a big town, and everybody knew everybody, and rumors grew like wildfire. And with the large bearing news, the emptiness in her chest, and the silent whispers of her own name, the girl broke down. She let tears stream down her face, cooling her warm cheeks. The lump in her throat began to grow larger and larger by the second, making it harder for air to find its way down her throat.
Near the end of the hallway stood the girl’s parents and two broad, stern looking nurses. Concern was drawn across her mother’s and father’s mourning faces. They almost seemed as upset as her. But nobody would be as upset as she was, at this moment. Nobody could possibly feel more empty. More broken.
She managed to slyly avert her parents open, welcoming arms. It seemed safe there, with them, but she didn’t want to be in their arms. She wanted to be someplace else, with the person she’d never get to see again. The nurses though, were not so understanding, as they grasped at her arms as she tried to glide past. They’re grip on her forearms was painfully strong, but this girl had a goal. She had intentions, and with one strong tug, she managed to break free from their grasps.
Long fast steps echoed down the hall as she began to sprint. Behind her, equally paced, loud footsteps followed. Her parents yelled her name, but the fuzziness in her head was loud and screaming now, and quickly blocked out any other noises. She turned quickly, pushing her way into Care Room #143, slamming the door quickly behind her, and blocking it off with a table and a free wheel chair. And as she turned around, her senses came back to her, and it felt like a punch through her chest.
There he was. So serene, so quiet. The heart monitor beeping repeatedly beside him, keeping the room from complete silence.
Beep. Pause. Beep.
Very slowly, she made her way to his bedside, seating herself in a nearby chair. Though it was made for comfortability, she felt tense, unsure, broken and beaten. Multiple wraps of gauze were wrapped around his forehead and arms. Bloodstains, which were now dry, but still a bright red, stained the porcelain white of the wraps. Her eyes began to drown in tears. Her cheeks flushed in heat and redness, and her bottom lip quivered.
“You promised you would never leave me.” She managed to say, squeaking her words carefully past the lump in her throat.
Beep Beep. Pause. Beep Beep.
Very slowly, the boy turned to face her. One of his eyes was swollen, black, and bruised, but the other was wide open. It’s glimmering soft brown took her breath away, like it had many times before. A small, sorrowful smile formed on his cracked lips.
“I’m not leaving you.” He replied, his voice raspy and uneven. He slowly reached out his arm, his hand resting lightly on her lap. It was frigid, pale and bony. With the odd scrape around his fingers and palms, which were easier to notice as the girl wrapped her hand around his tightly. She’d never felt a hand as cold as hers have always been, and it was frightening.
“I’ll always be here. In your heart. In your dreams. By your side.” He said after a moments silence. Though as he spoke, his eyes dropped from hers to the floor, as if he were unsure.
Beep. A long pause followed. Beep.
“I love you.” She said, drawing his eyes back up to her face. She squeezed tightly on his hand, and felt a very weak squeeze in return.
“I love you too.” He replied. His voice was so sincere, yet so quiet now. So hushed. So lost.
She leaned in to the bed, and placed her lips firmly against his. Feeling the outline of his against hers filled her with false hope. One final spark shot up through her mind. One final firework. One final flame of their chemistry.
Beep. Pause. Beep. Bee-
A frightening noise came from the heart monitor. It wasn’t exactly silence, yet it wasn’t exactly a comforting noise. As she pulled away from his lips, the girl focused her eyes on the screen beside his bed. One straight, green line confronted her. Challenged her strength. The monitor sounded like it was screaming at her, warning her, proving to her that it was all over. And like a strong slap in the face, reality knocked her to her knees. She drew her hand away from, the now limp, boy’s, and threw it over her flooding eyes. A loud wailing, heart-wrenching scream escaped her sore throat. Her heart felt empty, if there was any heart to feel. Her entire body felt empty, her mind numb, her skin, a frozen cold. She could hear voices yelling at her from the blocked door, but their pleading requests were now blocked out by the returning fuzziness in the back of her mind, and the unforgiving scream of the heart monitor.
They had always told her ‘Teenage love only ends in heart-ache.’ But they never explained to her it would be so sudden. So tragic.
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140,831 Literary Works • 673,694 Reviews
Hey,
Welcome to YWS. Now, off to your story, it was truly very good. Yes, there are bits and pieces which could use some work but otherwise well done. I loved the emotions. While reading it i actually felt the tragedy and sentiment of it all.
I look forward to read more of your stories.
Keep writing.
austynpotyok! I agree wholeheartedly with the perspicacious comments of Trident above but I'll add a few thoughts of my own. Benjamin Disraeli, a British Prime Minister, once said that "The magic of first love is our ignorance that it will ever end"; I myself have faced heart-ache in teenage love. Indeed, in today's world whenever we hear of "Teenage Love" we aren't presented with a Romantic prospect - rather, I think, teenagers today (of whose number I won't be counted in six months or so) don't really understand true romanticism. Maybe I'm just being sweeping but it is what I believe.
That is why your story was like a breath of fresh air. Though your narrative needs a little bit of tweaking here and there (as Trident has pointed out) I think it is a solid effort, mainly because of the inexorable pace of the piece which concludes beautifully. A suggestion of mine, to make the piece more powerful, would be that instead of having the girl's boyfriend reply with words, to let the monitor do the talking. I thought the "Beep. Pause. Beep" was wonderful and was a little let down by the boy's responding.
You write elegantly and I think you convey the correct emotions involved in such circumstances. This is a real tragic story and its ambiguity gives it a universal quality!
Capital effort!
Thank you so much!! I'll be sure to review your work often
The opening paragraph seemed a bit flat when compared to the rest of the piece, usually to convey comfort/discomfort one would mention the warmth/coldness that one feels. Perhaps, you might wanna add that? Just a suggestion
- "She wrapped her arms tightly around herself, trying to force the growing lump in her throat back down to where it came from. Her eyes stung, threatening tears, and her chest became sore, promising heart-ache. Her mind began to swarm with thoughts, causing dizziness [...] The hallways around her seemed to grow longer and thinner, and even though they were nearly full, the people around her only seemed to be ghosts in her eyes. It was as if they were not even there." - I really enjoyed this paragraph, absolutely excellent. There were enough images to stop it being bland, but not enough to overpower the reader - you struck a perfect balance, well done! Portraying how the speaker feels at this moment was excellent, and builds up the tension well.
- "She managed to slyly avert her parents open, welcoming arms." - I doubt she would have avoided them 'slyly'; if she wanted to avoid them, she wouldn't done so in defiance, but not through sneaking past them (put yourself in that position, you'd have to be willing in order to avoid your parents' arms).
- "The nurses though, were not so understanding, as they grasped at her arms as she tried to glide past. They’re grip on her forearms was painfully strong, but this girl had a goal. She had intentions, and with one strong tug, she managed to break free from their grasps." - I understand that you're trying to convey the strength of the girl's love and the vigour it gives her to 'fight' the nurses off, but, as Trident mentioned, it does seem unlikely that the nurses would be *so* inconsiderate of her feelings. I mean, damn, the girl's about to lose the boy she loves!
- "but the fuzziness in her head was loud and screaming now, and quickly blocked out any other noises [...] And as she turned around, her senses came back to her, and it felt like a punch through her chest." - again, I loved this paragraph, great imagery without being overbearing - excellent!
- "Very slowly, she made her way to his bedside, seating herself in a nearby chair" - blah, that was an awkward read. The syntax just makes it seem all over the place: "seating herself in a nearby chair", just seems a little off-putting.
- "Her eyes began to drown in tears. Her cheeks flushed in heat and redness, and her bottom lip quivered." - her breathing, woman, her breating! I read that and that was the first thing I was thinking: why isn't she gasping for air? You went into meticulous detail about her physical reaction, it just seemed odd to me that you omitted her inevitable gasps.
- "He said after a moments silence." - the silence belongs to the moment (apostrophe)
- "One final spark shot up through her mind. One final firework. One final flame of their chemistry." - "Firework" stands out here, in a bad way. I think understatement would be more effective here: "One final spark shot up through her mind. One final flame to rekindle their passion", or something to that effect.
- Again, the ending felt a bit forced, the "So tragic" was out-of-place. We have a story told in the third person, with a writer that has not past judgement up until this point, yet the add-on there just made the ending sound a bit tacky, and ruined the denouement of the final paragraph.
Overall, a great wee piece, can't argue there, and it captured what you wanted to capture excellently. The pacing also deserves a mention for being so on-point - well done, well done!
The only fault I can give ya is in the realism of the story. Toward the end, when the boy flat-lined, I was concerned about just how realistic it was that you can cover the entrance like that. Then I remembered hospital visits that I've been to and remember that furniture is light, or fixed to the floor/wall, probably to prevent situations like this from happening! Just thought that that was worth a mention.
So, great piece, really enjoyed it, and welcome to the Y.W.S. and keep writing! If you have any queries/comments about this review don't hesitate to let me know!
thank you! all this feedback is truly very helpful
Hi austynpotyok, thanks for the story. Here are a few of my opinions:
Okay, I don't know if you intended for us to think that the girl was in the hospital for her own health, but that was my immediate impression. We find out later it wasn't because of some disease that she had. If you wanted that ambiguity, I think you should probably drop it. It doesn't help keep us glued to our seats in suspense, but just confuses us about what's going on exactly.
On being ambiguous
Sometimes it's fun not to give out names or dates or background exposition. Most of the time, it's just fun for the author and not the reader. That is what I felt here. I think in order to connect to these two we need more information about them. You can keep their names out of everything; in fact, that could be very poignant. But we need something, something that makes us care about them. Give us background, give us short anecdotes about their relationship before the life-altering event. The girl could recall a bracelet she got from him, or the fact that he ate too many potato chips. Something. Right now we have blank canvasses with no life or soul. Help us know these two wonderful lovers.
Okay I understand nurses need to keep certain people from certain areas, but this just seems unlikely. Especially since we don't know about her boyfriend, it feels as though these nurse are just judgmental wenches.
"Comfortability" should be "comfort". "Porcelain" as an adjective is too much.
The ideas of fireworks and chemistry seem out of place for me here. Sure talk about her passion, but use words that describe that passion more ferociously than "fireworks" and "chemistry" which are stale and don't move one's emotions.
I certainly don't mean to be insensitive, but these lines are terribly melodramatic. I think you need to do some trimming. We don't really need a hundred words with somewhat cliched concepts of loss. I think a shorter, more focused, reaction would be more poignant and keep the reader attached to the story. I started to wander off a bit in the middle of this, which is really not a good thing.
Writing about death
Death is difficult because when we encounter the death of others, we encounter our own mortality. We encounter unfairness and unbearable loss. So we have to treat this topic with a huge amount of respect. Screaming and wailing and all the rest happen, to be sure, but in fiction, those actions don't do justice. I think this is one of those times where you should reverse the rules: instead of giving us action upon action, give us the thoughts in one's head and the metaphysical. To me, it's off-putting to have a main character flail about in grief, unless that is absolutely necessary to the story.
I enjoyed the story. It was emotional and you did a nice job of conveying some of that emotion. Think of getting a few more specifics so we can know more about these two people and care for them more.
thank you for the feedback
I'll be posting more stories and I'll be sure to look it over more before I post!