My house doesn’t look like much. It’s another two-story red-brick house in the suburbs that I’ve called home for almost a decade. But I like to think that sometimes walls tell stories, and the foundations listen, and the roof keeps them all trapped inside until they boil over.
My family’s never used a chimney. We’ve moved twice.
For reasons I’ve never understood, my mother has clung to an expensive, old vase she likes to display in the foyer of each house we’ve frequented. She gushes about it to every guest who takes a step through the front door. I can recite her speech by heart: Oh, did you know that this vase is centuries of years old? It was made in the Ming dynasty. I purchased it years and years ago, not long after I met my husband. It’s almost like family to me. And there she would laugh at the only thing that seemed to bring her joy, the cold, impersonal pottery she valued above anything--even the family she liked to pretend was whole.
Which we weren’t, no matter how much she denied it. My father had stopped fighting years ago and simply nodded along to the snake charmer's tune of everything she said. My brother had simply shut down. He once told me that everything had turned gray the minute he realized that he would never be more precious than the stupid vase.
I was beginning to see what he meant. My world was fading into monotony.
I stand in front of the vase, studying its smooth texture. The painstaking designs. The perfect, sloping shape. Anybody could understand that it was beautiful and valuable. What I couldn’t understand was how it had made my mother’s heart turn the same frigid porcelain.
When we’d first moved here, I’d been rowdy and exploding with color. I pulled my mother into a stiff hug, excited about the home, the neighborhood, the opportunities. She seemed to be made of cardboard at that moment, and I had barely enough time to wonder why she wasn’t hugging back before she stepped out of my grip as if she’d been pushed. I’d lost my balance and cut my arm on the blade-like edge of the table the vase was set on.
She’d pounced like a shark that smelled blood. Instantly, she was shrieking at the table that had tottered under my weight, the vase that had rocked back and forth. Not at my injury. Not at my pain. I think that was the moment I stopped seeing the delicate blue of the vase’s flowers.
I look at the steel-colored petals. Harsh and unloving. Beautiful like a desert is beautiful. For a moment, I choke on the bile that rises in my throat.
I take the vase and smash it in a million pieces.
Some shards of it fly up and slice my hand, and just like that, my mother is running in and screaming and the dead house comes alive because it’s never known open rebellion and my dad’s eyes are wide and my brother is taking my hand and the walls seem to shake with the silent weight of a tale that can only end in tragedy.
I walk out. The door slams shut behind me, and I find it strange that the neighborhood is silent.
A/N: So, this was partially inspired by the novel Starfish by Akemi Dawn Bowman which centers a lot on familial relationships that can be toxic. Let me know what you think!
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125,005 Literary Works • 672,798 Reviews
Well you had me with this line: “ I like to think that sometimes walls tell stories”
Oh is that a character quirk of saying it with “years” too? “his vase is centuries of years old”
I also feel like there is a word missing here? Something to say that she loved that vase more than the family she pretends is whole?: “even the family she liked to pretend was whole.”
I like the idea of the story and I can see it working—in parts for me to!
I like how you show the rest of the family checking out of the situation, even if the way you’re phrasing it is a bit repetitive.
I just think that the vase itself… hm
Let’s say the beginning paragraph about the house sets up a different expectation and that the centre piece of everything falling apart is the vase after all feels a bit like a …let-down. I guess I wasn’t as convinced as the character that this is the problem, that the problem runs deeper.
I think the vase is kinda a standin for that. For the deeply toxic relationships the mother has cultivated; I just feel like despite you setting it up, it didn’t really work for me as such?
I do like the final paragraph and that you bring it back to the house and the rebellion :3
I especially like the final line!
Hey! There's been an odd influx of short stories on here lately and I can't say I'm disapointed. Anyway, let us get into the review, shall we?
First things first, let's review your opening line, "My house doesn’t look like much."
Now, in order for what I'm about to say to make sense, I have to explain what I understand as the modern standard for the opening line and all that jazz. (I'll try to keep it breif so as not to bore you too completely with my nonsensical rambling).
Okay, keep in mind that this has changed over the years because of readers' shortening attention spans and whatnot, and also that this is not by any means a solid rule. Then again, there are really no real rules in literature. But I digress. The purpose of the first line, according to my opinion and understanding, is to hook the readers and tell them a little something of what to expect. Those two things work hand in hand, so fulfiling both roles once you know about them isn't really that hard. (For example, the line, "If there was one piece of advice I could give to the living, I would tell you to fix your problems before they come back to kill you." sets up both the hook (the living?) and tells you a bit about the story (this is told from the perspective of a dead person)). If a first line doesn't do that, I see it as a missed oportunity. And that's what I would call your first line here, a missed oportunity.
In my opinion, the first line of this particular story would work best if it had something to do with the vase, and it set up your protagonist's feeling's toward said vase. Something like, "I've always hated my mother's prized posession." The following lines would describe the vase and basically, the story would go how it does. The look of the house, being irrelivant to the central emotion of the piece, would be only mentioned in passing, if at all. Maybe it could support your greater point, that the house looks just as stagnant and worn as the people within, or something along those lines.
Anyway, moving on from my nitpicky nonsense, the piece as a whole is really, really good. The message is powerful and it hit really close to home for me personally. You captured the emotion and the well, general feel of the empty house filled with people and cloaked bitterness. Well done, really. I rarely see something like this done so well as you did it.
So that's all fro me, goodbye and happy writing!
Thanks for the review!
Amazing! Absolutely amazing! I don't know if I'm eligible enough to review a piece written by someone as skilled as you.
Still, let's do this.
Firstly, I had to search the web for word meanings at least six or seven times while reading this story. You have such a great stock of vocabulary! I have learnt a lot from you.
'.....simply nodded along to the snake charmer's tune of everything she said.'
Is this a phrase? I did get the meaning, but still, let me know if this was a phrase.
The opening was just perfect to grab all the attention of the reader. The part where you introduce the thoughts on the walls, the foundations and the roof was the work of a high-quality writer.
'What I couldn’t understand was how it had made my mother’s heart turn the same frigid porcelain.'
That was some metaphor!
The part where you go on to describe the first incident that made the MC realize his mother's weird attitude for the first time, the way you pictured the scene, made pictures appear before my eyes. I could see the whole thing happening.
'I think that was the moment I stopped seeing the delicate blue of the vase’s flowers.'
The depth of that line really absorbed me.
The ending was another great work. It's something that will leave your readers thinking, pondering over the message you've sent.
Overall, though maybe I'm not good enough to judge you, it was a brilliant piece. Keep writing, so that amateurs like me can learn.
Thank you so much! The snake charmer's tune was supposed to mean how the mom is manipulative.
Hello,
This is a really interesting piece! I love the way it's written, and I love how short yet powerful the idea is. You were definitely able to convey this idea of bad family relations to the reader, with combined emotion and imagery. I especially like how you used descriptions of this vase to really home in on the appearance of this family. "Harsh and unloving" is a lot like the mother who only cares for the vase then her own family. Overall, I just really loved reading through this!
There's simply one thing I want to point out...
"Oh, did you know that this vase is centuries of years old?"
In this quotation, you can cut the words "of years". Saying centuries already lets the reader know it is 100 years.
Anyway, that's all from me! This is a beautiful short story, and I hope to read more from you!
Keep Writing
Thanks for the review!
Np
So powerful!
Thank you!