This is a snippet of a much longer story that's not entirely fleshed out. Cheers!
I stumbled blindly through the yard, the open door swinging behind me, and everything was too loud.
“Nicky!” Sarah Ann called, joy ringing through her voice like a bell calling for its dog. “Where you going, Nicky?”
Punch dribbles from my hair, my shirt clings to my skin, and every breath I take feels like I’m gonna die.
“Is that even your name? Nicky?” She yells. “Because what I heard—”
“I don’t care what you heard!” Even I could hear the tremor in my voice, the way every piece of me rattled as I scrambled my way into the woods with my hands quivering and my chest filled with wasps. “Just leave me alone!”
I didn’t want to be here, I didn’t want to be anywhere, I couldn’t breathe right as everything was pounding on my skull like a drum and my chest was bashing itself in like the world was coming to an end and this was my final soliloquy.
I kept everything straight, had all my accounts locked, not even my best friends knew, so what could’ve tipped her off? How did she find out? Did she get into my phone? She got into my phone, and she saw it, that’s what happened. I don’t get to keep a single secret, and I trusted her, I really did trust her, why am I so stupid?
I should’ve realized I would’ve gotten lost when I started running through woods that weren’t mine. This wasn’t my house, this was some stupid dumb party I decided to go to and now I’m stuck here.
By now the wind was starting to get to me, and I knew I couldn’t run much further, so I stopped, the tired burn of my legs and the shake in my hands just another part of the noise.
“Nick?”
He found me. I didn’t turn around.
“I don’t wanna talk right now.” My voice cracks. “So don’t make me talk right now.”
He didn’t say anything. For once.
But I couldn’t, as my head ran a thousand different ideas about how I’m gonna die and how this is gonna kill me. “You’re not gonna fix this, Gray,” I said. “I don’t even know if you can fix this.”
I collapsed against a tree, my laughter hollow and my voice broken. “I know what’s gonna happen. The school finds out, calls my parents, and I’m out of Westerfield by next Tuesday. Or they’ll just call me—”
I stopped myself.
He didn’t follow up on that. I guess he knew he couldn’t. Instead he mutters, “I was worried you were gonna come out here and do something stupid when I saw you running.”
“With what?”
“I dunno..” He kicked up dirt.
“Well, I wasn’t, so.” I shrugged. I said it just to get him to leave, but he didn’t. I didn’t know why I wouldn’t just tell him to leave; it was like I couldn’t. Maybe I knew I would be alone if I did.
I could see myself reading an entire book with just this little bit of information.
The plot sounds really good and the characters sound really interesting.
I really enjoyed how you brought out the emotion of the main character. Imagery like ” I couldn’t breathe right as everything was pounding on my skull like a drum and my chest was bashing itself in like the world was coming to an end, and this was my final soliloquy” made me understand the anxiety and confusion the character was going through. I liked reading this.
Love the emotion and hinting! I am staring at this with big ole curious eyes.
This is so interesting!! I like how you portrayed the characters’ emotions in such an engaging way. I’d love to read the rest!
I think your use of dialogue has always been so enticing.