Mental Illness

Here's a very short story I wrote in July 2010 in one of the writing games I used to play with my best friend Anna.
The rules were we both had to write about a mental illness (hence the unimaginative title) and we had a time limit, I've forgotten how long the time limit was though :)
Hope you like it
:)

I looked up at the sky and touched a plane, plucking it from the smoothie pink sky and pretending to munch on it.

I smiled to myself as some people my age stared bug-eyed, too scared to even attempt to bully me.

It was nice.

It was a change.

I used to get bullied a lot.

It’s because I’m different, because I see things differently, the better way.

The fun way.

They used to call me names and push me about.

I used to cry.

But then one day, one day it all stopped.

And people have been avoiding me ever since.

People say I didn’t mean it.

My councillors.

The doctors.

My mum.

Everyone.

They all lie.

I meant it.

Every second.

Not many people deserved what I gave Launa Davids.

But oh my she did.

She was hurting me first.

She was poking me, making me feel uncomfortable.

Putting me out of my comfort zone.

A dangerous place to be.

A very dangerous place to be.

I thought I did well.

I held it all in until it was too much.

She got what was coming to her.

No praise came.

It confused me.  It still does.

I’m glad people avoid me now.

I like being on my own.

It’s so much more company.

I like things just the way I see them.

I hate being told to look at the world through blurry eyes.

Their eyes.

It’s so dull.

Life seems pointless when I look from their perspective.

So I stopped looking.

Taking Flight

This is a story that I wrote in January last year which came out in one big go without planning or any of that. 

It's called Taking Flight.

I hope you like it.

Samantha pressed the pillow more tightly over her ears.

The shouting hadn’t subsided for hours and she couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t think because of it.

How could someone argue for that long? She didn’t think she’d even be able to. But then again she was very passive. Her mother, however, was not.

Samantha thought that after her parents had split up everything could only get better. It wasn’t possible for things to get any worse. Oh how wrong she’d been.

Hot tears streamed from Samantha’s already red and puffy eyes and it was all she could do to stop herself from sobbing, crying out, screaming.

The world wasn’t fair. Samantha knew that better than most people. Life and her didn’t seem to get on. It played on her every weakness.

She caressed the softness of her quilt and curled up into an even tighter ball, hiding her head from view.

She had been promised, promised, that her life wasn’t going to be like this anymore. Promised it would get better.

And of course, Samantha had, stupidly, believed it. It couldn’t get any worse right? Her mother had said it, so it must have been true.

Those words meant nothing now.

A passionate scream of fury blasted through the ceiling and pierced Samantha’s ears. She hugged the pillow round her head more firmly.

Would it ever relent?

It would, Samantha knew that, but for how long?

Months this time, leaving Samantha feeling relieved and maybe, dare she even think it, happy?

Or weeks? Something stupid tipping them off?

Or was it one of those arguments that returned every day, hungry for more?

Samantha hoped for the first. She needed a break from misery.

A bird called from outside, alerting Samantha to the time.

It was only one o’clock.

Samantha slipped out of her bed and gazed at the bird through her pristine glass window. It looked so peaceful, free.

It looked at her for a second with its black beady eyes before spreading its wings and taking flight.

Taking flight . . .

Her mother roared from downstairs and she knew it was only a matter of time before she stomped off to sulk or hide. Sometimes those were the worst parts.

Samantha was always scared to leave the safety of her bedroom, but the bird, it’d left. So why couldn’t she?

Her heart pounded in her chest as she tied up her long blonde hair and grabbed her jacket.

Her shoes slipped on easily and her phone was found without thought.

She tiptoed downstairs, threatening to collapse from the weight that was about to be lifted off her shoulders.

The front door welcomed her departure and didn’t make a sound.

Her mother’s final words rang in Samantha’s ears as she shut her door and began to run.

Intuition

This is one of the creative writing games I played with my friend Anna in July, although I cannot remember what the instructions were.

All I can remember is that we gave ourselves a time limit in which to finish in and I called my piece Intuition . . .

I whip my head round and see nothing.

Strange.

I could’ve sworn I’d seen something from the corner of my eye. And I was usually right about these things. That’s what disturbs me.

I’d always had a kind of . . . acute intuition.

I always know when bad things are about to happen.

And I don’t mean a few flukes. I mean I always know.

How else could I tell you that a woman in Paris is being screamed at by her husband in a language I have very little knowledge of and is about to be hit so hard she collapses onto the floor, blood pooling around her body?

She’ll never know her husband is sorry and will regret it for the rest of his life.

Because the doctors don’t save her.

He doesn’t see the car coming that day when he’s saying his goodbye and suddenly he’s gone too.

And this happens because I see it.

I always see it.

I see all of these things.

All day.

All night.

With never even a second of silence.

I don’t see the good things, only the bad.

And what makes it worse is that I can’t do anything to save them, any of them.

A man in China is about to have a heart attack.

I decide to walk around the corner to put my ever boiling mind to rest, for my own safety this time, and feel better once I’ve made sure I’m right.

A car is about to crash on one of the busiest roads in New York. There are no survivors.

I sigh and begin to playing with a strand of my waist-length hair as I walk towards home, trying to listen to only my feet.

Tap, tap, tap.

A woman is about to get mugged.

Tap, tap, tap.

A young boy is being bullied to the point of suicide.

Tap, tap, tap.

A young girl is being forced to do something she doesn’t want to do.

Tap, tap, tap.

A girl forgets her keys.

I stop.

I rummage through my bag.

“Oh.” I say aloud to myself. That one was me.

A murderer lurks the streets of his victim’s town.

I drop my phone so it clatters to the floor.

A psychiatric maniac wanted not only for murder but for genocide.

I bang on the door, pummelling my fist against the hard wood reinforced with plastic.

“Harley!” I screamed to my little sister. “Harley!”

Please, please, please.

He creeps up to the window and expertly slips in.

“Harley! Harley! Harley!”

He silences another voice. Another voice with that name. They must all be silenced.

“Please!” I screamed, bruising my hand so hard I could hardly bear it.

He moves on to the pretty looking white cottage.

I scream at the top of my voice. “Harley!”

But it’s too late.

He easily, so easily, gets in here too, ignoring the cries of the girl outside.

He was going to get her.

He walks into her room and gives her a frightening smile.

My sister.

I don’t think for once.

I slam myself into our French windows and slice open my forearm and the top of my leg so my whole body is burning.

He prowls towards her, her face that colour of white he lives for.

I let out the worst sound imaginable but force myself up the stairs.

Another Harley, his tenth one.

I throw myself into her room and . . .

And something miraculous happens.

Something impossible.

The vision changes.

He doesn’t kill her.

I see it in the same second that I act.

I jump towards him, using the remaining of my dwindling fire that is my energy and spirit, having lost a lot more blood than I would’ve thought possible in such a short space of time.

And he sees this other threat and he . . .

Raises his knife at me . . .

And then he cuts into her flesh –

I see myself dead.

And my visions stop.

Death

Here's a short story I wrote early Febuary last year.  Short being an important word for this one!
The title could be a lot better I admit, but it was only so the document had a name :)
It feels like such a long time ago that I wrote it, but I still like it (otherwise I wouldn't post it!)
It's simply called Death.
I hope you enjoy it.

Look both ways before crossing the street.

I turned my head from left to right, taking note of the dangerous corner before crossing. It’d been a good day, cold - snow was falling softly on the icy ground, but good. I hugged my French coursework closer as I stepped out into the road.

Maybe he hadn’t looked, maybe he hadn’t seen me, maybe the fault was mine. I’ll never know.

A car came speeding around the corner screeching as it attempted to brake in time. I only had time to gasp and stare at the headlights before the bonnet connected with the top of my legs. It hit me at such an angle that I flew over the top of the car and landed on the bonnet of the car behind. My head crashed into the windscreen and sent shards of glass into the air to dance with the snow.

I stared up blankly at the sky, watching the gentle snow drift towards me. Each snowflake felt like a red-hot poker as it touched my face. I heard screaming and shouting but I made no noise. I didn’t shriek, I didn’t cry, I didn’t yell, I just laid there staring up at the beauty that was the sky.

My blood seeped around me, covering my clothes and hair, turning the pure white snow a deathly crimson. The pain caught up with me as I took a breath. It was indescribable, unendurable, impossible.

I shut my eyes to get away, feel alone. I never saw the snow again. Never saw the sky. Nature and all its splendour lost forever.

 I concentrated on the burning snow until I noticed my favourite song playing in my ears. My I-pod had survived and was playing me a departing tune. I blocked everything out, focussed solely on the music, the angel’s voice singing, music was remarkable. I never heard anything else. No voices, no shouting, it was peaceful.

I never listened to another song, never got to the end.

Never heard my breath in my lungs, the beat of my heart.

My mind blanked, I could no longer hear my song.

For a second there was only pain.

Fear.

Then nothing.