The old thread

Chatterbox: Inkwell

The old thread

The old thread wasn't receiving much attention, so I'll start another one.

I'm doing a writing prompt boot camp for fourteen days, where I'm given a daily writing prompt and have to write something based on it. I'm on Day 6, and I'd love feedback! I'm posting it on the CB for motivation.

The prompt is, "Write a 26-line poem using all the letters of the alphabet. Have the first line start with the
letter 'A,' the second 'B,' the third 'C,' etc." 

I was listening to sad music while writing this, so here it is:

As I stared out into the sea,

Blue and green and

Cerulean

Danced this way and that

Ever so far in the distance.

Flying above me were a pair of

Gulls,

High up, going “ha-ha-ha.”

I’ve come to this beach every day, ever since

Jasper died. He was

Killed

Lying down, at

Midnight, during the war. He

Never should have died!

Only the sea gives me peace. Its

Power, its beauty, and its strength

Quells my tears. Water

Runs, but it can also be

Still and clear, like my poor son’s eyes.

Tell me, Jasper, my little boy, did it hurt? I still don’t

Understand why you had to die. Fate is

Vicious.

Why? Why? Crossed out like an

X on a list.

You were so young. I loved you, then

Zip. Zilch. Gone.

I'm so proud of it! What do you think? 

submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh), Fairyland
(April 19, 2017 - 10:56 am)

deep. 

submitted by unsuspectingstrytllr
(April 19, 2017 - 4:50 pm)

XD That one word says so much!

submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh), Fairyland
(April 19, 2017 - 7:49 pm)

Whoa. That is absolutely beautiful. You should be proud of it!

submitted by Kestrel
(April 19, 2017 - 8:04 pm)

I know a boy named Jasper and now I'm scared... xD

The poem is very good.  

submitted by Zeus, Idaho
(April 19, 2017 - 9:02 pm)

Agreed! Beautiful Mei, that's so amazing!

submitted by LilyPad
(April 19, 2017 - 9:22 pm)

Wow. That was good.

submitted by Killim
(April 19, 2017 - 9:27 pm)

Day 7's prompt is, "A knock at the door catches you off guard. Upon answering it, you’re greeted by a man who
says he’s from the future—and he can prove it. More important, he says he has information
that will save your life."

I just finished my contest entry for the Cricket contest, so escape is on my mind. Enjoy!

Fifteen-year-old Helena had just finished a painting when the doorbell rang.

She opened it. “Hello?” A man she didn’t recognize was standing nervously on her doorstep. He had dark brown hair, and was wearing strange clothing. The fabric looked so fake, and the style wasn’t like anything she had seen. Like from he was from another culture. A look of shock passed over his face, like he knew her but wasn’t expecting to see her.

“Helena Landreth,” he said. “I’m John Landreth and I’m your son from the future. And I have to tell you how to save your life.”

“What?!”

“I’m your son from the future.”

Helena didn’t know what to make of this. She should probably just close the door on him, he might just be crazy. But he knew her name--and she could see in his eyes that he wasn’t insane.

She stepped outside. “Give me proof.”

He took out his phone. It looked way too advanced to be from the present time, it was flexible, and instead of a screen, it could project its images into the air like a hologram.

“This is you as my mom,” he showed her a picture. It did look like her! Just thirty years older. “How--”

“And this is you after you were . . . um, shot.”

Helena did a double take. “What--”

She stared at the hologram. It was the woman who looked uncannily like her, sprawled out on the floor, obviously dead. She looked like the dead unicorn from Harry Potter, with limbs turned at weird angles, blood all over her face. She shivered.

“When you grew up, you became more than a master artist. Your paintings had magic in them. One could cure cancer. Another was so beautiful that it could make a terrorist sorry for what they did. Simply by existing, your artwork erased evil.

Dark forces have always existed. It’s because of them that people get sick. It’s the reason that people do bad things. You were slowly killing these evil beings, and they got worried.

On March 7, 2051, they captured you. They threw you in a prison with magic even stronger than your own, with an impossibly hard password. You didn’t know how to get out. After they drained you of their powers, they killed you.”

Helena head spun. She sat down, right there on the welcome mat, and put her head in her hands.

“The evil forces eventually returned back to power. Wars and crime broke out again, people died of disease, and the paradise you created was gone.

But science was developing as always. When you died, I was only seven years old and I was crying my eyes out, as was the rest of the world. But NASA was in charge of time travel, too, and they took me aside and told me that one day, when they figured out how to do it safely, I could go back in time and save Mommy’s life.”

He wiped his eyes a little.

“This is a blunt request, but I haven’t seen you since I was a kid. I know I haven’t been born yet, but can I hug you?”

Helena nodded, and they did.

“How do I--how do I survive? And why did you come when I was still a kid?”

“Time travel isn’t very accurate yet. They didn’t know what age you’d be when I came.”

She nodded.

“And how do you survive? Carry a pen with you at all times. When you are captured, draw a picture of yourself fleeing on the wall of your cell. Do this before they start to take your magic away. A lock with a password will appear. Here’s the password, keep these papers forever.”

He handed Helena three whole sheet of paper. They were packed to the brim with tiny black numbers.

“Wow,” she stared at them. “Thank you.”

[Many years later]

Helena was world-famous now. With the magic she breathed into her art, she killed the forces of evil, little by little. Even though she was grown up now, she always remembered her encounter with John from when she was a teen. John was her little son now, in first grade. She would smile whenever she saw him playing, knowing what he would look like when he was an adult.

She carried a pen and the password with her wherever she went. She had to be ready. She had to survive for the sake of little John. And for the sake of the world.

March 7 came. Just as she finished a new painting, two black, ghost-like figures swooped into her room through the window! Her husband started screaming and called 911. She wanted to call to him, “Don’t worry,” but it would sound stupid. She had never told him about their son going back to the past.

Headlines all across the world would be made about the capture of Helena Landreth, the Magic One, but also about her getaway. She didn’t struggle--the password was in her pocket, and she knew how to escape. She’d be fine.

submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh), Fairyland
(April 20, 2017 - 10:52 am)

That was deep, Mei. Oh, wow, Mei. You are amazing, such a beautiful writer. Hey, do you mind if you could write down all the prompts? I have a bit of writers block. If not, thats fine, I was just wondering.

submitted by LilyPad
(April 20, 2017 - 8:49 pm)

I'm posting them day by day, if that's alright.

submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh), Fairyland
(April 21, 2017 - 1:53 pm)

Day 8's prompt is: "They toured the house with the real estate agent. 'We love it,' he said. Is there anything we should know about the house’s past? The agent looked down." 

I've been writing darker stories lately. Enjoy! 

The agent looked down. “Yes,” she said softly. “But I don’t think you’ll want to buy it anymore.”

"Tell us."

“Alright,” she sighed. “A family used to live here. They were very rich, and the father was a powerful man. He owned a large factory, and treated his workers terribly. They were forced to work with poisonous materials and toxic fumes while he claimed it was safe. He also did other illegal things, cheating money out of people.

The children, a boy and a girl, knew nothing of this. They were the sweetest, always being polite, even giving candy to their classmates. As they got older, they even started a small charity! They were known as the nicest kids around, while their father was known as the meanest man. They were naive to this.

People had died because of what their father did. One day, their family members banded together to seek justice. They stormed the house, and a huge fight broke out. You see, he even had security. After years of misery, the mother joined them, but died quickly once he realized his wife had turned on him. He pushed her, and she fell down the stairs.

The sister threw herself off the roof when she realized what her father was, the brother following suit. She died on impact, but the boy survived, and he ran off, never to be seen again. You can still see the spot in the garden where she fell.

Eventually, the father was killed in his room, the master bedroom that you two loved so much. Police came, of course, and investigated the whole thing. The entire family was gone, and while the father wasn’t missed, the children were. The boy has changed his name now, the only one left.”

She stopped. “Why did I tell you two this? I was so close to finally selling the house to a couple who didn’t know its history. It’s been empty for ten years now, and counting!”

The husband smiled. “This house has magic, you know? I used it to convince you. I was the boy from the story, and I’m tired of running away. I want to embrace my past.”

submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh), Fairyland
(April 21, 2017 - 1:55 pm)

Wow these a great! Keep it up, Mei!

submitted by LilyPad
(April 21, 2017 - 10:36 pm)

Day 9's prompt is, "Write an obituary for your favorite fictional character (literary, television, etc.), including
how the death occurred."

I was pressed for time, so sorry!

Hermione Jean Granger died March 22, 2017, at age 37.

She was an extraordinary woman. Best friend of Harry Potter, the Boy who Lived, she looked out for him all throughout their years at Hogwarts. She saved his life numerous times, including freeing him from the grasp of Devil’s Snare when they were eleven. She was an activist, always standing up for the underdog, coming up with an organization to protect house-elves. She was made prefect in her fifth year by Albus Dumbledore, headmaster of Hogwarts. Sorted into Gryffindor, she was extremely brave, fighting in battles against Voldemort. She was a warrior, strong and courageous. She was also intelligent, with Outstanding marks on almost all her O.W.Ls. She later became Deputy Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

She died when she went overseas to America. Seeing the treatment of house-elves over there broke her heart, and she attempted to rescue one stuck in a fire. She got badly burned, and died before she could reach a hospital.

 

The entire Wizarding world mourns the loss of one of the greatest witches of all time. She was a hero to many, helped save the world from Lord Voldemort, and always did the right thing.

submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh), Fairyland
(April 22, 2017 - 11:58 am)

Now I feel like writing one of these for a book character!

submitted by Lucy B., age 12, California
(April 22, 2017 - 7:32 pm)

That's beautiful! It really made me think. 

submitted by Moonlight , age 12 , Ellesmera
(April 23, 2017 - 12:59 pm)

Today's prompt is, "You’re at your favorite department store buying a birthday present for a friend. As the cashier
gives you change, you notice a message with specific instructions scribbled on one of the
bills. What do the instructions say? Do you carry them out and, if so, how?"

If you find this, and can read it, you are a Special One.

Come meet the others at 5 pm, today, in the Wise Palm Forest, at the clearing.

Please be there.

I stared at the note on that dollar bill.

“What are you looking at? Hurry up!” the cashier said.

“Uh . . . can’t you see it?”

“No.”

“Sorry,” I said, then walked off with my bag, still staring at the money. Was it a trick? Even worse, was I seeing things?

I looked at my Nokia (my mom still wouldn’t buy me an iPhone). It was four o’clock, so I had time to go home, talk to my parents, and then bike to the forest. If I wasn’t crazy, then the note sounded urgent. Almost pleading.

I decided to go.

As I entered the forest, riding on the trail, I felt that something was off. I had biked there a few times before, but it always seemed teeming with life. Now, it felt wrong, it felt empty.

I arrived at the clearing. A couple of other teens my age were there, looking as confused as I was. I knew a few of them.

“Does anyone know what’s going on?”

They all shook their heads.

“I found my note in my textbook!” said Jason, a boy from my school.

“Mine was on change that a cashier handed me. She couldn’t see it.”

“Weird!”

Before we could talk more, a strange-looking woman walked into the clearing. Leaves were braided into her hair. Her eyes were an odd, translucent grey, and she walked with an aura of . . . magic. But it was faint, and she looked sick. Her skin was dull, and although her hair was decorated, it was falling out. Her fingernails were yellow, and there were dark circles under her eyes.

“Hello,” she said. “If all of you arrived here, it means I was right in picking out the Special Ones. All of you will believe me. You had enough faith to come here.”

What was she talking about?

“This forest has a life force. It’s what keeps it alive. But it’s weakening, and will soon be gone. I’m the manifestation of it, and I’m dying too. I chose you all, older children living nearby, because you are the right age and the right people to learn magic, and save this place.”

[Fast forward to a few weeks later]

I felt like a completely different person. I, along with the other kids, had walked to the clearing every day for three weeks after school to learn from the woman. Every human has the power to control nature inside of them, but we didn’t know how to find that power and use it. She taught us mostly healing, as that was what we needed to do, but also, for fun, we learned tricks like moving things around.

But she got worse and worse by the day, and so did the forest. The empty feeling soon felt like a gaping hole, and I noticed that the leaves were turning brown, even though it was spring.

“There’s not much time left, and you children know enough. Pool your energy as you learned how to do, and chant, ‘Sana hac silva’ five times.”

We gathered in a circle. Concentrating, we extended our hands into the center, golden light forming in the middle.

“Sana hac silva, sana hac silva!”

Nothing happened.

Suddenly, our teacher stumbled. “Ah!” She collapsed onto the ground. “Run!”

All around us, the trees started to smoke, then fire formed.

“Run!” she yelled again.

We all took off as the forest burned down.

We had failed.

submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh), Fairyland
(April 23, 2017 - 7:04 pm)