'Prompt 1: Imagine you are on a train or at a train station when a murder takes place (500 words or less).'
Alice couldn’t remember much to be
honest; her memory had always been a sieve but today it had been
particularly shabby. Maybe because the events of this day had sent her mind
into shock, scattering it into tiny pieces that seemed to fly away in the harsh
breeze that had been blowing through the station. She tried to wrack her brain
for the details before the Police came to question her as a witness. They
seemed to be taking a while and it almost felt that they were talking to
everyone except her but she knew it was coming. She’d watched enough murder
mysteries to know how the story goes.
Breathe.
Calm down.
Think.
Retrace every little detail of the
events of that morning.
Alice couldn’t feel her feet
anymore. Shock does that to you apparently. She tried to push the feeling away
and focus. Think about what had happened this morning. She had said goodbye to
Louis in her flat in Deptford, crossed town and arrived at New Cross Gate
Station, a place with so many platforms yet so little elegance. Smeared
graffiti lines the platform walls along with crude signs and language drawn on
every bit of free space. She liked this though; it made her feel like an edgy
Londoner. Candid photos infront of these edgy pieces of street art were her
speciality.
STOP.
You’re thinking about irrelevant
things, Alice.
Focus.
She’d sat down on a half broken
bench, the wind biting at her cheeks. The train arrived and as she was about to
board, that’s when it happened. A guy in a dark hoodie running from the scene.
A gang following after. Blood seeping out of the wound inflicted on the body
and a woman with a blue streak in her hair crying out for help. Alice could see
the blue streak woman giving her statement to the police, speaking inbetween
heavy sobs. Seeing her cry made Alice want to run over and hug her but she couldn’t
move. She felt like ice.
The policeman finished with blue
streak woman and finally headed towards Alice.
Think.
Breathe.
Speak.
However, he
moved straight towards the paramedic stood just behind her.
“Seems
that this is another postcode war. A revenge stabbing of some sort,” the
policeman said. Louis had mentioned postcode wars. There was a group of men
that he and his gang had had a fight against the other day. Could it be the
guys he had mentioned before? He’d always warned her to stay away from them.
“We’ve
identified the woman as Alice Hardy. Her license was in her pocket. She’s
fading fast. We need to get her to the hospital now.”
Sorry.
What?
Did she just say my name?
It was then Alice looked down and
saw her own face staring back up at her, crimson red smearing the white top and
blue jeans she’d been wearing. She’d stepped over a postcode threshold.
A revenge stabbing.
What had Louis done?
The last question she thought as
her outer-body self started to melt and the tunnel of light swept her up into
the abyss.
1 Comments
Very good - reminds me of "Ghost"
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