Hi everyone! Can you tell me what you think of my short story comp. entry?

[xCrystalxCharmsx]

Well, here it is! It gets judged at the end of July, it had a word limit and the theme was 'My Great Escape'. Note: i don't like word limits!! My friends thought it was a little confusing...



I had been watching the clock for some time before it occurred to me that it had stopped ticking. Its pale face stared coldly into mine; yet I glared back, unfeeling, watching still the hands which had ceased ticking long ago.
A memory kindled in the back of my mind.

“Marie, could you please fetch the other pen from the drawing room?”
My mother, sitting at the table, writing letters.
“Yes mama.”
I recall running down many flights of stairs.
Breathing heavily as I stopped at a room with an intricately designed door.
I turned the elaborate handle, only expecting dark, wooden furniture.
My eyes automatically gravitated towards the new piece in the centre of the room.

I was jolted back to my current position.
Failing to shift my legs, I quickly glanced around.
Something was amiss.
I shivered, my breath swirling in front of me.
The air had frozen.
The bitter cold had consumed the fire that had been burning merrily…long ago.

“Oh my….” I breathed.
The chair before me was magnificent.
It’s beauty was almost unreal.
I was enraptured.
Suddenly remembering mother’s request, I quickly snatched the small, pointed object from the table and departed reluctantly, with one last fleeting look to sustain me.

A curious haze obscured my sight.
I felt a numbing, icy breeze.
I sat immobile in my velvet chair, doubting whether I was awake. Reality and dreams… The two states flowed seamlessly into one another.
There was no difference any more.

“Here mama, this is for you…” I handed over the pen. “That strange red chair is wonderful…” I say absently.
Imagining the warm, comforting softness. Inquisitive eyes watched me.
Mother’s concerned voice sharply brought me back to reality.
“What chair?”

The word ‘cursed’ particularly echoed in my recollection.
It did not do the situation justice. I could hardly make out the dirty, time-stained furnishing of my prison.
The window was almost opaque with grime.
Everything used to shine so much you could see your doppelganger staring back at you.
I sighed forlornly.
It’s all because of my recklessness.

Cursed…. I mocked the word. How ridiculous.
My eyes opened and caught sight of a grand clock in front of the vast window. A clear, sunny sky could be seen outside.
The clock was ticking: I attempted to move.
The door suddenly slammed.
Trapped.

An unexpected glow pierced my vision. I cried out, shielding myself, but it wrapped around me nevertheless, like a warm blanket.

Why will no one rescue me?
I lamented my earlier actions. Ignorant of the changes occurring around me, I wept in sorrow as the area around me darkened ominously.
Cursed.

A white orb was drawing me aloft.
I screamed in pain; the pure radiance burning my skin.
There was a sudden compulsion to look down. Tears fell from my half-closed eyes.
The body of a girl, still sitting in her cursed velvet chair, waiting for rescue that would never come.
But …
I smiled as I vanished.
I had escaped the nightmare.

[Commonmind]

This belongs in the critique section, which is right above you. I'm sure someone will be along to move it shortly, but in the future please be sure and post excerpts there.

[Teresa Edgerton]

Originally Posted by Commonmind

I'm sure someone will be along to move it shortly...

And someone has. Moved to Critiques forum.

[Commonmind]

Thanks Teresa!

[BookStop]

I, too, wish you hadn't a word limit. I think it limits the piece. There are details that would be nice. I think I get it. It's a memory, she's sitting in a cursed chair, to escape the curse she dies, not really escaping in the traditional sense. Interesting. But I want to know more. What recklessness? Does her mother not know about the chair? Is there really a chair at all? Arg - this is why flash fiction bugs me; I always want more. Here a a couple of technical edits:

I had been watching the clock for some time before it occurred to me that it had stopped ticking. Its pale face stared coldly into mine; yet I glared back, unfeeling, watching still the hands which had ceased ticking long ago.
A memory kindled in the back of my mind.

"into mine, yet I" - no semi-colon. Also, you say the habds stipped ticking long ago, but I ge tthe sense from the first sentence that it just now stopped ticking.

My mother, sitting at the table, writing letters.

I would love a real verb here, not just hte gerund.

I recall running down many flights of stairs.
Breathing heavily as I stopped at a room with an intricately designed door.

stairs, breathing

I was jolted back to my current position.

I get that this is her present tense, but if you had something more substantial than just "my current position" it might be more clear. Maybe you can switch the focus here to her "reality".



I feel like you need more to differentiate between her reality and her cursed dream existence. It is confusing jumping back and forth only at the beginning of the piece. Towards the end, it is all present reality, and I think that is what's confusing.

How ridiculous

italics?

The clock was ticking: I attempted to move.

why the colon?

The door suddenly slammed.
Trapped.

What door?

I screamed in pain; the pure radiance burning my skin.

comma, not semi-colon and you could use another verb in the second half

I like the premise, and mostly I like the execution. I think it might do better if every other sentence followed the pattern of reality versus dream. it kind of reads like poetry now, but if you tweaked it a bit more, you might really have something.

[xCrystalxCharmsx]

Thank you! I think i just made a few mistakes when re-writing it on here... it was a little different on the paper because my english teacher told me to correct bits in the lesson... And i'm sorry about putting it in the wrong place, i'm new and wasn't sure where to put it in the first place...

The door was open and slammed as she sat down, it was open at first. It's not that the clock had only just stopped, it had been motionless for a very long time. She had been sitting there for so long that her memory just...fizzled, and it was as though she was gazing into space, apparently at the clock, before she actually realised it had stopped (make sense? I ramble a little...) You know, the room is all dirty and the windows are opaque with grime that built up over the years. Before the curse claimed her (actually in the next paragraph) she was looking THROUGH the window at the sun and the clock, which was ticking at that point in time. The room darkened as time was passing...

She was already dead, thats why when she looked down, she saw her own body that had been trapped in the room for so long. Her recklessness was that she went back to the room, after her mother told her of a cursed chair, even though she didn't know it was in the very room she had asked her daughter to collect the pen from. She (the girl) went back on a whim, without thinking.

Every other paragraph was supposed to switch between past and present... I'm sorry if that was unclear. <_>. Anyway, i hope i answered some of your questions. The other random bits are probably typos or mistakes i did because i typed it up at about 4 in the morning... ¬¬