While I impatiently wait for my computer to get fixed, I need to make sure Were Just Here Pretending has something for its viewers to read. With that being said, I shall share a story I wrote for my Creative Writing class. We were given several categories to chose from, a list of ten characters, settings, time of day and a situation/challenge. I cannot say the story is exactly the happiest or the best that I have written, but I did sort of just allow my pen to take my thoughts and run. Enjoy.
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Linda is a lonely woman in her nineties who lives deep in the Woods in a log cabin in Bennington, Vermont. This sweet woman married her high school sweetheart when she was just eighteen. All of her life she aspired to be an artists and open her own gallery; all of which had happened. Her husband’s name was Henry and he did everything in his power to treat Linda like a queen. He worked two jobs throughout their marriage just so that the two love birds could leave their cramped apartment in Boston and finally buy their luxurious, comfortable, log cabin. Henry first started out working as a police officer for the city of Boston and then found an additional evening job answering phones for an alarm company. Linda was not a woman that desired diamonds and gold, she learned to respect the little things in life and the love that she had for others. Henry taught her this of course, coming from a family with very little money growing up.
Henry had always hoped to be a father someday and care for his lovely children as well as his wonderful wife, but that hope died twenty years into their marriage. After about five years of Henry and Linda’s marriage, they finally left Boston and started their new life in Vermont. The scenery was especially important for Linda so that she could continue to paint and draw. The quaint town near their home also gave her the advantage to open her own gallery. Henry left his two jobs in the city and began working at their local bank as a teller. He did not mind it much because he knew that he had already more than enough savings to live off of comfortably and he also had made it in life where he liked to be; happy. One evening, Linda was in her paint room working her magic when she heard a knock at the door. The painter quickly turned off her music and walked to the front door with such a puzzled look on her face. Linda reached for the knob and opened a passage to what she later interpreted to be the end of her life, in a sense. The police officer was one of Henry’s old co workers from the Boston Police Department. He asked if he could come in and led Linda to the kitchen table. Henry’s friend blatantly announced to Linda that her husband had passed away. He was on his way home from Boston after fetching some flowers for Linda from her favorite florist. As traveled back on the roads that took him to his home, a tractor trailer driver slammed on his brakes too late as Henry drove straight through a stop sign, completely missing it. This police officer that was Henry’s friend was on the scene of the accident and felt that it was preeminent for him to tell Linda the news himself.
Linda replays that night over and over again in her head daily. After Henry died, she lost her passion to paint because she was simply unhappy and lost. She received money from Henry’s insurance but she knew it wasn’t enough to keep her home. Linda eventually found a secretary job at a high-end law firm that included wonderful benefits as well as a 401k plan. But all of this did not matter because she was alone, and she knew that she definitely did not want to remarry. Because Linda had barely any friends and limited family, it took her extremely, to almost never getting over the tragic loss of her husband. He was the only one she wanted. Henry told her that they would be together forever, and marriage made that label apparent but now she was by herself in an open field of willow trees. They sway back and forth reminding her of what she had and now she wasn’t sure that she could ever be the same again.
As Linda spent her afternoon on her back porch reading, or thinking, or just gazing across the gorgeous woodland paradise, she came to a conclusion; she wanted to give up. As if losing the foundation of her life was dreadful enough, just a year prior, Linda was diagnosed with a severe grade of breast cancer. She went through all of the treatments and even attended a group therapy session, because Again, Linda was basically deserted and had absolutely no one to spill her sorrows to. After all of her suffering, it just was not good enough because more news was given to her, she would only have a few more months to live. At this point, all Linda wanted to do was wait. All of her hope was lost and nothing could possibly encourage her to find it. At ninety-three years old, Linda had left her secretary job and spent her last days in bed or on the porch. Her younger sister Sheila had even hired an aid to take care of her and to maintain the household because Linda quickly grew weaker with every sun rise. Sheila began to check on her sister every couple of days as she came to realize the reality of the situation. It was slightly sad actually, that the two sisters had only just become close and dispersing such memories and secrets, similar to that of two teenagers. After a month of Sheila visiting her sister, Linda had shows a few signs of actually emerging from her mental shell that she created ever since Henry’s death.
Linda very rarely left the house during her last month, but Sheila did help her enjoy herself at home. Together they would play card games, cook new meals and desserts that they researched and they even painted a few times. Linda was so thrilled to have some life back in her habitat and she knew that it was time to take what was left of her strength to travel down the road by herself to visit Henry, just after a peaceful thunderstorm. The atmosphere was so right and she was tired of being tired. Linda would always pass Henry’s grave on the way to her therapy sessions but she usually held too much fear to stop. On the night of Linda’s death, she was laying beside what was left of her beloved and just the cold ground beneath her. Sheila found her sister as she was driving towards the log cabin to check on her. She immediately called the ambulance where Linda was pronounced dead on the spot. Linda is now peacefully laying next to her one and only, continued to forever and to never be split up again.
To be a part of the Fight Against Breast Cancer movement, visit Susan G. Komen for the Cure to learn more
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