Writer's Hangout, Entry #1.
Decided to have a bash at this new community - it sounds like good practice! ^^
WARNING: None explicit child abuse, but it's very heavily implied. The prompt was 'Blue ribbon' and when I googled that to see if there was some significance, I found a story about a woman in...Ohio? I think it was in Ohio, trying a blue ribbon to her car in memory of her grandson being beaten to death by his father. The blue represented the colour of bruises, and that's referenced heavily in this. Please, DO NOT READ if this is particularly traumatic to you for whatever reason.
On a side note - Why can I never write short? I decided to challenge myself to make the maximum impact in minimum words. It...failed. Miserably. Although I guess four pages (three and a half, really) is an improvement on my norm ^^".
It was Christmas, near enough. We’d had heavy snowfall that year, heavier than I’d seen since I was a kid. It made me kind of nostalgic, feeling my feet sink into the deep drifts when I climbed the hill, walking back from school. I looked an idiot - black school skirt, black tights, black coat, and then a massive purple scarf, matching mittens and those stupid flowery wellies that Granny had bought me when the snow started to fall, but everyone was in the same boat. Fashion had gone out the window once the cold set in, even in my school of clothing-obsessed teenage girls.
I’d got home early that day. The heater had broken at the school, and we’d been sent home around lunch time, buses arriving to shuttle the kids from the outlying village’s home. Cassie had given me a distinctly unimpressed look as she climbed on board, carrot-red hair standing out in spikes around her pixie-pale face.
‘Betcha we get stuck in the snow.’ she’d drawled as I waved goodbye. ‘Betcha.’
I’d laughed, muffled up in my coat, and turned to follow the main street, winding past the shops and the outlying houses. It was quite a long walk; halfway up the big hill to our old cottage, but the road was a well-used one most of the way, so a lot of the snow had been cleared that morning. Besides, I liked it. Naïve, childish as it was, stunned as people would have been to hear the practical, cynical person I am say it - snow really does make everything magical.
Mum was still at work. She’d called to say she’d be late - the snow had caused an accident on the motorway, and she was stuck in a three-mile tailback. Nose to bumper all the way. I winced when I heard the recorded message - it sounded like she’d be a while. I hoped no-one had been hurt.
I made dinner - tomato pasta, left some on the stove for Mum when she came in, and settled in front of the fire with my book. My mobile buzzed, and I flicked it open, reading the incoming message.
CASSIE
- Told ya we'd get stuck! I only just got home!
I laughed aloud, texted her back.
KIM
- No way! Sucker. I’ve been home for hours. Mum’s stuck in traffic though.
CASSIE
- I hate you. I really do. Is school open tomorrow?
KIM
- No idea, I’ll see if they’ve put a message on the website.
I flicked the computer on at the wall - and as if I’d hit some kind of fuse button, all the lights died. I froze, letting my eyes adjust to the flickering light still coming from the fire. It was pitch black outside by now, frosty and clear, but there was no moon to light the sky.
KIM
- Tough luck - power just went out.
CASSIE
- I’d laugh, but ours did too. I’m about to run out of credit, so talk later. If the power comes back on, go on MSN.
KIM
- OK
I slid my phone into my pocket and got up to fetch the emergency candles from the shelf in the garage. Jessie, my big ginger cat purred when I tickled her under her chin, curling up by the fire. Her yellow eyes glowed in the flickering light.
I tried to read by candlelight for a while, but it hurt my eyes, so I set the book aside. The fire, combined with my tiredness, was making me sleepy, and I could feel myself beginning to nod off.
The doorbell rang, and I almost fell off the sofa.
‘Jesus, don’t tell me you forgot your keys again.’ I grumbled, grabbing my jumper and yanking it over my head as I padded out into the cold hallway to open the door, expecting to find my Mum standing on the doorstep.
Instead, a small boy fell through my door, landing in a frozen, crying heap at my feet.
I stared at him in shock as the wind blew snow through my door.
‘Oh my god, Ben?’
I dropped to my knees beside him, kicking the door shut. He was frozen, soaked to the bone, and barefoot.
‘Ben, what’s wrong?’ I asked in horror, trying to get him to straighten up. I was afraid he was injured, maybe ill - or maybe his mother had fallen, hit her head? Living at the top of the hill in that isolated farmhouse, it did mean there weren’t many options in an emergency.
‘Help.’ Ben was sobbing, clinging to my jumper with cold little hands. I didn’t know how old he was actually, but he couldn’t have been more than seven - even then, he would have been small for his age.
‘Ben, shhh, you’re alright, you’re safe!’ I said frantically. I didn’t like the colour of his face at all - his eyes were wide, showing white all the way round, and his skin was pale, icy blue.
I grabbed the fleecy throw from the sofa, peeled off his sodden t-shirt and wrapped him in it, chafing at his hands.
‘Ben, listen to me.’ I told him as calmly as I could. ‘You’re alright now. You’re safe here, O.K? I need you to tell me what’s wrong.’
‘Please help.’ he gasped. ‘Lucy - Lucy won’t move. She hit her, and she fell down the stairs, and now she won’t move. It’s been ages, and she won’t wake up.’
I stared down at him. Lucy, his sister - god, she couldn’t be more than three, four?’
I lifted Ben bodily off the floor - it was way, way too easy. I’m no shrimp, but even so - and carried him into the living room, settling him down beside the fire. A little colour was returning to his skin, but his eyes were still wide, and his breath came in little shuddering gasps.
‘Ben, where’s your Mum? Is she home?’ I questioned, shoving my feet into my wellies. He shook his head, staring fixedly at a blank point on the wall. I crouched in front of him, making him look at me.
‘Ben, I’m going to go help Lucy. You stay right here, alright? Right here. Don’t move, get warmed up. Please don’t touch anything while I’m gone, I don’t want you to get hurt.’
I don’t know if he understood me or not, but there was no time. The last thing I wanted to do was leave an obviously traumatized, possibly hypothermic child alone in a strange house, but there was no other choice. All our other neighbours lived right at the bottom of the hill, and by the time one of them arrived, it could well be too late for Lucy.
I flung the door open and took off into the snow. The icy wind stabbed into my chest, making me cough as I floundered, squinting through the thick drifts.
‘Please don’t let me have an asthma attack now.’ I prayed. ‘Please.’
By the time I reached the farmhouse, my fingers had frozen to the torch I had snatched from the shelf, and I was soaked through. The door stood ajar, snow already building up against it. I climbed over the drift, slid through the gap, and flicked on the torch, shivering with adrenaline, fear and cold.
‘Hello?’ I called through chattering teeth. ‘Anyone home? Ms Dawson? Lucy? It’s Kim!’
The door at the far end of the hall stood open. I knew it led onto a flight of stairs, down to the cellar, from the couple of times I’d been in the house before.
I flashed the torch down the stairs, moving it in a wide arc.
‘Lucy?’ I called. ‘Can you hear me?’
Please, please let her answer. Please let Ben just have had a nightmare or something.
The beam of light landed on something white and still.
A child’s hand.
I nearly fell down the stairs, hitting my knees beside Lucy’s prone body as I flew to her side. The cold stone bruised my skin, but I didn’t even feel it, staring at the child who lay beside me.
She didn’t look like she was sleeping. Not at all. Not with her neck like that.
I choked, icy fingers clamped over my mouth. Lucy’s eyes were wide open, and blank. She looked like a porcelain doll, sweep of blonde curls spilling over the shoulder of her little white Christmas dress.
She had a blue ribbon in her hair.
Somehow, my eyes focused on that blue ribbon, even as I reached out cautiously to press my fingers to the inside of her wrist, knowing I would find nothing.
Her little hand was cold and stiff.
I sobbed aloud, eyes blurring.
Dammit, Kim, focus! Think of Ben!
Ben. Little Ben, begging me to help his sister, running through the snow in bare feet to fetch me.
I yanked my phone out of my pocket, dialed for the police, and asked for an ambulance too. Told them everything - Ben arriving at the doorstep in shock, coming here, Lucy’s neck, lack of pulse.
I even told them about the blue ribbon, and the way it matched the bruises on her cheek.
I couldn’t stay in the cellar anymore. Ben was alone in my house, terrified and half-frozen, and as much as it felt like a betrayal to leave Lucy alone in the cold and the dark, she was already gone. There was nothing I could do. I had to focus on the living.
I sat with my arm around Ben - made him change out of his sopping wet clothes, bundled them into a plastic bag for the police, wrapped him in thick blankets, and then sat in the window-seat with him, just waiting for them to arrive. He kept asking me questions which I couldn’t - or wouldn’t - answer.
Is Lucy alright? Is she going to be O.K?
When will Mummy come home? I don’t want her to come home.
Where’s Lucy now? Is she on her own?
I shushed him, rubbed his back, babbled softly, anything to avoid telling him the truth.
How do you tell a little boy you couldn’t save his sister?
The police pulled up after about fifteen minutes, skidding past our house in screaming sirens and flashing lights. Ben clung to my side, and I had to lift him up with me to answer the door, wrapping him tighter in the blankets as he trembled. The paramedics took one look at him and fetched those foil, hypothermic blankets they use on rescued mountain-climbers, carrying him back inside to sit in the warm room while they talked to him quietly.
I had to take the police up to the house. I didn’t speak to them, couldn’t speak to them, nothing more than monosyllables. I couldn’t bring myself to go down to the cellar, pointed instead. Two of them, and a guy holding a medical bag, headed down into the darkness. I sank against the wall, hugging my knees, and the policewoman put a comforting arm round my shoulders.
‘She was wearing a blue ribbon.’ I said hoarsely, stupidly, as if that somehow changed things.
They took me back to the house. Ben had gone hysterical when they tried to load him into the ambulance, screaming and crying, surrounded by strangers. He would only calm somewhat when I sat with him on my knee, held his hand, so in the end I went with them to the hospital. Eventually, though, he was taken away, and I was driven to the police station, given a cup of hot, sweet tea, and asked to make a statement. Eventually, they drove me home, where Mum was waiting with another police officer, white and shocked.
That night I dreamt of a cold, stiff little hand grasping mine, Ben’s voice begging for help, and blue ribbons the colour of bruises on a little girl’s face.
WARNING: None explicit child abuse, but it's very heavily implied. The prompt was 'Blue ribbon' and when I googled that to see if there was some significance, I found a story about a woman in...Ohio? I think it was in Ohio, trying a blue ribbon to her car in memory of her grandson being beaten to death by his father. The blue represented the colour of bruises, and that's referenced heavily in this. Please, DO NOT READ if this is particularly traumatic to you for whatever reason.
On a side note - Why can I never write short? I decided to challenge myself to make the maximum impact in minimum words. It...failed. Miserably. Although I guess four pages (three and a half, really) is an improvement on my norm ^^".
It was Christmas, near enough. We’d had heavy snowfall that year, heavier than I’d seen since I was a kid. It made me kind of nostalgic, feeling my feet sink into the deep drifts when I climbed the hill, walking back from school. I looked an idiot - black school skirt, black tights, black coat, and then a massive purple scarf, matching mittens and those stupid flowery wellies that Granny had bought me when the snow started to fall, but everyone was in the same boat. Fashion had gone out the window once the cold set in, even in my school of clothing-obsessed teenage girls.
I’d got home early that day. The heater had broken at the school, and we’d been sent home around lunch time, buses arriving to shuttle the kids from the outlying village’s home. Cassie had given me a distinctly unimpressed look as she climbed on board, carrot-red hair standing out in spikes around her pixie-pale face.
‘Betcha we get stuck in the snow.’ she’d drawled as I waved goodbye. ‘Betcha.’
I’d laughed, muffled up in my coat, and turned to follow the main street, winding past the shops and the outlying houses. It was quite a long walk; halfway up the big hill to our old cottage, but the road was a well-used one most of the way, so a lot of the snow had been cleared that morning. Besides, I liked it. Naïve, childish as it was, stunned as people would have been to hear the practical, cynical person I am say it - snow really does make everything magical.
Mum was still at work. She’d called to say she’d be late - the snow had caused an accident on the motorway, and she was stuck in a three-mile tailback. Nose to bumper all the way. I winced when I heard the recorded message - it sounded like she’d be a while. I hoped no-one had been hurt.
I made dinner - tomato pasta, left some on the stove for Mum when she came in, and settled in front of the fire with my book. My mobile buzzed, and I flicked it open, reading the incoming message.
CASSIE
- Told ya we'd get stuck! I only just got home!
I laughed aloud, texted her back.
KIM
- No way! Sucker. I’ve been home for hours. Mum’s stuck in traffic though.
CASSIE
- I hate you. I really do. Is school open tomorrow?
KIM
- No idea, I’ll see if they’ve put a message on the website.
I flicked the computer on at the wall - and as if I’d hit some kind of fuse button, all the lights died. I froze, letting my eyes adjust to the flickering light still coming from the fire. It was pitch black outside by now, frosty and clear, but there was no moon to light the sky.
KIM
- Tough luck - power just went out.
CASSIE
- I’d laugh, but ours did too. I’m about to run out of credit, so talk later. If the power comes back on, go on MSN.
KIM
- OK
I slid my phone into my pocket and got up to fetch the emergency candles from the shelf in the garage. Jessie, my big ginger cat purred when I tickled her under her chin, curling up by the fire. Her yellow eyes glowed in the flickering light.
I tried to read by candlelight for a while, but it hurt my eyes, so I set the book aside. The fire, combined with my tiredness, was making me sleepy, and I could feel myself beginning to nod off.
The doorbell rang, and I almost fell off the sofa.
‘Jesus, don’t tell me you forgot your keys again.’ I grumbled, grabbing my jumper and yanking it over my head as I padded out into the cold hallway to open the door, expecting to find my Mum standing on the doorstep.
Instead, a small boy fell through my door, landing in a frozen, crying heap at my feet.
I stared at him in shock as the wind blew snow through my door.
‘Oh my god, Ben?’
I dropped to my knees beside him, kicking the door shut. He was frozen, soaked to the bone, and barefoot.
‘Ben, what’s wrong?’ I asked in horror, trying to get him to straighten up. I was afraid he was injured, maybe ill - or maybe his mother had fallen, hit her head? Living at the top of the hill in that isolated farmhouse, it did mean there weren’t many options in an emergency.
‘Help.’ Ben was sobbing, clinging to my jumper with cold little hands. I didn’t know how old he was actually, but he couldn’t have been more than seven - even then, he would have been small for his age.
‘Ben, shhh, you’re alright, you’re safe!’ I said frantically. I didn’t like the colour of his face at all - his eyes were wide, showing white all the way round, and his skin was pale, icy blue.
I grabbed the fleecy throw from the sofa, peeled off his sodden t-shirt and wrapped him in it, chafing at his hands.
‘Ben, listen to me.’ I told him as calmly as I could. ‘You’re alright now. You’re safe here, O.K? I need you to tell me what’s wrong.’
‘Please help.’ he gasped. ‘Lucy - Lucy won’t move. She hit her, and she fell down the stairs, and now she won’t move. It’s been ages, and she won’t wake up.’
I stared down at him. Lucy, his sister - god, she couldn’t be more than three, four?’
I lifted Ben bodily off the floor - it was way, way too easy. I’m no shrimp, but even so - and carried him into the living room, settling him down beside the fire. A little colour was returning to his skin, but his eyes were still wide, and his breath came in little shuddering gasps.
‘Ben, where’s your Mum? Is she home?’ I questioned, shoving my feet into my wellies. He shook his head, staring fixedly at a blank point on the wall. I crouched in front of him, making him look at me.
‘Ben, I’m going to go help Lucy. You stay right here, alright? Right here. Don’t move, get warmed up. Please don’t touch anything while I’m gone, I don’t want you to get hurt.’
I don’t know if he understood me or not, but there was no time. The last thing I wanted to do was leave an obviously traumatized, possibly hypothermic child alone in a strange house, but there was no other choice. All our other neighbours lived right at the bottom of the hill, and by the time one of them arrived, it could well be too late for Lucy.
I flung the door open and took off into the snow. The icy wind stabbed into my chest, making me cough as I floundered, squinting through the thick drifts.
‘Please don’t let me have an asthma attack now.’ I prayed. ‘Please.’
By the time I reached the farmhouse, my fingers had frozen to the torch I had snatched from the shelf, and I was soaked through. The door stood ajar, snow already building up against it. I climbed over the drift, slid through the gap, and flicked on the torch, shivering with adrenaline, fear and cold.
‘Hello?’ I called through chattering teeth. ‘Anyone home? Ms Dawson? Lucy? It’s Kim!’
The door at the far end of the hall stood open. I knew it led onto a flight of stairs, down to the cellar, from the couple of times I’d been in the house before.
I flashed the torch down the stairs, moving it in a wide arc.
‘Lucy?’ I called. ‘Can you hear me?’
Please, please let her answer. Please let Ben just have had a nightmare or something.
The beam of light landed on something white and still.
A child’s hand.
I nearly fell down the stairs, hitting my knees beside Lucy’s prone body as I flew to her side. The cold stone bruised my skin, but I didn’t even feel it, staring at the child who lay beside me.
She didn’t look like she was sleeping. Not at all. Not with her neck like that.
I choked, icy fingers clamped over my mouth. Lucy’s eyes were wide open, and blank. She looked like a porcelain doll, sweep of blonde curls spilling over the shoulder of her little white Christmas dress.
She had a blue ribbon in her hair.
Somehow, my eyes focused on that blue ribbon, even as I reached out cautiously to press my fingers to the inside of her wrist, knowing I would find nothing.
Her little hand was cold and stiff.
I sobbed aloud, eyes blurring.
Dammit, Kim, focus! Think of Ben!
Ben. Little Ben, begging me to help his sister, running through the snow in bare feet to fetch me.
I yanked my phone out of my pocket, dialed for the police, and asked for an ambulance too. Told them everything - Ben arriving at the doorstep in shock, coming here, Lucy’s neck, lack of pulse.
I even told them about the blue ribbon, and the way it matched the bruises on her cheek.
I couldn’t stay in the cellar anymore. Ben was alone in my house, terrified and half-frozen, and as much as it felt like a betrayal to leave Lucy alone in the cold and the dark, she was already gone. There was nothing I could do. I had to focus on the living.
I sat with my arm around Ben - made him change out of his sopping wet clothes, bundled them into a plastic bag for the police, wrapped him in thick blankets, and then sat in the window-seat with him, just waiting for them to arrive. He kept asking me questions which I couldn’t - or wouldn’t - answer.
Is Lucy alright? Is she going to be O.K?
When will Mummy come home? I don’t want her to come home.
Where’s Lucy now? Is she on her own?
I shushed him, rubbed his back, babbled softly, anything to avoid telling him the truth.
How do you tell a little boy you couldn’t save his sister?
The police pulled up after about fifteen minutes, skidding past our house in screaming sirens and flashing lights. Ben clung to my side, and I had to lift him up with me to answer the door, wrapping him tighter in the blankets as he trembled. The paramedics took one look at him and fetched those foil, hypothermic blankets they use on rescued mountain-climbers, carrying him back inside to sit in the warm room while they talked to him quietly.
I had to take the police up to the house. I didn’t speak to them, couldn’t speak to them, nothing more than monosyllables. I couldn’t bring myself to go down to the cellar, pointed instead. Two of them, and a guy holding a medical bag, headed down into the darkness. I sank against the wall, hugging my knees, and the policewoman put a comforting arm round my shoulders.
‘She was wearing a blue ribbon.’ I said hoarsely, stupidly, as if that somehow changed things.
They took me back to the house. Ben had gone hysterical when they tried to load him into the ambulance, screaming and crying, surrounded by strangers. He would only calm somewhat when I sat with him on my knee, held his hand, so in the end I went with them to the hospital. Eventually, though, he was taken away, and I was driven to the police station, given a cup of hot, sweet tea, and asked to make a statement. Eventually, they drove me home, where Mum was waiting with another police officer, white and shocked.
That night I dreamt of a cold, stiff little hand grasping mine, Ben’s voice begging for help, and blue ribbons the colour of bruises on a little girl’s face.