STORY STARTER
Submitted by Petit-Mythe
Your protagonist finds themself in a graveyard where each stone has the deceased’s last words inscribed on it. One gravestone catches their eye...
in the shelter of the moonlight
August wanders through the graveyard, searching for one certain gravestone. The one belonging to the person she cared about more than anything in the world. The one that had belonged to her wife.
August has to know what her final words were.
She'd been told that Viv had killed herself. She needs to know if those final words will explain why, hoping it has nothing to do with anything she's done. They'd gotten into an argument just hours before. What if August had been the catalyst, the final straw in whatever Viv had been going through? What if August was just too wrapped up in herself to recognize that?
The rows of graves flow down the hill, the moon glinting off them, seemingly taunting her as she searches for her wife's tombstone. Shining a spotlight on all the others while refusing to show her the one that matters the most.
As August reads the final words magically inscribed on the other slabs, she wonders if she'll be able to handle what she might see from Viv. Most of them aren't significant, off-hand comments that are pure coincidence, and nothing to do with the death of the person that spoke them. Some of them, however, surely haunted those who knew their host. One reads, "Oh my god, Vicky, hit the brakes!" and August almost looks away before she can finish reading another, "Mr. Walloway, he can't get in, can he?"
Finally, she reaches a gravestone at the end of the line, sheltered by a tree, preventing the moonlight from reaching it.
"When I survive this, I'll kill you, I swear it."
August sees the quote first, recognizes the name on the grave second. Genevieve Hallow. Though August called her Viv.
Everyone had told August that Viv had done it herself. The hospital, the coroner, the ones at the funeral home. How could they have messed it up so terribly, that the only thing revealing her true fate was the luck that her final words had been a threat?
August had come here to find peace. It's now clear that she may never find that closure again, now knowing what she does. Her wife was murdered.
This was a very good piece!! It really kept up the tension the entire way through, and I really like the style of writing you have :)
My only suggestion is that of the tone and the point of view. I think this piece might work better from a first person perspective, so you can experience the situation from August's point of view. There is already such a good voice in the piece, and I think it would be helpful if this voice belonged to August (for example, she might be telling the story as she experiences it). Another suggestion I had was to have a more concise tone. At, "Oh my god, Vicky, hit the brakes!" the tone is rather comical (it actually got me to laugh). You use more serious language throughout your piece such as August's pain at losing here partner or the descriptions of the cemetery. Of course, this disparity in tone can heighten the moods of each section, and I just wanted to see if it was intentional.
Anyways, amazing piece!!
