A/N- I have written this short story an English assignment. Please tell me what you think and how it could be improved! Some of the paragraphs are a bit choppy.
All the characters in this story are mine and solely mine. I own the story and everything in it is my own.
A glacial breeze brushes past your cheek as you walk down the dim, derelict alley way, alone. You listen to the deafening silence, pained by your solitude, comforted only by the routine, agitated breath escaping your nose. The air is cold. Colder than a white Christmas, but warmer than the Antarctic coast trapped in a cruel winter.
You walk further down the abandoned path, watching your steps as you would a mind capturing horror movie. You follow their moves, careful as not to slip on the glassy jacket of ice enclosing the alligatored asphalt. Too dark to see, the only thing leading the way is a faint, distant glow, of the moon, lustrously radiating beyond arms reach.
Your black coat is now dirty grey, flakes of crusty snow falling delicately from the black sky. Like a sack, the jacket hangs off your limbs, making you seem healthier than you really are. Your elfin, bony finger clutch onto the artificial wool of your deep pocket, the tips curled over in agony, frozen. Between your icebound knuckles sits a soft piece of stained cloth, the only thing the remains from the past, the only thing that makes you feel safe.
With nowhere to go, you continue to tread up the street. Your steps become curtailed, your feet heavy as they drag your troubles behind them. You begin to wonder where you will sleep tonight, whether anyone will come to take you home, or whether anyone will come at all.
Your face is gaunt, your eyes sunken and hollowed. Your skin is cleaved to your thinning bones, making you seem almost transparent. Your mind is devoid of all thoughts and emotions. The scars on paper thin skin are constant reminders of this. They stare at you and don't let go, like the haunting glow from the eyes of a black cat. They stay, clutched to your war torn skin, as reminders of what life used to be.
As your eyes scan the deluded constellation of buildings and houses, you watch as the city lights start to dim. It is late at night, you think. Maybe even early in the morning. People, however rich or poor, sink deep into their beds, safe and fenced from the world. You think about how warm they are, how they are loved. But you are alone, alone in the pitch black night, alone with only the crowded sense of nothingness flooding through your body.
You notice a movement from the corner of your bloodshot eye. For a while, the thing is still, but as you continue to journey forward, it starts moving again. It creeps towards, a tiger about to launch on its prey, and scans you with its eyes, stretching their jaw in delight. The animal paces forward, careful as to not startle its meal. You're still. Still as a gravestone. Unable to capture your thoughts, you prepare to lunge forward to escape from the beast. But something startles you.
"My, what is a boy like you doing out at this time of night?"
Your lips are static, except for slight chatter of your few teeth.
"I heard footsteps walking this way. Funny that, you most never hear anything on this street, especially anything that loud. Such a big noise from a little boy. How old must you be? 6? 7?"
The sound is comforting. For the first time you feel merely warm. Your mouth threatens to speak, even just a noise, but you hold it in like a mother holds her new born baby.
"Come on, love. Come inside. I'll put the kettle on for you."
The noise rings in your ears. It is raspy, from years of breathing smoke and the thick smell a flaming kerosene lamp. Her chubby limbs call you towards her, motioning for you to follow. You are tempted; your flaking mouth yearns for the alien feel of food.
You are struck. For the first time you want to move closer to this 'thing'. Your head throbs, blood curdling at the back of your neck, the hairs upright with excitement. You move towards the calling creature, finally making up your mind to follow it. But as you look up to its face, you noticed something.
You breath becomes staggered and you start shaking, shaking like a weak, old tree in a blizzard. You watch its mouth. Its parched lips press together. The edges of its mouth turn slowly up. A slight smile appears. It is all too much. You cnat bare to look at the expression for any longer. The image is ironed into your head, plastered to your memory. You can't stand it much longer. So you do the thing you do best. You run.
Your bare feet ache with pain; the soles dry as the head of the water pump from your home town. The toes burn with each crush of the ground's debris; glass and rock settle in the gaps between your pulsing toes, dripping with blood. Yet this doesn't stop you. Pain and suffering has with you so long now that you are past caring. You sprint, fast as a speeding bullet. You weave in and out of the countless memories in your way, dodging and leaping.
Once again, your ponderous steps lumber forward. Your wheezing breath is dense. Your lungs cry with pain as you respire. Your frost-bitten hands snake their way into your deep pockets, once again resorting to you, warm by a hair's breadth. Your spine is curved too much. It sags with worry, much more than any child your age should have to bear. It weighs you down, pulling and tugging on you on you, and doing whatever can to consume you. You are only a young boy. A young boy who has only seen eleven years, but lives the life of one that has seen so many more.
Something tickles your cheek. Your crippled fingers reach towards it, caressing the sunken hallows of your eyes. A drop of liquid melts onto your finger, quickly absorbed into its thin skin. Leaning on a rickety for support, you bring your fingertip towards you mouth. You place it onto your swollen, parched tongue. The liquid sinks into your tastebuds, the perception of sorrow and salt lingering in your mouth. A tear, you realise. Slowly, more tears release themselves from your ducts, an unbroken row of glistening silver rolling next to the bridge of your nose. Your bosy slides down the pole until you are sitting on the ground.
All night, you let the tears and what they represent stream out your body and splash against the coarse ground. And the next morning, when the sun awakens and the moon falls asleep, your still body watches; eyes rolled to the back of you head, you jaw relaxed and deprived of the rise and fall of your chest. It is they most peaceful you have ever been.