Halfway through the year and I’m now out of the Short Story Challenge but still in the 100 Word Challenge.
My 2nd round entry to the Short Story Challenge, The Cave, which I submitted back in April did not get me through to the 3rd round. Honestly, I’m not surprised. I’m not making excuses (well I am really). That whole weekend we had visitors who didn’t leave till Sunday afternoon. Much food and drink was consumed and I wasn’t at my best on Sunday afternoon when I sat down to write my story. As a result, my effort was not one of my best and the feedback from the judges confirmed this. General consensus was that, while there were moments of true suspense and tension, the story lacked structure and was error ridden to the point of distraction. Oopsie!
I’m not sure I want to share The Cave with you, but I will do, if only for completeness. You can read it at the end of this post. Apologies in advance. Just a reminder that the requirements were as follows:
Genre: Suspense (one of my favourites which is even more annoying)
Action: Petrified
Character: Milkman
Better news on the 100 Word Challenge. I Found Love in the Same Day Emergency Care Department was well-received, which was good because I was pleased with this one. It was inspired by my own experience of spending a day in this department at our local hospital and my observations of my fellow patients. One of the judges said, “I was bowled over by the impressive, even utilitarian simplicity of style in this submission, that nevertheless managed to relate a warm, even adorable love story between two people close to their worst.” You can read this below. Just a reminder of the requirements:
Genre: Romantic Comedy (Urghh!)
Action: Waiting for a number to be called
Word: Worst
My next entry was submitted on the 14th of June and the results are due on the 7th of August. I enjoyed writing this one. The requirements were:
Genre: Horror (YAY!)
Action: Swerving
Word: Except
I chose to write about one of my favourite subjects. Sleep paralysis! I went a for a long title again as this works well when words are limited to 100! They allow for a title up to 15 words long. The story is called, Sleep Paralysis: Unexplained phenomenon associated with total immobility and the sense of an evil presence.
Anyway, fingers crossed…
In the meantime, here are I Found Love in the Same Day Emergency Care Department and The Cave.
I found love in the NHS Same Day Emergency Care Department.
Male, 27, Appendicitis
Female, 25, Viral Meningitis
Hours staring wordlessly over grey cardboard vomit bowls at our pale up-all-night faces, waiting for the numbers on our plastic wristbands to be called.
You: “Fancy a drink?”
Me: “Go on then.”
You: Shuffling to the cooler, with your dangling IV stand, hospital gown gaping at the back.
Me: Smudged mascara eyes ogling your cheeky little bum crack peeking over the top of your faded boxers.
An exchange of wan, stale-breathed smiles over flimsy plastic cups of lukewarm water.
You: “Should’ve worn clean underpants.”
Me “Should’ve washed my hair.”
Worst first date ever.
The Cave
Friends, Trudy and Chris, are heading to Milkman’s Cave and Petrifying Well to petrify their baby’s first shoes. The remote location is said to be named after the legendary Milkman.
Trudy stands beside the car, staring out over the grey, windswept moorland. The sky hangs heavy with unspent rainclouds. Theirs is the only vehicle in the tiny car park and there is nothing but moor grass and heather in all directions for as far as the eye can see. Her hair whips against her face and she tugs her beanie down over her ears to keep the loose strands in place. The moors have always made her feel uneasy and today is no different. As if they are in a place where they are not meant to be. Trespassing on primeval lands, where ancient echoes whisper through the heather, and long-kept secrets lurk beneath the peat.
“Come on, Trud. We need to get going. It’s a forty-minute walk to the cave,” Chris yells from the back of the car, where she perches on the edge of the open boot putting on her hiking shoes. Trudy walks round to join her. Her friend is grinning. Her eyes are sparkling. She loves this place almost as much as I hate it, Trudy thinks, as she slips out of her trainers and starts putting her own boots on.
Once they are fully booted and jacketed, with rucksacks fitted snugly to their backs and walking poles dangling from each wrist, Chris hurries back round to fetch a small carrier bag from the floor of the passenger seat.
“Mustn’t forget these!” she says, waving the bag that holds the sole purpose of their expedition.
“God no!” Trudy agrees as Chris removes a small pair of blue baby-shoes from the bag and thrusts them at her. Trudy takes them and puts them in the inside pocket of her jacket as Chris does the same with a pink pair. They walk over to where a weathered sign marks the start of the footpath. Trudy studies it for a moment.
Milkman’s Cave
and
Petrifying Well
2.3 miles
It had seemed like a good idea when Chris had suggested it. Now, Trudy isn’t so sure. Trudging across the moors to some creepy, wet cave to hang their babies first shoes in the Petrifying Well and return for them years later, by which time they would be preserved in stone for eternity. What had she been thinking? The first spots of rain were beginning to fall. She glances back to the warm, dry car then back to the path ahead. Chris is already striding up the path. Trudy hurries after her.
He is aroused by the sense of someone approaching. No, not one. Two. Two souls. On their way to him. He rises from his chamber and slithers across smooth boulders to the cave with the crack between the rocks. He crouches. He listens. He waits.
The entrance to the cave sits at the bottom of a dip, out of sight from the main path until it’s directly below them. It looks like a gaping black mouth with lacy lips of creeping ivy. Another small sign identifies it as their destination.
“Who was this Milkman anyway?” Trudy mutters, reading the peeling lettering. “And what was he doing delivering milk out here in the middle of nowhere?” she gestures across the barren landscape.
“He wasn’t an actual milkman,” Chris scoffs. “He was just called Milkman because his skin was the colour of milk. Story goes, he’d lived in the dark depths of the cave for so long that his skin turned completely white. And his hair. And his eyes. All white.”
“Jesus!” Trudy shudders. “Why? Why did he stay down there? That’s horrible!”
“It’s only a story, Trud. A myth.”
“No! I don’t like it! I’m not going in there.” Trudy closes her eyes, presses her lips together and vigorously shakes her head.
“Don’t be daft. He’s not real. There’s no one in there. Nothing in there, except a mouldering collection of petrified toys and teddy bears. Come on!”
“I don’t know…”
“Trud, we’ve come all this way. Let’s just do what we came to do. It’ll only take a minute.”
Trudy watches in horror as Chris scrambles down the slope and ducks beneath the ivy before she disappears inside the cave. Now Trudy is alone on the path. The car park long out of sight behind them. The wind moans around her and a crow caws in the distance, its call raw and harsh. Suddenly, the thought of standing here on her own is more terrifying than going inside. She picks her way down to the mouth of the cave and slips through.
His senses are under assault. He covers his ears against the thud of their footsteps. Their breathing. Covers his nose and mouth against the smell of their bodies. Their sweat. Their perfume. Cowers and folds in on himself as the air they disturb sends ripples over his tender skin.
As her eyes adjust to the darkness, it is the smell that hits Trudy first. Earthy and damp and metallic. But beneath that there is something else. Something organic and rotting. First the smell, and then the cold. Although she is just a couple of steps inside the entrance, the temperature has dropped by several degrees. Her eyes gradually adjust until she can see Chris, a dark shape just ahead of her. There is a soft electronic click and a circle of light from Chris’s phone torch illuminates the wall in front of them. Trudy gasps.
The wall is wet and glistening. At its foot is a small pool surrounded by rocks and vegetation. Around the pool on the rocks and hanging from strings that crisscross the surface of the wall, are hundreds of items in various stages of petrification. Dolls, teddy bears, toy cars, figurines, keys, hats, jewellery, hats, handbags, and shoes, all turned or turning to stone. The bottom of the pool is littered with petrified coins.
Trudy is mesmerised. She walks past Chris to the edge of the pool. All fear forgotten. It is magical. Beautiful. Like stepping into a fairy story.
“Wow,” she breathes.
“See? Isn’t it amazing?” Chris says.
“Amazing,” Trudy echoes.
They spend a few moments taking in the scene. Trudy lights her own phone torch and examines the details of some of the objects.
His senses have settled slightly. Grown accustomed to the onslaught of new stimulation. He watches and listens to them through the crack. His vision is dim. He can only make out their blurry shapes. But he can feel them. Hear them. Taste them.
“We better make a move,” Chris says, after a while. “Don’t want to run our phone batteries down.”
She takes Ella’s baby shoes out of her pocket and ties the laces together to hang them over an empty spot on a loop of string. The string itself is thick and solid. Trudy takes out Jake’s shoes. His have tiny straps and buckles and she interlocks them to hook them over the string beside Ella’s. They stand back to silently admire their handiwork. The shoes are bright and clean amid the other grey-brown objects.
“Right, let’s go.” Chris switches off her torch and heads back to the entrance. “Shit!” she exclaims, making Trudy jump and spin around.
“What?” Trudy asks. “What is it?” She follows Chris’s gaze to the opposite wall of the cave.
“I…I saw something. Something…white.”
“Stop it!”
“I’m not kidding. I did. I saw something.”
“Chris! You’re freaking me out. Please”
Trudy hurries towards the entrance. But Chris walks slowly towards the wall ahead, her eyes fixed on a specific spot that is darker than the rest of the grey green surface.
It happens quickly. A gasp. A soft rustle of fabric on stone, then silence.
Trudy feels an absence.
She turns around.
Chris is gone.
All her senses are screaming at her to run, but Trudy forces herself to walk deeper into the darkness. Tears well in her eyes and roll down her cheeks. Her breath is shallow. Her heart racing. Her whole body is trembling.
“Chris?” she whispers. “Chris, are you there? Chris?”
She is almost at the wall. She can see the long crack now. The dark crease.
Something white flashes behind it!
Trudy shrieks. Stumbles. Loses her footing. Steps to the side. Into empty air. And then she is falling. Sliding. Into blackness.
The Milkman lets out a long high-pitched keen. He scuttles from his hiding place back to his chamber. He is confused. Violated. He is panicked. Agitated. He is terrified of what is to come.
When Trudy hits the bottom, it knocks the breath out of her. She is gasping and crying. It is black. So black. Something is moving beside her. Touching her. Pawing at her. She screams and bats it off.
“It’s me!” Chris hisses. “Are you alright? Are you hurt?”
Trudy can’t speak. She takes a couple of deep, painful breaths.
“Trud?”
“I’m OK,” she croaks. “Just winded.”
“Thank, god!” Chris sighs.
Trudy can feel her crawling around beside her. Grunting and huffing.
“Are you OK? What are you doing?”
“Dropped…my…phone,” Chris mumbles. “Ah,” she sighs with relief and, a moment later, the comforting light from her torch lights up the space.
The two women look around in silence. It is another cave. Bigger than the one above but still small. Chris directs the light above their heads revealing the wide crevasse and almost vertical rockface that they have slipped down.
“We’re not getting back up there,” Chris grumbles. “We’re going to have to find another way out. Can you stand?” She helps Trudy to her feet.
Trudy’s teeth are chattering. She thinks she might throw up.
“What was that…thing?” she croaks.
Chris pointedly ignores her. Walks across the cave towards an opening on the other side.
Trudy starts to follow her but something on the ground catches her eye. A small cluster of objects tucked neatly in a corner. She bends to examine them.
“Chris. Look. Shine the light back here a minute.”
Chris directs the light at the group of objects.
“Oh,” Trudy’s voice is small. Something tugs at her heart.
The objects are a petrified hairbrush and a baby rattle. They are resting on a photograph. Trudy moves them aside. The photograph is creased and faded but she can see that it is of a man and a woman, and a baby. The man and woman are smiling. They hold the baby between them. She feels the love radiating from the image. But when she looks again at the stone comb and baby rattle, a wave of sorrow rushes through her.
“Leave that. We have to get out of here.” Chris’s tone is terse. It tells Trudy that her ever-stoical friend is just as afraid as she is. She wordlessly falls into step behind her as they follow the bobbing circle of light out of the cave and into the next.
Both women gasp at the sight that greets them.
Another wet, glistening wall. Another rockpool. Another well. But this one is not surrounded by petrifying toys and trinkets. The pair of petrified objects dangling in this well are something else entirely. One small. One larger. Although their features are smoothed by layers of hardened sediment, they are immediately recognisable for what they are. The shape of the human form is unmistakable. A woman and child. A mother and her baby. Immortalised in stone.
Close by in a dark corner of the cave, the Milkman crouches. His skin so pale it is translucent. His long hair and beard, white as cream. His nails yellowed and thick. His eyes are cloudy. He is weeping.
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