I slept through most of the ride. When we arrived, the cabin was much bigger than I had expected. It was actually more like a house in the woods than a cabin. There was electricity. In fact, there were fluorescent lights in each room. There was one bedroom that was small and had one double bed in it. I assumed it to be Justin’s parents’ room. Then there were two other bedrooms, each having four cots and four cubby-type things to store belongings in. The living room was huge and had in it three couches with blue cushions. There was even a TV, but it didn’t get cable. The kitchen was small but had a refrigerator, freezer, and gas stove. With all the advanced equipment, it was really strange that there was not a single phone. All the walls were wood paneled, and only the living room had a rug, a brown one. There were two bathrooms, which was a good thing considering there were six of us. In the front there was a beautiful porch with windows on the three walls that were not part of the actual cabin. It was spacious compared to what I had expected. Eve, Jill and I chose the room that was more towards the back of the cabin for our own. It had a back door so if any creepy people came to kill us, as one would in a cheesy horror movie, we’d have an escape route. The guys stayed in the other bedroom, where there was no such escape route.
Tag: early work
Affinity for Darkness – Chapter Three
It was a year after the funerals, two years after the party, and a week before Winter Break. I was a senior in high school and eighteen years old. I couldn’t wait to graduate in June. Life seemed to be going well.
It was on a Saturday afternoon rich with blowing snow and howling winds, that my parents decided to talk with me about Winter Break. I was up in my room, working on a book I was trying to write. I had been working on it for about six months, but couldn’t get very far. I had some strong images and scenes that would not leave my head. I knew it was about a girl who dreamt often and vividly of a girl who looked exactly like her, yet it was not her. Nor was it her long-lost identical twin, or the likes. I also knew I would title it Stranger is Me if I ever got around to finishing it.
I was summoned downstairs by my mother. She needed to have A Talk with me. I honestly thought it would be about studying, grades or some other grueling topic.
Affinity for Darkness – Chapter Two
All nine of us went to Jake and Todd’s joint birthday party, the one I spoke of earlier. We were the only attendants, rather odd for a sweet sixteen party. Jill, Eve and I figured we were invited because of Brenda, though none of us had really spoken with her since she began seeing Jake. Justin was invited without question, being Todd’s best friend. Jake had invited Karl and Don; don’t ask me why. Jake is Jake though, unpredictable and pushy. He gets what he wants whether he has an explained reason or not. He had insisted the two of them come, which was no problem with either of them. Eve and Don had not been going out then, but they did argue a lot, and a real romance was growing between them.
I had hopes of going and talking to Justin. As of yet, I had never done so. At least, not of any significance. While preparing to leave, I thought of as many ways as I could to start a conversation with him. I thought of how I could impress him with my wicked sense of humor, wow him with my brilliant intelligence. But I knew all of this was quite exaggerated and only in my mind. Who was I kidding? I’d be lucky if I could gather up the courage to say hi to him. I was a coward, too scared that I’d get my heart broken and shattered like fragile glass.
Affinity for Darkness – Chapter One
There were nine of us before the party, the one time we all were together before the trip to Justin’s cabin in the woods. By the time we left, there were only six of us. We were all friends. A group.
I guess we didn’t really know each other well at all. We were not exactly all best friends to begin with. We were all connected. We all knew and respected each other. Let me explain as I go along. I have no time to waste.
The only way the six of us who made the trip to Justin’s cabin were really all connected was through the deaths of three of our peers a year ago, and at a party the year before that. At that party, all nine of us were together. It was never to happen again.
Affinity for Darkness – Prologue
I’ve always been enchanted by darkness. It haunts me. It lures me. It holds my deepest fears. My deepest desires. Ever since I can remember it’s been there, playing with my mind.
My heart can melt just by being surrounded by a night scene. It’s inviting. It’s tempting. I wish for nothing more than to be able to become one with the night.
The stars. The skies. The far-off planets. It’s their mystery that intrigues me so. And their supreme beauty. The moon, too. It lights the night. Illuminates all the wonder.
The trees, the ground, scattered street lights, the wind—they fascinate me as well. Maybe it’s simply ply the way they look under the dark sky. It all just makes me think of dreams and nightmares. And oh yes, I love those too.
A Good Read: An Essay
I have tried many times to explain who I am, at all different points in my life. I have used up pages and pages trying to convey all the different and conflicting attributes of my personality. I have used my interests, my reactions to situations, the way I think, what I believe in, some significant experiences, my aspirations, my fears, and my deepest innermost emotions to try to define what makes me who I am and separates me from the rest of the world. I have tried to find what makes me an individual, unique in my own way. Each time I have tried I always have come away feeling that I am too complex to explain, or maybe that I am no different from anyone else.
Then, over the course of eighth and ninth grade I read the six-part series by Christopher Pike called The Last Vampire series. They sound like books that are just simple thrillers for young readers, and for someone at a younger age, that is really all they are. However, I read the series earlier this year at a much deeper level and was amazed at what I found. There is really significant material within the lines of the books.
After the first reading, I finished the last book feeling different, but I could not easily put my finger on the reason why. I felt a sense of tranquility that I was unaccustomed to.
Josie – Sunshower Chapter Two
“Josie, I’m so sorry. Seth told me what happened,” Ray Ann said as soon as she saw me the next day, during our break between our first two sessions with the InfoMaster. We were in the Psych-Lab Wing, the most central spot when the cafeteria wasn’t open. White, windowless walls surrounded us on all sides. Above were large fluorescent lights that left not a spot of darkness, much to my dismay. There were large heavy doors on each side of the boxlike room. The one to the cafeteria had a green metallic number pad next to it-students needed to punch in their ID numbers to enter-that read “CLOSED” in electric blue letters across the display.
“Oh, so you’re speaking to me now? I feel honored,” I replied with a twinge of bitterness. Lately it seemed she was a friend when it was convenient for her, or when she felt it was her duty.
“Of course. I’m sorry about that dumb fight. It was all my fault.”
Computer Junkie: A Complete Short Story
I love my computer. Since I’m what some people would call a “loser,” I don’t have much of a social life. But when I get on the computer, a whole different side of me comes out. I am no longer shy and dorky, but the queen of the chat rooms. I run three mailing lists and manage two newsgroups. My real hobby, though, is creating webpages. I am an expert when it comes to HTML, and many people do not know it, so the business is pretty good.
Life is always shoving it down my throat that I am never going to be a success, or anyone important, however. My older brother, Brian, is a professional webpage designer and a computer programmer. He gets paid a ton of money for doing the same thing I do, and all I get is lunch money out of it. Sometimes I envy him so much; Brian is everyone’s favorite guy. He was always the prize child. Now he is the richest guy in the family. I will never be anything compared to him.
At the same time, though, I can’t dislike him. He’s nicer to me than anyone else is. He makes time to call me at least once a week and listens to my teenage angst even though he’s been out of college for three years already. He is always doing special things for me like buying me little presents or sending me funny e-mails just to make me laugh. Even though I’m jealous of him, he’s really a great guy. And he can always help when the stupid computer won’t listen to me.
~~~
Okay, this has to be the most embarrassing story I could post, but since I allude to it in my introductory post, it seems only fair to put it up. This is the one with characters named after members of Alice in Chains, one of whom speaks in song lyrics. I wrote this in 1997, back when my parents very first got the internet and I had no knowledge whatsoever of how the internet works so there is a bunch of made up stuff, and a lot of it is really dated. Entertainment purposes!
Don’t forget, you can always check out the Samples section, including Older Works and Published.
~Chrys
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Dear Friends: A Complete Short Story
I walked slowly to my backyard with candles and matches under my arm. The wind howled and whistled in the trees. The dead leaves crackled under my feet. It was as dark as night. That’s probably because it was night. Halloween night to be exact.
We were planning to have a seance. It was rather strange, the way it came about. All of us, excluding Curt, had dreamt about it. I was first, last Monday. Since then, one by one, we each had the seance dream. We pretended to take this lightly, as a joke to see if our dreams were psychic or something, but we all knew how serious we were about it. We tried to keep it light so that we couldn’t admit to ourselves how spooky and terrifying it was. If only we’d truly known how terrible it would really be.
Even though Curt hadn’t had the dream, he was included. We couldn’t not inc≥lude him. He was there last Halloween when the whole thing began, along with Daniel, Alexa, Edna and I. It did bother me though, that he had no dream about it.
Night of Evils: A Complete Short Story
It was to be a night of evils. I knew that the moment the sun set. As soon as the blues, violets, reds, greens, oranges and yellows drained from the sky it was clear. The evil vibes were almost tangible. Mystery hung in the air and fear was everywhere. I could taste the sadness and smell the sorrows. Horror and hatred weighed heavily in the clouds. It didn’t need to be spoken aloud, the fact was evident: Death was ready to strike. I knew all this and yet I went to the lake anyway.
I could get to the lake by taking a path through the woods that were in my backyard. It was so familiar and routine that I could easily get there blindfolded. Tonight, though, everything was different. I had trouble staying on the path, which had never happened before and really worried me. The wind blew fiercely, chilling the night air and making whistling and howling noises in the trees. I had to pull on a sweater to avoid the cold.
When I arrived at the lake, it was spooky as well. The full moon cast eerie shadows all over its surface. The stars didn’t seem to twinkle as they should. The sky had a strange reddish tint. No light from nearby homes shone through the trees, as it usually did at this time of night. The whole place had a somewhat grayish fog around it that reminded me of a dream scene in a TV show.
~~~
I’m going back to delving into early work for some writing samples.
I thought of this story in particular because it was right about this time of year that I wrote this story. The year was 1997. I was a junior in high school and for a creative writing class, the assignment was to write our first full-length story. This started for me with trying to evoke the atmosphere. I can actually remember typing this up on my parents’ computer and doing some really funky stuff with the background and font colors to help match the atmosphere I was trying to portray, which I never felt I fully did. Some things in our minds, especially the very ethereal, just can’t be fully captured in words. So instead, I made a story out of it.
As always, you can check out other Friday Writing Samples that cover lots of different styles, genres and media, as well as other Older Works and Published.
~Chrys
Chrys Buckley 