I have finally decided to post this here because I need to critiquing. I am a visual artist and writing does not come easily to me. Some friends of mine in the writing program in my school have helped me edit and have proof read what I have so far, but I would like some more opinion and thoughts.
Please read, comment and enjoy.
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He grew up living a mundane life in suburbia with a normal everyday family. No one, including himself, knew he was different from anyone else. You see, an angel incarnate will appear human in every way, that is, until some sort of horrific trauma hits that individual.
His teenage years were wild. He often partied with his friends, drank and smoked; anything to rebel against his brutally boring life. He never took anything seriously and nearly everything was just a big game to him, but his whole life, he felt something heavy inside. This may be one of the reasons why he acted like such an animal. When he was around people, he had to be the center of attention, the class clown, the goof; the one that always drank too much and passed out within the first few hours of a party. It was the only way he could forget about the weight inside him. The only person that he ever really spoke to was his 6 year old sister. In her innocence she could neither judge nor condemn him for his deepest secrets, and for the most part, she barely understood what he had to say anyways.
When he was alone, he felt sad. It was as if he could feel the burdens and the secret pains of all of those around him; A deep, empathetic pain. To avoid this, he surrounded himself by loud, rowdy people. You know the type, the party animals. No house, campsite or yard was safe from their chaos. If it wasn't policed, the settings were often destroyed.
One night (morning might actually be more correct), Merric arrived home at an ungodly hour. His parents already in bed, he supposed, as they no longer bothered to wait up for him. They had given up trying to make him behave more humanely. He stumbled into the house and staggered up the stairs to his room, knocking over a lamp on the way, making a loud crashing sound. He was severely intoxicated and collapsed on his bedroom floor.
When he awoke, there was no noise in the house, which he was thankful for, as his head throbbed and his limbs ached. He pulled himself up onto his double bed and glanced over at the clock on his nightstand. 3:14pm. His little sister should have arrived home from school 10 minutes ago... his mother should be making a ruckus in the kitchen making a snack for her... shouldn't the TV or at least the radio be on just loud enough for him to hear the hum of voices?
Curious, he dragged himself to his feet and glanced out into the hallway. There was nothing, no sound, no one. He made his way down stairs to have a look around. There was no sign in the kitchen and nobody in the living room. In fact, the whole house was completely empty.
"What's going on," he asked aloud to himself. Silently he added to his question ‘Where is everyone?’
A knock on the front door startled him out of his confused stupor. He answered it, only to find two officers at the door.
They told him that the bodies of his parents had been found in the woods, they had been brutally tortured and murdered and that his sister had yet to be found.
The news hit Merric like a brick, causing his knees to give out. The police offered their condolences and asked Merric if he would join the search party looking for his little sister. He agreed.
So the search began, and for the first 6 days there was no luck. Volunteers were beginning to lose hope and whisper about giving up the search. But Merric pursued. He may have ignored and resented his family, but his little sister was barely 6 years old and being all he had left he was not about to let her go.
After 17 days, the police were ready to call off the search. Merric began to search for his sister on his own. On the 26th day after she had gone missing, he found her and the culprits that murdered his parents. They were a couple of drug addicts hiding out in the woods who probably attacked the defenseless family looking for something to steal and trade for their drug of choice.
When Merric saw his sister, something in his mind snapped. The 6 year old was brutally beaten and looked sickly and skeletal. She had several cuts, many of which were infected. Bruises covered her body and her eyes were dull and pupils dilated. One of the criminals revealed a switch blade and held it to the girl’s throat. Merric froze petrified in place. The man with the knife simply grinned and pressed the blade tighter to the girl’s neck. Hard enough that crimson beads began to roll down the girl’s neck. Merric's sister did not move and did not react. He realized, at that moment, they had drugged her recently.
Merric simply stood in horror unable to move, knowing he should make a move but afraid that if he did his sister would surely die. The second culprit stood and pulled a revolver from his coat pocket, aimed at Merric and pulled the trigger. He reacted by making a dive, which startled the man with the knife, causing him to run the blade across the width of the girls throat. The last thing Merric remembered was seeing his 6 year old sister’s lifeless body hitting the ground, the sound echoing in his ears as his consciousness faded.
When he awoke, the scene around him would have been appropriate for a horror flick. The addicts were both dead, blood smeared everywhere as if it were a preparation for some satanic ritual. He felt that he might vomit, but held the sick back. He needed to see his sister. He crawled over to her still corpse and pulled her into his lap. He cried as he held her in his arms, running his fingers through her long blonde hair and trying to wipe the dirt from her face, which only smudged it more.
The weight inside him suddenly felt heavier and excruciatingly painful. It moved from the pit of his stomach to his heart and then slowly through his arteries and veins. An enormous pressure hit his back around his shoulder blades and he suddenly cried out in pain. His sisters body fell from his lap as he keeled over, screaming in agony. He felt his bones moving as if they were reorganizing themselves and his skin began tearing apart. He began to vomit, blood, lots of it. His vision blurred, nerves trembled, and his joints threatened to give out. Suddenly, it was gone. The pain, the pressure, the throbbing; it was all gone. He tried to stand but found he lacked the strength. Something was keeping him off balance. He tried again, and this time, clumsily succeeded. He looked around to try and find some answer for what happened, but couldn't. Then he saw something he would never forget. A ghostly image of his sister rose from the girl’s body in front of him.
He stumbled towards the apparition, trying to touch it, to feel that it was real. He collapsed in a vain attempt. The apparition smiled lightly, approached him and glided a hand across his brow. Her touch was like a cool breeze and nothing more. He reached to touch her but his hand only passed through a cold spot in the air.
His eyes welled with tears that he could hold no more and he again started to cry. The girl extended her ghostly arms and lifted his chin with a gentle force, wiping the tears from his eyes with her semi-transparent thumb. She took a step closer, kneeled, and then wrapped her cold arms around his neck. Merric cried harder, and the girl pulled away, and tried to smile again. She did not speak, as for ghosts, speaking takes a great deal of energy, as does moving objects. The ghost simply kissed him on the forehead and then vanished in a bright flash that could be compared to a lightening strike.
Merric collapsed and cried for a long time. When the tears ran out and he could no longer cry he tried to stand again, and again had a great difficulty doing so.
He felt different. Not the emotionally and mentally different which was caused by the great deal of despair, but physically different. He staggered to the edge of a small creek not far away and found a still spot. What he saw astounded him. Erected from his back was a pair of deep gray, feathered wings.
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