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The snow is hard against his shovel, packed together over months, each flake hunkered down now for the winter, locking icy fingers with its neighbour. Hard like concrete. Digging through it makes him feel weak, vulnerable. The snow is stronger than he is, more patient: he feels it jarring in his hands as each downward thrust of the shovel ends scratch deep in the ground, and he feels it biting into his foot as he stamps his whole weight onto the blade. Little by little he makes progress. The cold is bitter. He expects to acclimatise but does not: instead the cold enters him, settles into a lattice, freezes him finger by finger, limb by limb; and every few minutes he fights it, resting the shovel and beating his hands together, jigging his feet, then drinking from a silver flask before returning to work. He finds a rhythm, forgets everything but the freezing air; his breath leaves his mouth as steam and his arms and legs dig by themselves, up and down like slow pistons. Then the shovel hits metal. Minutes later he has dug out a box. He kneels down, opens its lid. The tears are already in his eyes.
* * * *
"Don't know her."
The barman looks at him, a warning stare, daring him to challenge the lie. Everywhere he has heard this same answer. He has stamped back and forth across the town for hours and met with shrugs and blank stares - all of them false - in the post office, the library, in a dull grey cafe, even in the tiny schoolhouse with its three bored pupils and a teacher who barely looked up from her newspaper. His are the only footprints in the snow. The town seems deserted. Carcasses of strange machinery litter the streets: timber-saws with teeth the size of his hand, excavation drills, winches and snow ploughs. Silence, inside and out. The whole town is rusted shut.
He wants to beat an answer from someone. Instead he reaches into his pocket, draws out a silver flask and slides it across the bar. The old man takes the flask, turns it over in his hands, runs his thumb over the engraving and slides it back.
"Let's talk in the office."
* * * *
A plank of light slides through a gap in the curtains, crosses the floor, props itself against the bed and pokes him in the eye. But he is ill, or wants to be ill, and doesn't get up. The doorbell rings, an unwelcome stab of noise. He waits but no one answers and when the bell rings again he gets up, creaking like a fossil, stumbles downstairs and opens the door.
"Sign."
The delivery man doesn't look up, doesn't notice his state of undress. He takes the clipboard, signs, and worries that the delivery man can smell his penis. He takes the parcel and shuts the door without saying goodbye.
He makes a cup of tea then sits down at the table with his parcel. There is a noise at the front door, rustling in the hallway: his mother returning from the shops. "Up early", she comments, flushed in the face, laden with carrier bags that seem to rise up, struggling against her, clawing at the doorway to slow her down. He thinks what he always thinks: she buys her food alive, takes it home to kill it. They are smiling at each other
His mother hauls her unwilling load to the kitchen and he turns back to the parcel. It is the size of a shoebox, wrapped in brown paper that has been stained coffee dark by bad weather or bad luck. It has his name on it: three times, in fact, on labels he pulls off one by one, each written in a different hand. The address on the top label is his house here; the middle address is their old home, nearby, that they left fifteen years ago; but, underneath both, the last address - the first, he corrects himself - is one he does not recognise, in a distant city he has never visited. The postmark is from a town he has never heard of.
He opens the parcel and holds in his hand a silver flask, thick with grime. He rubs at it with a thumb, finds the grooves of an engraving that he then cleans with a nail, its letters emerging like coins from a black puddle. His mother comes out from the kitchen, tea in hand, and stands behind him rubbing his shoulder. She reads the name on the flask, goes pale, and drops her cup.
* * * *
"Mary Feierman", the barman says. "I knew her. I say 'knew' - my best guess is she's dead - I'm sorry if that's news to you but there you go, I guess news is what you came for. Can't know for certain but no one's seen her for months - and it's a hard winter out there. She left us, the town, a year ago, went to live in a shack a couple of miles out. Something had grown between her and this town. Shame. Her shame, and our shame - so she left. People said then she was a broken down witch, gone crazier. Then they said she had hidden something out there - a treasure, a stack of bills, some mystery. Then people said little, then nothing. We tried to forget her. But you've seen this town - the mill's stopped, the mine's stopped, the quarry's stopped - the memory of her is there, in every shadow, every silence. This is still her town."
"I can draw you a map of where she went. Here, take it. But before you go, it's cold out there, let me fill that flask one last time."
* * * *
The shack is miserable: two rooms covered in cobwebs, dust and half-darkness. The first thing he thinks is 'kids have been here' because the table is covered in empty spirit bottles. But as he explores he finds these bottles everywhere - in cupboards, under the bed, in the sink - and he sees that the carpet of dust has been pitted only with his footprints. He is the first person here since Mary Feierman left. He finds some threadbare clothes, chipped crockery, a newspaper used as a tablecloth, but nothing personal. In the bedroom he opens a cupboard stacked with medicines: a dozen kinds, failed experiments she has never thrown away. He recognises some of the boxes. There is nothing else here.
He sits at the kitchen table, finds one bottle still half full, and opens it to take a drink. Curled inside the rim is a note. He reads:
"I've gone for a walk. Not the kind you come back from. I'm sorry. Sorry for something I did a long time ago. I know I've left behind a lot of questions. If you're reading this then you knew where to look - where I'd look anyway - and maybe you're the one who deserves the answers. There's a marker fifty yards West of here. All the answers I can give you are buried there. I'm sorry. Goodbye. M.F."
There is a shovel leaning against the wall. He goes outside to dig.
* * * *
He kneels on the snow, leafing through the open box. Letters, notebooks, diaries. A name keeps jumping out: his own. Realisation spreads through him, then confirmation: a photo of a young woman, almost beautiful, with a flattened nose and sad eyes. The nose is his nose, her cheekbones match his own, their eyes are identical. He closes the box and tucks it under his arm; but before he leaves he takes the flask from his pocket and throws it in the hole. He smiles on the walk back to town: he has found his blood in the snow.
* * * *
"Don't know her."
The barman looks at him, a warning stare, daring him to challenge the lie. Everywhere he has heard this same answer. He has stamped back and forth across the town for hours and met with shrugs and blank stares - all of them false - in the post office, the library, in a dull grey cafe, even in the tiny schoolhouse with its three bored pupils and a teacher who barely looked up from her newspaper. His are the only footprints in the snow. The town seems deserted. Carcasses of strange machinery litter the streets: timber-saws with teeth the size of his hand, excavation drills, winches and snow ploughs. Silence, inside and out. The whole town is rusted shut.
He wants to beat an answer from someone. Instead he reaches into his pocket, draws out a silver flask and slides it across the bar. The old man takes the flask, turns it over in his hands, runs his thumb over the engraving and slides it back.
"Let's talk in the office."
* * * *
A plank of light slides through a gap in the curtains, crosses the floor, props itself against the bed and pokes him in the eye. But he is ill, or wants to be ill, and doesn't get up. The doorbell rings, an unwelcome stab of noise. He waits but no one answers and when the bell rings again he gets up, creaking like a fossil, stumbles downstairs and opens the door.
"Sign."
The delivery man doesn't look up, doesn't notice his state of undress. He takes the clipboard, signs, and worries that the delivery man can smell his penis. He takes the parcel and shuts the door without saying goodbye.
He makes a cup of tea then sits down at the table with his parcel. There is a noise at the front door, rustling in the hallway: his mother returning from the shops. "Up early", she comments, flushed in the face, laden with carrier bags that seem to rise up, struggling against her, clawing at the doorway to slow her down. He thinks what he always thinks: she buys her food alive, takes it home to kill it. They are smiling at each other
His mother hauls her unwilling load to the kitchen and he turns back to the parcel. It is the size of a shoebox, wrapped in brown paper that has been stained coffee dark by bad weather or bad luck. It has his name on it: three times, in fact, on labels he pulls off one by one, each written in a different hand. The address on the top label is his house here; the middle address is their old home, nearby, that they left fifteen years ago; but, underneath both, the last address - the first, he corrects himself - is one he does not recognise, in a distant city he has never visited. The postmark is from a town he has never heard of.
He opens the parcel and holds in his hand a silver flask, thick with grime. He rubs at it with a thumb, finds the grooves of an engraving that he then cleans with a nail, its letters emerging like coins from a black puddle. His mother comes out from the kitchen, tea in hand, and stands behind him rubbing his shoulder. She reads the name on the flask, goes pale, and drops her cup.
* * * *
"Mary Feierman", the barman says. "I knew her. I say 'knew' - my best guess is she's dead - I'm sorry if that's news to you but there you go, I guess news is what you came for. Can't know for certain but no one's seen her for months - and it's a hard winter out there. She left us, the town, a year ago, went to live in a shack a couple of miles out. Something had grown between her and this town. Shame. Her shame, and our shame - so she left. People said then she was a broken down witch, gone crazier. Then they said she had hidden something out there - a treasure, a stack of bills, some mystery. Then people said little, then nothing. We tried to forget her. But you've seen this town - the mill's stopped, the mine's stopped, the quarry's stopped - the memory of her is there, in every shadow, every silence. This is still her town."
"I can draw you a map of where she went. Here, take it. But before you go, it's cold out there, let me fill that flask one last time."
* * * *
The shack is miserable: two rooms covered in cobwebs, dust and half-darkness. The first thing he thinks is 'kids have been here' because the table is covered in empty spirit bottles. But as he explores he finds these bottles everywhere - in cupboards, under the bed, in the sink - and he sees that the carpet of dust has been pitted only with his footprints. He is the first person here since Mary Feierman left. He finds some threadbare clothes, chipped crockery, a newspaper used as a tablecloth, but nothing personal. In the bedroom he opens a cupboard stacked with medicines: a dozen kinds, failed experiments she has never thrown away. He recognises some of the boxes. There is nothing else here.
He sits at the kitchen table, finds one bottle still half full, and opens it to take a drink. Curled inside the rim is a note. He reads:
"I've gone for a walk. Not the kind you come back from. I'm sorry. Sorry for something I did a long time ago. I know I've left behind a lot of questions. If you're reading this then you knew where to look - where I'd look anyway - and maybe you're the one who deserves the answers. There's a marker fifty yards West of here. All the answers I can give you are buried there. I'm sorry. Goodbye. M.F."
There is a shovel leaning against the wall. He goes outside to dig.
* * * *
He kneels on the snow, leafing through the open box. Letters, notebooks, diaries. A name keeps jumping out: his own. Realisation spreads through him, then confirmation: a photo of a young woman, almost beautiful, with a flattened nose and sad eyes. The nose is his nose, her cheekbones match his own, their eyes are identical. He closes the box and tucks it under his arm; but before he leaves he takes the flask from his pocket and throws it in the hole. He smiles on the walk back to town: he has found his blood in the snow.
Page:
That was great
Oh very, very nice. The whole idea and the way you fitted it all together to tell the story. It just fell in lovely.
Congrats again.
Congrats again.
Don't worry: constructive criticism is always welcome. And it definitely helps to have a second pair of eyes to judge your work rationally.
I get the feeling people think I criticise heavily, but really I like the majority of what I read, I just like to help people try and improve.
:)
:)
Cheers, that helps. And three of the four things you mentioned had me feeling uncertain when I wrote them!
unknown kernel wrote:
> The snow is hard against his shovel, packed together over months, each
> flake hunkered down now for the winter, locking icy fingers with its
> neighbour. Hard like concrete. Digging through it makes him feel
> weak, vulnerable. The snow is stronger than he is, more patient: he
> feels it jarring in his hands as each downward thrust of the shovel
> ends scratch deep in the ground, and he feels it biting into his foot
> as he stamps his whole weight onto the blade. Little by little he
> makes progress. The cold is bitter. He expects to acclimatise but
> does not: instead the cold enters him, settles into a lattice,
> freezes him finger by finger, limb by limb; and every few minutes he
> fights it, resting the shovel and beating his hands together, jigging
> his feet, then drinking from a silver flask before returning to work.
> He finds a rhythm, forgets everything but the freezing air; his breath
> leaves his mouth as steam and his arms and legs dig by themselves, up
> and down like slow pistons. Then the shovel hits metal. Minutes
> later he has dug out a box. He kneels down, opens its lid. The
> tears are already in his eyes.
What I've highlighted are parts that I felt were really forced, or else just didn't work.
I'm no expert, but that's my opinion.
EDIT:
It amy not look like much, but if you check, it's one every other sentence for me.
The rest is good though.
Congrats.
> The snow is hard against his shovel, packed together over months, each
> flake hunkered down now for the winter, locking icy fingers with its
> neighbour. Hard like concrete. Digging through it makes him feel
> weak, vulnerable. The snow is stronger than he is, more patient: he
> feels it jarring in his hands as each downward thrust of the shovel
> ends scratch deep in the ground, and he feels it biting into his foot
> as he stamps his whole weight onto the blade. Little by little he
> makes progress. The cold is bitter. He expects to acclimatise but
> does not: instead the cold enters him, settles into a lattice,
> freezes him finger by finger, limb by limb; and every few minutes he
> fights it, resting the shovel and beating his hands together, jigging
> his feet, then drinking from a silver flask before returning to work.
> He finds a rhythm, forgets everything but the freezing air; his breath
> leaves his mouth as steam and his arms and legs dig by themselves, up
> and down like slow pistons. Then the shovel hits metal. Minutes
> later he has dug out a box. He kneels down, opens its lid. The
> tears are already in his eyes.
What I've highlighted are parts that I felt were really forced, or else just didn't work.
I'm no expert, but that's my opinion.
EDIT:
It amy not look like much, but if you check, it's one every other sentence for me.
The rest is good though.
Congrats.
Cheers for the comments. What bugged you about the first paragraph, Clazon? Overwritten? Or the commas instead of ands thing? I wanted it to be quite terse, I think.
Definitely an interesting way of using the topic. The atmosphere built up of what seemed almost a ghost town was great.
Having started to read it, the opening paragraph almost forced me to stop mreading and post a heavily critical post. However, I always give music and short stories a chance, so I read on and it just got better and better.
Not a perfect story by any means, for me. The beginning wasn't right at all. But the rest was great. Everyone felt authentic in a strange way and the whole story passed in a blurry state of half understanding.
Not a perfect story by any means, for me. The beginning wasn't right at all. But the rest was great. Everyone felt authentic in a strange way and the whole story passed in a blurry state of half understanding.
Very good. I love the way it unfolds, and the cut chronology suits the tale well, starting and ending in the snow.
Page: