Hi hello my little darlings, for college English I wrote an ending to a southern gothic short story for an extra credit assignment. I had waaaaaay too much fun with this, and I thought I’d put off my four page essay just a little longer to share with you what I’d put into the category of some of my best work as a writer.
Just for a little back story the young Lucynell was deaf and slow until Shifner prayed for a rain to wash the bad out of the town. The rain chased him, but I thought it’d be a happy little thought for the rain to do something nice for Lucynell.
This is a very twisted story, and by the end of it you will all be wondering if I’m mentally stable. The answer is yes of course. This is just a twisted messed up assignment because it is after all a southern gothic story.
Without further ado, please enjoy my writing. I’ll attach the name of the story in a few days!
COLLEGE ENGLISH EXTRA CREDIT ENDING
Lucynell woke up on a plain brown couch in a white walled room where the only other furnishings were a plain dark wood coffee table in front of her and a simple brick fire place with a fire going. Lucynell stood up and tightened the quilt that had covered her around her shoulders. Her feet felt cold on the white tile floor. She was surprised by how clear her thoughts and observations were. She was usually very slow, and people had noticed it. Where am I? Lucynell thought. She decided tried to recall what had happened that night. She woke up in her usual slow mental haze, mute as usual, at a bar stool in a restaurant. There wasn’t anyone there, and she was confused. A man grabbed her hand across the bar, and she wondered what he was doing. He wasn’t a familiar face, this wasn’t a familiar place. She giggled at her internal rhyme. He took her hand and led her out the door into a storm, he hurried her into a car, but it didn’t matter she was already soaked with rain. All of a sudden she heard thunder. She HEARD the thunder. She looked over at the man and realized he couldn’t be any older than 22. “Don’t be scared,” he said. And she didn’t know if he meant of him, or the rain. She leaned her head against the door, and somewhere between where they left and where they were going she fell into another deep sleep as she wondered about the weird sensation of hearing things like a stranger man’s voice and thunder. She came back from her day dream and decided to go into the connecting room that looked like a kitchen. She turned on the sink and washed her hands and splashed water on her face. She didn’t realize that she’d started crying. It was as though her hearing and thoughts had come in with the rain. She heard the door creak open and the man walked in; she read the name tag on what appeared to be his work shirt. Timothy she thought. His face softened as he realized that she had been crying. He came over to her, close, but not too close, and shut off the water. He looked into her eyes studying her for a second, and suddenly Lucynell felt self-conscious about her wrinkled white dress. Timothy asked with a smile, maybe sensing her self-consciousness, “What’s your name ma’am?” She was nervous to hear her own voice because she never had before, but she smiled in spite of herself and said, “Lucyne…” And then smiled ever bigger and finished, “Just Lucy.” Because nothing sounded better than a new life as “Just Lucy.”
Old Lucynell grew older and bitterer every day. She had filed police reports, and had alerted half the state of Alabama that her daughter was missing. But the police came back after a year finally telling her every lead was a dead end, her car was gone, and there was no man named Shifler. The police said give up, little Lucynell was gone. Old Lucynell was going insane and getting lonely. Finally one night she set fire to everything that Shifler had repaired. After all, it didn’t matter; he had damaged everything she cared about. The fire was put out by all the firemen in her one horse town, but even after all of her property was level and smothered with ash she refused to leave. When she was finally alone she went through the ashes of her home. She found only one thing, and that was the charred remains of little Lucynell’s doll. She grabbed her daughters doll and held it as if it were her baby Lucynell. She walked for a mile down to the train tracks that she and Lucynell used to flatten pennies on, and lay down on the tracks. Old Lucynell clutched the doll to her chest as hard as she could and let out a trembling sob. She wailed until she felt the tracks shake. Then she lay still and squeezed her eyes shut tight. The last thing old Lucynell heard was the whistle of a train. The only person to visit old Lucynell’s grave side was a man named John Westbrook who sometimes liked to be called Shifler.
Five years later Lucy was married to a man named Timothy, and using the money from his three jobs he put her into college. She wanted to teach the hearing impaired. She never bothered to go home or check on her mother. She was too busy being free, although her mother did cross her mind a lot. She imagined her in her rocking chair enjoying her view. Her mother always loved her view.
“Shifler” hadn’t stopped in Alabama to settle in. He kept driving his green car until he came just inside the Ohio border. He got a job at a bike shop where he made $9.00 an hour and eventually fell in love with the petite blonde shop owner named Carol. They got married, but Carol went missing two years later. When they found Carol she was buried in the front yard of their modest home. The police are now out looking for a man named Ronald Richardson, with the same features and missing limb as “Shifler.” John is sstill on the run, but he always stops in Alabama once a year to check in on Old Lucynell.
XOXOXO
Nothing But Nealie 