TW: suicide
He sang, he sang again; he sang how much he loved her, and she felt his tears rushing down into her grave.
***
“I’m sorry,” said Dan; as he held her close to his chest, giving her his temperateness, but she didn’t need any; because even at the termination of her life she was much tenderer than he could invariably be.
“I love you…” said Kate, and they were the last words that arose from of her mouth.
With a side gander, she saw her. Standing over her, glancing down at her, was Katrina looking remorseful. Besides, Kate couldn’t even endure paying attention to her because the ultimate person she would look at would be Dan.
“Go in Katrina,” said Dan, and she did so.
Dying can be fast or slow, painless or painful, nevertheless, no matter how I go, I’ll be unscathed, thought Kate. Regardless, this was a painful process; She didn’t reminisce how she was lying underneath this car as battered and bruised as her heart in front of his house
Then she realized it was the vial.
***
As she traversed through the suburbs, she remembered earlier to that day. Kate reminisced, seeing that blonde girl with Dan after she unfalteringly followed them. That girl looked familiar, which made her cynical. She was older than she was, and everything Kate wanted to be. She had a thick concrete of makeup that hid her snake-like skin; her clothes were barely covering the essentials and her mascara was thicker than the tips of lead pencil. This is what Kate should’ve been, she should’ve worn crop tops and skinny jeans instead of wearing her gargantuan hoodies and shapeless joggers. Then she remembered her: Katrina; their senior and Dan's mentor.
Kate could recall the time when Dan was observing her in the canteen. When Kate asked him what he was looking at, he looked away. He revealed that she was a "JUST HIS MENTOR". Kate couldn’t apprehend that he lied blatantly to her.
She has to amputate the bullet from her wound. She must let the sorrow come out. It hurts like hell because it does; but with her despondency, there was another intertwining sentiment: anger. The anger in her eyes showed the petrified child within. Anyone could see the agony beneath it, and her soul was drowning in this persona.
Dan pulled Katrina closer and kissed her vigorously as if he would never let go of her. Just like he used to do with me Kate thought
Her love was a unicorn, but Dan never believed in unicorns. So that was both the start and end of their story, and their story had ended even before she could realize it. Some things are merely real if you believe they are, and this love story wasn’t real. Even if Kate believed it was.
There she saw it: the bracelet with the letter K on it, on Katrina’s wrist. He purchased it for her, not for me. Tears started streaming down her eyes like a river escaping a dam. Their salinity burned her and etched marks into her skin, but she didn’t care anymore.
She had to tell him that this was over; she would not be his mannequin anymore. If
this was a video, now would be the instance to delete and not pause. Taking a picture of them, she sent it to him, telling him that this relationship was over.
Going into the dispensary, she bought some medicine in the vial. ‘50ml a day’ was written on the label. Just there she held the poison to her lips, ingesting it all at once. The others in the store watched impetuously, waiting for her to wither and die. But she discarded the vial and stared at the mirror, and saw people on the other side. “So, what are you waiting for?”
What have I done? Thought Kate; as she went out of the store. I should’ve thought this through. I should’ve …
***
Whilst she drove past Dan’s house, Kate saw him and Katrina going inside. They both looked exultant. Kate couldn’t comprehend that he was content with another girl who wasn’t her. How could she grasp this because he did promise to love her everlastingly?
Feeling vertiginous, she left the steering wheel and fell forward. Her skin was as pallid as her eyes and she knew she was clocking out. The medicine was having its effect. Her lips were barely there, and her body puckered like a puppet abruptly released from their strings. Colliding with a lamppost, she lay stone-cold in her grave. Suddenly, blackness submerged her, and she gave out whilst being interchanged with some kind of black- hole. Nausea sidled from her abdomen and the world went black.
Seeing Dan walk towards her, she recalled yesterday when they were together. It was mid-afternoon and a blazing furnace of swirls warmed the colours painted. The sky was a faucet, progressively draining the vibrant colours into non-existence. Her heart had never felt more loved, her immense adoration for him was unparalleled. It was her “forever home” and it gave her the capability to fly so freely; but his love wasn’t like that, he didn’t even love her.
She saw something whilst examining his jacket: a bracelet with the letter K on it. There was an inaudible blooming of her soul. This was for me, she thought. Feelings of elation and ecstasy were penetrating her and filling her up to the brim, but he did not mean this to be for her…
Not K for Kate. NO. It was K for Katrina, but she didn’t know that yet.
As Dan came back with ice cream, Kate let go of the bracelet and gazed at him. Whilst he cupped her chin, Dan told her he would love her eternally, and she told him she would love him until the day she died.
***
She sang, she sang again; she sang how much she loved him, and he felt her tears rushing down with rain whilst she was in her grave.
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246 comments
I have just edited my story and thank you so much to everyone who has given me such wonderful feedback on my story and please do not be hesitant to share your opinions with me. Normally, I don't write romantic stories and I really want to see how this one turned out :))
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I really liked this story! The way you started and finished we’re really good and beautifully written! A few grammatical critiques: ~* Dying can be fast or slow, painless or painful, yet lover, no matter how I go, I'll be okay. Heaven comes after, and we remember these things not. I'll be there. Our journey is ever onward together, you are my eternal lover thought Kate. This is a painful process, She doesn’t know how she is lying underneath this car which is as battered and bruised as her heart, she doesn’t remember how she got here. she do...
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Thank you for this, I think I deleted the comment thread lol :)) sorry Anyway, how are you?
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Woah. That was beautiful, heartbreaking and visceral. The imagery was vivid and the story well done. The prompt was well handled too, I wouldn’t have known where to start, but you did so well. Loved it!
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Thank you so much Ana :)))
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No problem!
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Hi Palak, very powerful story. I have a few critiques: 1). When you're trying to convey a character's thoughts, use italics 2). Be careful where you put those strong, metaphorical lines. They have to be placed just right, or it makes the story a little cheesy. 3). You had a couple grammatical errors, (tense switches, missing periods/commas, etc.) so be sure to use spell check or Grammarly before submitting a story. That's all! Overall, well done! You're really growing as a writer! :)
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Oh okay thank you for all these suggestions. I have never actually used grammarly before so I never knew that it could help with tense and stuff. Thanks for telling me. Thank you for reading my story.
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Of course, happy to help!
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:))
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I have edited my story with your suggestions so please let me know if it is okay now. Thanks :))
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Eek, sorry, I'm so late! Yes, everything looks good.
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I like this, even though it was confusing at times.
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Thank you Graham, I appreciate you reading my story :))
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Hey Palak! How are you? :) 🍿
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Hey I am good Hbu?
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I'm good too! Do you remember our Gilmore convos XD
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Yes, I do, I loved them and I have the same convos with my friend at school. Do you want to start again? :))
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Yes we should!
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Sooooooooo how are you?
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New Story! Reviews are appreciated!!!
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Yep I am coming
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:)
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I HAVE BEEN DOWNVOTED!!!!!!! I HAD ABOUT 1100+ POINTS, AND NOW I AM LEFT AT 660+.... PLEASE HELP ME, MY REEDSY FRIENDS STOP DOWNVOTING NOW!!!!!
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Yh I was also downvoted to 666 around 6 months ago I will try to upvote our conversions and just keep on writing.
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Yeah...so do you want me to spam or what?
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I don't mind but can you also upvote me if possible?
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Sure, I'll do that. (although I don't have time right now. Can I do it tomorrow?)
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Yh sure :))
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🍿
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Yay, Hey Aerin how are you doing?
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The emotions in this story were so loud! I know that's a funny way to describe it, but your character's emotions sang this story off the page. Her love is so unbridled, unrestrained. Even after being betrayed, she sings of her love. Great writing!
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Thank you so much Anneliya for the awesome feedback :))
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This was such a great story. It was sad but I really liked it. Thank you so much for recommending it :) :)
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Thank you so much Daniel :))
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🍿 how's it going?
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Yay It's great Hbu ?
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doing alright, a bit blah but yeah :)
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Yh yh :)) Read anything good lately?
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yeah actually, the first book of The Threshold series. It's super interesting :)
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Oooooo I haven't read that series yet, ill have to check it out lol :))
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What a beautifully tragic tale. Your descriptions in here were masterful and through the subtle unfolding of events, you really captured her heartbreak. This line though was so good.. "Her love was a unicorn, but Dan never believed in unicorns. So that was both the start and end of their story" <-- I LOVE this! WELL DONE!! Thanks for sharing!
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Thank you so much, Kelly. That was also my favourite line :))
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Not the kind of story I would normally choose to read. But you asked if I could read it and comment on it. So I did. To say that it was sad is putting it mildly. Whether the "love" Kate felt for Dan was real or not, her reaction was definitely a bit extreme. Rather like in "Romeo and Juliet", when Romeo thinks Juliet is dead and buys some poison. He goes to her tomb, speaks to her supposedly dead body, and then drinks the poison. But Dan isn't like Romeo; he's more like Paris. Paris never really loved Juliet; at least not as intensel...
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You know what. I never thought my story was sorta like Romeo and Juliet. Thank you so much for all your feedback and it is fine that you didn't like my story everyone has their own taste. To be honest mine isn't really sappy romance lol :)) Thank you so much for all your feedback. I have edited my work and put it in and now thanks to you it flows so much better. I have been using software like Grammarly they have really helped me in my grammar and punctuation so I think I will keep on using these and hopefully in a few years, I will not ev...
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This is weird. I got a reply from Natasha Romanoff that was the same as yours, but now I can't find her reply at all. Are you and Natasha the same person (with different user accounts on this website)? I don't think I was imagining her reply. But if I was, maybe it's from watching YouTube videos about the "Rocky and Bullwinkle Show" (where Natasha is one of the Russian characters). Anyway... ----- Nothing wrong with that. I've read at least two books that were strongly inspired by "Romeo and Juliet". Both were written by the late Ta...
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Yeah, I use that to upvote people when they have been downvoted. No one was meant to know oops. I think mine a sorta realistic but then I sometimes want them not to be so that the reader can escape into a different dimension. Yeah, I will make sure next time to proofread my work.
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The only place I've seen a downvote symbol is in response threads. The stories only allow for upvotes (unless one chooses not to upvote a story, which I sometimes do). Oh. Sorry. I didn't mean to spill the beans (picks them up and puts them back in their bowl). I honestly thought I was losing my mind for a moment there. Glad to know that my mind was found and not lost after all. Nothing wrong with "escaping" via reading. Sometimes, as Neil Gaiman put it, it's the only we can escape an intolerable reality into a reality where we feel ...
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I have been downvoted so many times. Once I got downvoted to 666 and today I got downvoted around 20 points. It is so annoying and so many of my friends are leaving Reedsy because of it. Yeah same, I do have some good stories in mind nevertheless I cannot find a suitable prompt for them and I am busy with classes and everything.
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Exactly, I totally agree with that, there should be a way to track these downvoters and with some guilt and shame, they will not do it anymore. This should not be tolerated and Reedsy should do something about it. I think my ideas are normally influenced a lot by what I watch on TV and social media and mainly my own life sometimes. Sometimes it takes me a long time to write mine so I ask my dad and he gives me some ideas but I have never actually used any of his. How do you get your ideas?
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I wouldn't say "with some guilt and shame". But at least remind them that what they didn't *wasn't* funny to the receivers and that maybe they should apologize to the receivers. The problem with a website that doesn't insist on real names (I'm using mine on this website and I usually use my real name on other websites) is that people can hide behind fake names and anonymously attack other users. I've seen it happen before ... in fact, it happened to me. I never went back to the website that it happened on, and I was actually happy there ...
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I understand what you are saying and maybe they should feel guilty about what they have done because it is wrong in my opinion, but a lot of people are jealous of the good writers and that is so annoying because at the end of the day we have to make ourselves write better. Same, mine also comes from research for example some of my Sci-Fi stories. I would like to write more Sci-Fi stories but I haven't gotten a good prompt for it lol :))
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I just noticed that I made a goof in my previous message to you. In the second sentence of the first paragraph, I should've typed "did" instead of "didn't". Oops. Hope that didn't cause any unintentional confusion. ------ Jealousy is a strange emotion. I tried once to imagine what jealousy felt like and burst out laughing. My mother asked me, "What's so funny?" And I explained what I was trying to do and concluded, "Jealousy has to be one of the dumbest human emotions ever." Envy, on the other hand, can be harmless: you can envy so...
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Yeah, I get some ideas but they aren't as good as I would want them to be, I have tried to read online so that I don't have to actually buy my books nevertheless I like reading paper copies more than online. Maybe it's just a personal preference lol :))
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Ideas can be like that. I guess one needs to have faith in them that they'll turn out all right at least once every three or four attempts at converting them into stories or poems. I prefer hardbacks and paperbacks over e-books, too. They're not as convenient if you want to take a dozen or more on a trip with you, but they're also less prone to having technological problems. They can get wet and soggy, though (which is one situation where an e-reader would be an advantage).
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I prefer hardbacks or paperbacks mainly because they are good for your eyes. Also, I think they are better to read :))
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Unless you're 53 years old like me and in need of reading glasses. I have to push my glasses until they're almost on the tip of my nose before the text is clear enough to read ... and that's when reading a hardback, not the much smaller print in a paperback. Unfortunately, I don't think there are any inexpensive reading glasses strong enough for my eyes (and I can't currently afford to get farsighted glasses any more than I can afford a new pair of nearsighted glasses).
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Yh, I am shortsighted so I can read without my glasses but I prefer to just have them on :)) I just got downvoted again to 666 ugggggg that is so annoying, I hate being downvoted because everything I just do goes to waste
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This was a really nice story! I loved the descriptions! One error: "I'll be okay thought Kate This was a painful process..." Correction: "I'll be okay, thought Kate. This was a painful process..."
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Thank you so much for your feedback.
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Np!
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Hi Palak I agree with keya M’s comments below. I’m working on the same prompt and find it extremely challenging. Good for you to have taken this on! Keep writing!
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Thank you so much, Cathryn :))
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you are most welcome! I am not making a lot of progress on this backward story thing. Hard to do!
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Yeah, it is. There is a lot of change in tense and a lot of flashbacks involved. It is hard to get into grips with. I had to write out my draft about 3 times for it all to make sense lol :))
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TOTALLY!
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All the imagery in the story were so good. Great command on words. ❤ The ending confused me a little bit. Coming back with ice-cream to her car? Was it a flashback?
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That was a flashback and I have tried editing it a bit more to make it sound a bit more like a flash-back.
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I think it's good then. Also. Do read my new story. Thank you. ❤
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Of course :))
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I really like it, I just feel like the grammar wasn't necessarily checked. There just wasn't some punctuation, and some parts needed to be italicized. Other than a few mistakes, it was a very good story
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Thank you for your feedback. I will get right on to fixing my grammar :))
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:D
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I have tried to fix my grammar so please tell me if it is okay or not. Thanks :))
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I can tell that you changed your grammar, good job! Can you check out my latest story, Wishing?
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Thanks. Of course, I am going over there right now :))
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oml so sad. I LOVE IT! beautiful details and I adore every word of it. A few grammatical mistakes but keep up the good work, Palak! -Timber <33
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Thank you so much :))
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Np!
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That was so sad, I loved it, the depression from the broken love triangle, how she crashed into the lampost. I would have said "Suddenly, blackness engulfed her" or something a bit more dramatic, yhou forgot a period at the end of black as well. whilst could have been replaced with "as she lay stone cold in her grave." but just little things, nice work Palak, glad to see you still writing. Also some italics on the Kate's thinking so we knew what was happening as the reader to take us into her feelings, the inner voice. cheers good work
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I have tried to edit my stories with your suggestions so please let me know if it is okay and thank you for all your feedback :))
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I am not an expert and still learning but glad to see you open minded. You def have some strong talent for a young person. I just posted a new story too today, I wrote it quickly but I wanted to work on dialogue tags and using present to past prompt idea. cheers
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Well, I am coming right over to look at your story. That's fine, you have given me constructive feedback because your feedback made my writing so much better and gave it that flow which it needed, so thanks again.
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My pleasure and thanks for liking my stories too.
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No problem :))
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