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General

You have to admit you have waited for your Hogwarts letter since you first read the book but nothing prepared you for the letter you just received. You stood there a stack of papers in your hand, reciting what they were as you threw them away.  “Bills, bills, late notices. Sale flyer after-sale flyer. Very large yellow envelope with your  name and that of a law firm from a place you never heard of.”  Even as you said what it was you tossed it into the garbage until It struck you like a bolt of lightning. 

“Large yellow envelope with a law firm on it,” You pulled it out of the trash grateful it was on top.

You broke open the seal and a puff of smoke enveloped you.  When it finally cleared you were standing in front of an office door not knowing how you got there.  “Maybe you were drugged”  You muttered to yourself as your hand raised to knock on the door.

“Abagail, I am so happy you got the letter”  a portly man answered the door a huge smile on his face.

“I wonder why you felt the need to kidnap me. Also, what was that smoke, am I going to get sick from it?”  the mere thought of some cancerous vapor in your lungs made you want to cough.

“You are okay. I just know you have been very depressed lately and I know how to make it better for you”  he bowed deeply showing me into the room.

“You don’t know me” You were looking around the room. So many pictures of people,  You wondered if these were clients of his or maybe just family members.

“You are well known by everyone here. We have been watching your case for many years and today is the day we decided to take you on as a client” he seemed so happy as though you should be happy as well but I truly had no idea what was going on.

He offered you a seat, You sat down still not knowing what was going on. You had to think about how you got to the mailbox since for some reason you couldn’t recall even leaving your apartment to go to the mailbox.  

You had been thinking about everything going on, how not a single person could go outside without proper covering. You had my mask and gloves on when you left the apartment but when you arrived at the office it was just you. You looked down and saw you were no longer wearing the sweatpants and sweatshirt you had thrown on, You were sitting in the office in your PJ pants and tank top.

It was the middle of winter what the hell were you doing outside in what you wear to bed?  Even though that wasn’t the most pressing issue at hand it was the one most on your mind. You never went anywhere without being dressed.   You had been depressed for a while maybe it was finally getting to be too much.  You thought there was a chance you were finally losing your mind. You should have just let the mail pile up more, after all, what would they do next, bomb your apartment because you can’t pay. You were to the point you honestly didn’t even give a damn.

You thought many times about taking your life, not that anyone would mourn you. Your job had been closed down for months, the money was running out so why not take yourself out.  Your wrists were scarred from all your failed attempts. 

You had a gun sitting in your closet, bullets loaded just waiting for you to pull the trigger. You had overdosed many times but each time you woke up sick but you would wake up and that is not what you were trying to do. Why the hell do you keep waking up when all you want to do is die?

“Abagail, we will discuss how you are feeling as soon as we wrap up the little matter of the letter” he sounded all business.

“I have no idea what is going on here” You felt tears coming to your eyes, for so long you had buried your head in the sand not caring what was going on but now you were sitting in a lawyer’s office discussing some letter you had no idea of, You probably going to go to jail but really jail would be better than living.

He was smiling at you over his horn-rimmed glasses. His eyes were sunken into his head as if he hadn’t got much sleep at all or maybe he was simply nothing more than a  walking and talking skull. 

“You do know but first let me ask you a question. If you could get what you really wanted and nobody got hurt would you do it?”  he was peering at you as if really wanting to know the answer. 

“I don’t know” You had no idea, your head felt heavy, all you wanted to do was lay down and forget you even opened the letter.  You needed something to focus on so you thought about the letter, the dust that came at me could very well be dirt. 

There was a scent of flowers in the air, You thought I could detect some canned music.  You glanced at walls once more and realized each of them had been taken in this very room. Some of the people were smiling while others just looked lost.

“Each of them received the letter the same as you did. Some were happy they got it while others such as yourself weren’t really sure. Once I showed them what they would have to deal with for the rest of their lives they changed their minds and became happy”  he got up and stepped around the massive desk. 

His eyes were piercing as if he was trying to read your mind.  You wondered if he could see how horrible a person you were, how you hated your life, and just wanted to die. You wondered if it even mattered since you had a feeling you were already dead.

“You see the letter you never thought you would get has come for you, The only question left is Are you happy that your mundane life is over, the life where you would never accomplish anything you set out to do?” His words were muffled. 

“I ended my life not you” As you spoke the words you knew they were true. The first thing you actually accomplished to do was to die it had nothing to do with the letter or did it? 

The End

June 19, 2020 21:12

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1 comment

Philip Carlisle
20:17 Jul 03, 2020

Firstly, thank you for posting your work for me and the world to see. That is never easy. Secondly, all my reedsy critiques are done with my "typical reader" hat on, not my "beta reader" hat. Meaning I treat all these stories as if I pulled the book off the shelf at B&N to read the first page. I did put yours back on the shelf after that first page. In your opening sentence you say "you+verb" three times making it too wordy to be a good hook. You also have dialogue that has "you" instead of "I". you are also have capitalization...

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