9/11: A Short Story

Claire Alistar shifts in her seat to cross her right ankle primly over her left and readjusts her large, black sunglasses so that they sit farther down on her nose so that she looks even more unimpressed. "Beck got caught during a job in cicily? Really? Cicily?"

It all happened so quickly. One moment, a boy was waving to his friends, and the next, he was lying in the street. I heard the screech of brakes and a loud crash. The car’s windscreen was completely shattered. People were screaming and crying, and without thinking, I ran into the street, knelt down beside him, and called 911.

She had given this up. All of it. The path of the witches, she had decided, was not hers to take. Wielders of the gift were meant to maintain balance in a world of evil. But those same protectors had fallen prey to greed, pride and an overbearing lust for power. Bethany was raised on the stories of covens going to war and even siding with the monsters they had sworn to destroy. Beth had promised never to choose a side. And to fulfill her promise, she rid herself of her powers. So why was she here, staring at the tattered notebook that contained not only her history of witchcraft but also her magic? Pale, slender fingers flipped through the makeshift grimoire. The nightmares hadn’t stopped. They wouldn’t. Bethany was normally conscious enough to dream lucidly, but the dreams were spiraling out of control. She was aware of the old phrase, “if you die in your dreams you die for real”. That’s what frightened her. Every night she died. Her lack of magic made her vulnerable to attack. The identity of the attacker was unknown. But not

As kids, we were all warned about the basics. Call 911 for emergencies, tell an adult if someone touches you or even tell the teacher when someone says a bad word. But what happens when something happens to the last person you’d think it would happen to.. Yourself. Who could you actually turn to, and when the time struck, how would the words flow out to confess the crime done to you. Or even worse, would the words come out at all? “Can you tell me what happened exactly?” “It's okay to talk to us, we’re here to help you, not hurt you.” The words kept ringing in my head. But was it okay to talk to them? Speak of the unspeakable with people... people I didn't know, nor trust? Being so young I had no idea what was going on. As my heart was racing,

Nothing I did worked. His skin, so close, so warm against my own, did it distract me? Was that it? I had done my best to free myself from the darkness he had encompassed around me, but my efforts did next to nothing in getting him away. He evaded it all. I was floundering amidst my own failure, but he was still there, still overshadowing me.

"Is it that hard to be serious for once?!" I yelled. Matt looked speechless. "You know what? Just forget about it." I sighed as I slammed the door behind me.

"This is 911, what is your emergency?" A desperate eleven year old girl tried to answer the operator's question, but all I could manage were sobs.

“No!” It was my mom’s voice, I ran into the office and saw a gun on the floor, part of the wood chipped out as my dad stormed away. My mom was sobbing, visibly terrified. My mom followed my dad, while Missy took me upstairs with the baby and the pets. She locked the door behind her, and we saw my dad storming away from the garage in his car. After we knew he had pulled away, She led me back downstairs where my mom was waiting for the police. After around three minutes, a police officer arrived. It was after then that my mom made sure my dad couldn’t pick me up from school anymore.

Dad, on his way to work, noticed the water rising and the waves splashing over the seawall. He turned the car around and rushed home. Dad dashed into the house yelling, “If we don’t leave immediately, we won’t be able to get out! Pack your bags!”

“Evan, everything’s going to be fine.”like any other mom would say in a situation like this. I rolled my eyes and I got a sudden

“I’m sorry, but your parents are dead,” she replied. “The system overheated and the engine blew up. The fire started in the front of the car, and your parents couldn’t do anything about it. You were lucky that somebody called the fire department in time to get there, before you got burned down to your bone.”

You see, what had happened was after my mom had driven down the street my dad turned to me and said, “Well Violet, since your mom’s gone we’re going to go to Orlando for a day at the beach!”

For it was on the Princess Anne Country Club, the richest golf club in town- why would it flood so early? I whipped around the corner and saw a large puddle but misjudged how deep the puddle would in fact be since I made it through the smaller one just seconds earlier. “Oh no, I don’t have enough time to…” BOOM BOOM. I went head on into what I thought was a small puddle, never letting go of gas and absolutely never hitting the brake because the water would flood into your tail pipe, just like my mom always told me. Screaming at the top of my lungs, for I did not want to lose my dream car. My boyfriend, Lane, jumped out of the car and pushed it out of the water. What felt to be like minutes of sitting in the water because everything was in slow motion was mere seconds. When Lane jumped out of the car, water came in through the door because my car was floating- he pushed it to the top of the tiny hill to at least get me out of the water,

All the cold and hot waterlines were shot also. Thank goodness for the old reliable bathtub. My poor brother in law just happens to be a plumber. He also has a heart of gold and the willingness to help out someone in need. Although he does shake his head a lot in a state of shock or dumbfounded awe. Anyway, he showed up on the Forth of July 1996 and we had the entire house plumbed and running water in one day. That was nice. Remember I said we paid $30,000.00 for the house and five acres? Well I kept track of all the money we spent of fixing the place up over the next five years. After a new roof, some new siding and paint, new furnace and all electric heat also. Then came two new Cleary metal buildings, a new sewer system, and 150 apple trees I had $78,000.00 invested a cute little place in the country. Life was good. Then at age 50 I had a chance to retire and take another job doing the same thing I was doing in a nearby town. So I retired and took my pension and a raise with my new job and moved again. I did get all $78,000.00 out of the acreage. And once again we moved into what was supposed to be a dream house that needed no repairs. Well think again! We now have been doing projects on this house for the past five years. The worst thing that happened was that when we moved in we didn 't know the former owners had dogs in the house. And apparently they refused to walk these pets. They used the carpets like a fire hydrant! I was working in another

Water Ghosts.That’s what they were called. Not that anyone in Beacon Hills knew that. As far as they were concerned all the drownings were down to some psychotic murderer. But nothing in Beacon hills is ever as simple as that.