Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-33642912-20171114223911

















A mother, a father, and their two kids were sitting in the living room. The two kids were playing with blocks together, the mother was reading a magazine, and the father was glossing over the newspaper as he sipped coffee. They sat there in silence, until the phone rang. The father got up and answered it. He was on the phone for a solid minute, and then all the colour drained from his face, and his expression went blank. He then turned and walked into his room. He didn’t leave for the rest of the day.

    That night, the mother went into the father’s room - which was also the mother’s room - and the father was nowhere to be found. She looked out the window, he wasn’t there, she went to the backyard, he wasn’t there. No matter where she looked, he wasn’t there. Needless to say, she slept very little that night.

    The next day, the mother and the two kids were sitting on the carpet and playing with toy cars. The mother was reading a new magazine, but she wasn’t paying attention to the article, instead, she was glancing at the phone.

    As she had been expecting, the phone rang. As it rang, one of the kids, Aubrey, got up to get the phone. As he did it, the mother shouted “Don’t!” But it was too late, Aubrey had picked up the phone and started listening to the other end. The same thing happened, all colour drained from his face and it seemed as if emotion was non-existent. He then turned and walked into his room. He didn’t leave for the rest of the day.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;text-align:justify;"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:#000000;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">    That night, the mother went into Aubrey's room. She slowly creaked the door open and saw, to her horror, Aubrey was nowhere to be seen. She checked high and low, but it was all in vain. That night, she refused to even turn off her lights

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;text-align:justify;"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:#000000;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">    Only the mother and Aubrey’s sister, Amy, remained in the living room. The house was full of melancholy. The atmosphere had gone from a perfect nuclear family filled with laughs and good times, to the only two members sitting in fear of death by whatever horrible way they could imagine.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;text-align:justify;"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:#000000;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">    Then...the phone rang. Amy stood up and picked the phone up. All colour and emotion drained from her face, her eyes staring glassily ahead. She turned on her heel and walked to her room.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;text-align:justify;"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:#000000;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">That night, the mother had no need to check Amy’s room, she was gone. All the windows were locked and their blinds shut or shutters as closed as they would get. The doors were all locked. Everything was closed under lock and key.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;text-align:justify;"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:#000000;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">    The mother and no one else sat in the living room. She was going through a the family photo album. She was on the page where a seagull had eaten Aubrey’s ice-cream while they were at Canada’s Wonderland the year before. A tear slipped and plopped onto the plastic covering as the mother smiled, remembering how Aubrey had brushed it off and laughed, oh, she could see that smile and hear that laugh. But, as if on queue…

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;text-align:justify;"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:#000000;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">...the phone rang…

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;text-align:justify;"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:#000000;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">She felt as if the phone was drawing her towards it like a magnet, but then, she heard from behind her:

<span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:rgb(0,0,0);font-style:italic;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-variant-position:normal;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-alternates:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Don’t pick up that phone…” <span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:'TimesNewRoman';color:rgb(0,0,0);font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-variant-position:normal;font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-alternates:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;white-space:pre-wrap;">     <ac_metadata title="Don&#039;t pick up that phone &#10;(in need of fixing)"> </ac_metadata>