Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-29458657-20160805183834/@comment-29458657-20160805203027

Here's a revision I made. Please comment.

As time passes, I start feeling more lonely. The set of apartments I live in has never been a nice place to live. Actually, it was the perfect place for ghosts to play. The lights on the hallways were dim and when one used to go out, it took months before anyone would come to repair it. I remember that since I was a child there were cuts in the walls that seem to have been carved with knives.

Some used to say it is actually fun to live here, but this only before they left. I still remember when one drunk man jumped in my apartment with a knife, wanting to steal something or even worse. I think I was eleven when that happened and thankfully my father put him down. I still remember his malevolent smile and his mad eyes. The man wasn't taken by the police. He still lived there up until the bottles got the best of him and, as he got drunker than usually, he felt on the stairs and broke his head.

Yesterday, an older woman was found dead in the elevator. It has been proven that she has been strangled to death, but the attacker wore gloves and no prints remained. It caused another family to move. As I said before, I start getting lonely. Not many people come to this neighborhood and especially not to this God-forsaken block.

At this moment, there are just seven apartments in this block where people live: mine, Gregory's, Joseph's, Gina's and Clara's (they live together), Michael's, Lissa's and of an idiot who would rather leave, really. His name is Bruce and he tries to make live horrible for everyone, but no one suspects him for the murders because he is so weak and absent to the point that he just couldn't kill someone and hide it.

Gregory lives next to my apartment. He is one of the most friendly people in the entire neighbourhood. Greg links the murder of this woman to the disappearance of the little girl a week ago (which caused her parents to leave) and to the death of Lerry, who was found dead at the entrance with his eyes gouged out. Poor Lerry, he really didn't deserve it. He remains my only good company in here. Let's get to the present now...

Today Lissa told me that Joseph invited me to his apartment at the second floor. As this guy usually doesn't want to talk to me, I got to the office in a hurry, thinking that something interesting happened to him.

"Henry, what do you think is going on in here?" he asked me.

This is definetively not the most interesting question he could put me and also not one where I could come with a good answer.

"I don’t know, sir. Do you?"

"Look, Henry, the policeman who I called yesterday said he needs more evidence to find this damn murderer. Now look, I know you dislike me in the same way as I disliked you since you were just a kid randomly running around here with your big-mouthed parents. But if we want to survive and make justice, we must be united. Now, first I would like us to visit the two girls that live at the last floor. They always make fun and not take it seriously when I ask them about the current events."

"What do you mean, sir?"

" They just change the damn subject! Always!"

I agreed to go with him to see them and we talked about stuff on our way. I observe he slowly changes his behaviour as the situation worsens. We didn't use the lift. It's just too dangerous. We go up the stairs, over rivers of dirt and I ask myself again: how did my parents get in this hellhole? They say it was better in the past, but it just couldn't get so bad.So, we went to see Gina and Clara.

When we arrived at their apartment and knocked, Clara opened the door, welcoming us with her cute, but uncaring smile and dressed as if she was going to a party. Joseph begins to talk and asks about Gina. She says her "sister" left to get a gun so they could defend themselves if the killer would attack. The laughing tone she had made us question where her girlfriend really was. After we convinced her that we aren’t the murderers, she let us enter and Joseph already started to put her questions.

The "interview" we took her didn't lead anywhere and I'm dead serious that she is hiding something, although I don't think she killed anyone. Maybe an accomplice? I'm quite sure she fooled Joseph. It looks like me and my friend will solve the mess. I hope.

I went back to my apartment and thought about MY situation. I know I'm not the murderer. I don't suffer from double personality or anything. I don't have a gun. What the... I must get one as fast as I can. I felt helpless. I must move out of the block and get my gun. A knocking made me wince. I took a baseball bat and went to the door. It was Joseph. His eyes were full of fear, but that didn't make me think he didn't do it. I opened the door and he spilled everything:

"Bruce is dead! I just saw him in the elevator."

"Wait, what? He's dead?"

"Yes! He was fuckin' decapitated! I can't belive what's happening in my block!"

That's the moment when I observe that Joseph is holding a pistol. I suddenly feel the need to run, but then he turns and leaves in a hurry. Against my better judgement, I decide to follow. I run after him on the stairs. He stops. Then points the gun at me. I raise my hands without letting the bat off my hand.

"Where are you going?"

"To see the bitches!"

He turns again and continues on his way. We reach the last floor and Joseph walks up to the women's apartment and knocks furiously on the door. Clara opens the door and Joseph busts in.

Gina points her gun at him and then Joseph points his to her. I sit at the doorway and watch, being ready to run if it turns for the worst.

"Clara, leave the room!"

She does and then Joseph turns his attention towards Gina, who seems to have her eyes full of hatred.

"I know you did it."

"And what are you gonna do, huh? Turn me to the cops?"

"No. Before I do that, you might do a lot more. I will kill you right now."

"Who are you to judge?"

Joseph feels an anger he can’t comprehend. I was expecting the worst, but also hoping he would put the gun down. He shoots her in the neck and she releases her gun, falling to the floor, dead. Clara almost starts crying.

"Oh, my God! You murderer! She did not do it!"

She leaves in a hurry, passing by me and walking to the stairs.

"What are you doing?"

She doesn't answer. I turn and my face meets Joseph's, more angry than I've ever seen him. Frowning, he studies me. I think I might be also giving him an ugly look, but I try to control my expression and just show bewilderment.

"Are you sure it was her?"

"Shut up! Yes!"

He tries to calm down. Then he looks me in the eyes and says:

"Do you know where Clara left?"

"I seriously don't know."

Now, my position changed. I was no longer Joseph's ally, I was supposed to keep him from killing us all while Clara was calling the cops. He turned to leave, but I felt the need to do something, so I grabbed his shoulder and he pointed the pistol at me with trembling hands.

"Please don't tell me you wanna kill her too."

Joseph smiles and fills me with fear. He turns again, but I just can't let him kill anymore. Before he gets too far, I catch his right foot and he starts sliding down. Fastly, I raise the bat and lower over his body and hit him in his head and then on his right hand and I grab his pistol. Now, I am in control of the situation.

"Calm down, Joseph. I don't want you to kill anybody. We do not have proof!"

"Then tell me, smartass, who did it?"

"I don't know, actually, but what you did is wrong. Do you realise that you just fuckin' killed someone?!"

Joseph stands up and looks at me. He studies me. Does he... think I am the killer? How dares he? He's the killer! I wait for him to turn, but he doesn't.

"Do you think I'm gonna show you my back while you have a gun pointed at me."

He's right, but I am right too to keep the gun pointed at him.

"And what are you going to do?"

"I'll wait before the cops come here and find you pointing a gun at me"

Son of a bitch. He got me. Hmm...

"I'll throw the gun, but please then turn and leave."

"All right. But do not throw it at your feet and let me take the bat."

It couldn't get any better, really.

"All right. I'll give you the bat, then you go back. I'll throw the gun further, but don't try to take it, sir."

I try to separate myself from his deep stare and I throw the gun in a corner, ready to fight in case he would attack me. He just bends down and picks up the bat and then runs down the stairs.

A day has passed. Joseph is in jail for killing two women. I am in my bedroom with Gregory who is too afraid to live on his own from now on and it looks like he'll move to my apartment as it is bigger. I stay at the computer and I hear him going in the hallway. Then he opens the door to the entrance and I hear a deafening shreak. I am so scared that for the moment I just can't move. Then I fastly hide under my bed and try to not make a sound. My pistol is in the living room, God damn it!

The bedroom door is open, whoever passes by the door also passes by my sight. The lights in the hallway turn off. Then someone steps in front of the door. It's a human shape, but it doesn't seem to be Lissa. Whoever he is, he seems to have a problem with breathing because he seems to use his mouth to do so. Then he steps in the room. Then he... lowers and faces me. He's a man, but one who should be long dead. A person of about 120 years old. He crawls near me with his mouth agape and looks me in the eyes. I hear a voice in my head, one that I definetively remember, grumbling in a wicked way:

"I told you to leave when your parents died. Why didn't you listen? My patience reaches an end - always"