2021 English Short Stories

Morrow-land

The devil will take what is beautiful, smash the souls of loved ones into small bits, and then toss it into the sky like confetti before vanishing into the night. On the morning, we will stand on the ashes and pray for the ghosts of our departed brothers and sisters, praying that they find a safe haven.

As the carriage flew over the deep empty sea, the rocks, bejewelled by barnacled crowns as brilliant as any jewel to the human eye, danced in the moonlight. Today was the second night of searching, yesterday the waves were calm and collected. Now we had to gaze deeper into the emptiness of what was below, as the waves break around the rocks in the shallows, their foam crests becoming chaotic lace over the blue. Jazz watched as they swirled, mesmerized as if the movement of the water choreographs her thoughts.

The sea breathed, its surface rose rhythmically and fell. The waves were her heartbeat by day and kept the echoes of the souls in her savoury crib as the night reigned. The waves rushed to the shore, just as quick as the carriage began to decline. Leaning over the edge of the carriage, I noticed water whirling in between the grey sharp rocks. Death at sea was always a mystery to me never reality, until now. The only escape was to jump for the deep hole ripped between the sharp rocks. At the end of a fall in a deep pit, there is no wonderland; the fall is simply the excitement. It's the effect, it's the climbing back to the ground and it's the real challenge again. It takes time to heal from these things, my thoughts rushed through my brain as I finally decided.

Gripping Jazz's sweaty hand, which once sat deep in the pockets of his woollen cotton jumper, my body left the carriage's oak floorboards. We braced for death. I've been close to death before searching for treasures but in novels, people have a weird and sick way of romanticising forms of death. Drowning is silent, their gestures are subtle, hardly motion. This was different though someone was holding a gun to my head and not allowing my heart to pump. It's going to beat, of course. And just like the heart would go, it inhales my lungs whether it is air or water. I know that I'm already dead as the coolness surges in.

The tide recalls the arrogance of assumptions and the existence of exception for beautiful people. Relieving torrents of water, rocks emerge as bows in a sinking sea ship, and their drowned crew's screams are the hiss of far-off waterfalls. I could hear distant the songs of the drowned crew listening closely, who sung memories of vessels that sailed the magnificent sea once. The caverns are grey, marvellous with barnacle-shaped crowns, with infinite patience in the mud, and the creatures of the sea are readily alive. It was clear, we weren't alone.