I am enrolled in an online creative writing course. Our first assignment is to introduce our character and offer the beginnings of a plot by using rising actions. Because Sarah is my writing muse in most of my chapter writings, I have her in my mind and is easily available to use. Because of that, we will flashback to when Sarah was a teenager, when she lost her parents. I welcome and (and all) feedback in the comment section below. And so, without further ado, my first writing assignment:
(Note, I have edited and updated from my original blog. This was what I ended up submitting.)
Sarah sat on her aunt’s oversized couch as a stream of relatives that she had varying familiarity with passed by, offering their condolences. Utilizing her imagination, Sarah used the trick her Father had taught her when she became stressed around strangers and suddenly, in her mind’s eye, the relatives’ faces morphed into cartoon characters. It was too much to bear for a teenager, the loss of both parents at once. The last memory she would have as a family was her Father holding the doors of the LIRR and yelling “All aboard!” as Mother and she ran, giggling to join him. In her Father’s hand was a velvet pouch full of marbles he had just purchased. Without warning, Uncle Walt was standing in front of her and she was back on the couch where he was morphed into Tony the Tiger, less stressful than Uncle Walt the banker with high blood pressure.
Sarah excused herself and moved to the banquet table, picking up the tongs and poking at the array of food there, brought by kind people who did not know how else to take the pain away. Auntie was suddenly at her side, asking questions as Sarah popped a carrot into her mouth and pretended she could not talk because she was chewing. Waving her empty cup, she showed her annoying aunt that she was without a drink and made her escape through the door and into the kitchen. She leaned against the fridge, such a huge appliance, and tried to shake off the feeling of being a small sad animal in a cage at the zoo and being watched by scores of interested passersby.
Sarah turned from the fridge and saw the black velvet pouch laying on the counter and she walked over and picked it up. The marbles, her Father’s marbles, were gone! That filthy beast of a woman who made Sarah’s brain want to explode! She had searched for the marbles all week. Why would Auntie steal her Father’s marbles?
