New Message: Casady Allens

Um… hi…

I know, I know… it’s been forever since I texted you…

But… let me explain, ok?

My name is- oh nvm you should know that… I mean… we’ve been friends for… what? 10 years?

Anyway…

Remember when my stupid parents made me move to Missouri? Yeah… I missed you so much…  but… I’m ok… I’m fine!

So… um… all this dumb stuff started happening.

I might have insulted a “popular” girl… and she um… she and her two friends told me they would hurt me… as you know, I’m already depressed and my anxiety is… well… so this wasn’t good at all… on… monday I think… They took me into the bathroom and cut me with a machete… don’t ask me how they got it.. this school doesn’t have very good security.

Oh jeez… well…

I was cut up pretty bad… and um…

I didn’t talk to you for days… sorry I was just… idk anymore…

I’m stupid, ik…

So… they threatened me and insulted me for days… even tried to trick me… that dumb trick where it’s like “I love you” and then they completely call you out? Well don’t worry, I knew it was too good to be true so I didn’t fall for it.

Oh! You must be wondering about the pic I attached to this message… well…

That’s me…

So… the girls… they really hated me…

They um… pulled a gun to my head…

Then you called me… and uh…

The lead girl looked me in the eyes and said, “Answer the phone, b***h.”

I hesitated cause… what if you found out about this? Stupid, ik…

“Answer the damn phone…” she said.

SO FREAKING STUPID

I answered and you asked what was wrong… why I hadn’t been calling or texting…

I whispered what was happening to you… but you couldn’t hear…

When you asked what I said, I heard a gunshot… and um…

My cheek burnt with metal…

You asked super loud what happened…

“It’s ok… I’m fine…” =)

I hung up… that was a mistake I guess…

The girls… they laughed at me…

I laughed too…

I grabbed the lead girl by her stupid ponytail and kicked her ankles.

I said something cool I think like… “WHO’S LAUGHING NOW, B***H?!” Or something.

So um… the other girls tried to shoot me again… they missed and shot the lead girl.

She gasped for air and fell down… I ran as the girls screamed.

When I got home I kind of um… I….

So… my brother hanged  himself…. my mom and dad got in a fight after that apparently and… they uh… they killed each other…

Crazy right?

I’m not crazy though… I’m fine =)

And um… I looked in the basement and found some scrap metal. I cut it with a really strong knife that I found or whatever and made a sort of mask.

I used some black paint to paint a smile on it, since it’s… kind of hard to smile now… ha ha…

I’m fine though =)

So… I noticed my eyes were kinda weird now… red ish…

And um… I wanted to hurt people…

Badly…

Don’t worry though! I won’t hurt you!!!

So… now I’m… missing I guess… but people still see me…..

I show up to hurt them… sorry…

I make sure people see my eyes before I kill them… so they can see how sad I am… but most people mistake it for mad… or INSANE EVEN! CRAZY RIGHT?!

Wait… you aren’t Holly… why do you have her… is she… did you….

You… yes, you… why are you reading this… this isn’t… I mean… I…

… I’m ok… I’m fine…

Don’t look behind you… I want it to be a surprise, ok?

We can be friends… just don’t turn around…

I’m fine…

  • Sarita Tinsley King

    That was a very choppy and odd story. Which I guess makes sense, considering the girl had gone crazy. Well done. 🙂

  • Jed

    1/5 This story is written like one of those text horror stories, (a genre I’m not particularly fond of) and I can feel that this person is wanting to write something good, but the story just doesn’t have direction; it wanders aimlessly.

  • Advice from a pizza

    Story format:

    Considering this is supposed to be a message from either a text or an email, I cannot see the reason behind all the ellipses (…). It comes off as distracting and not aesthetically pleasing.

    Plot:

    There were quite a lot of extremes in this story: Students who brought full-fledged machetes into school to cut up another student? The parents fighting to the point where they killed each other? The brother hanging himself? The main character suddenly developing red eyes like the Dark Side of the Force?

    Basically, it’s a teen-gets-bullied-but-gets-revenge-and-develops-random-super-powers-while-going-insane kind of story which has been done to death. There was no indication for us, the reader, to see how moving away and getting bullied for a short span would make this character into a murderous, lunatic.

    The icing on the cake was the classic, “I’m right behind you,” closing statement. It’s very cheesy, especially since it doesn’t consider if the reader is leaning against a wall or a passenger in a car, etc..

    There’s no reason for us to get behind this character. What are her motivations? Her goals? If she was striving to be or do something and the bullies kept intervening then we could feel her struggle and frustration — feel the satisfaction and justification of everything. If the bullying was the tipping point into her insanity, then what started it?

    Closing Thoughts:

    The story is very amateurish and I don’t mean that as insult. Yes, the teen-bullied-turned-insane-killer has been down to death, but the beauty about the horror genre is that you can do the same thing over and over IF you execute it in a different way. This story doesn’t try to break the mold. Instead, it uses the familiar tropes of the topic and adds another page to its cliche riddled formula. You haven’t done anything different and it comes off just as unbelievably as the others.

    Stories are supposed to help us escape reality. Yet, what makes them work so well is that they are dipped in some pool of realism. Despite being fictional, we have to believe there is some possibility of this happening. If your story is about a killer then it needs to adhere to the basic laws of OUR world because it’s a reflection of it. Your character can’t stab one person, zap another with their eyes, then fly to school if there was no indication before why they could do that.

    You also need to have challenges for the protagonist. If everything comes easy to them and they don’t struggle, we get bored. Why read? We know they’re gonna get out of it okay. If you can establish that emotional connection, where we can see their flaws, then it makes us want to root for them.

    Aside from her turning insane, what was the main plot of the story? The answer is there isn’t one. You created a story ABOUT a character instead of creating a story INVOLVING one. I hope you can return to this later and really flesh it out IF it’s something you wish to improve. If you do, take some chances with it. Develop the main character more — make her someone we care about not some super-powered revenge teen.