potter_lover456 (potter_lover456) wrote in potter_lover_hp, @ 2006-08-04 08:54:00 |
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Entry tags: | original |
Story: "Untitled" (Original, Any Age)
Title: Untitled
Author: potter_lover456
Summary: Isabella Thompson is going to be an art history major, she's even going to Paris to study abroad. That is, until she gets in a car accident. Now she must deal with a crazy old man that is living next to her.
Warnings: N/A
Notes: Keep in mind that this was supposed to be 6-8 pages, and I just couldn't seem to do it. So if it seems like some bits and parts were cut out, that's why. There will be a little commentary at the bottom of this.
I have given you the original final copy that was turned in to the teacher. If I do go back and edit I will make a new post (most likely with a title).
Today is the day, Isabella Thompson thought bleakly, slicing a big red ‘X’ through the Sunday spot on her calendar. She fingered her guide to Paris, the spine creased and even ripped in some places, from being read so much.
“Honey, it’s time to go. You don’t want to miss your plane,” Doreen Thompson, Isabella’s mother, called from the bottom of the stairs.
“I’ll be down in two seconds,” Isabella shouted back, tossing her French dictionary into her carry-on and shutting off her TV.
She had spent countless Saturdays studying for tests, passing up dates to make sure she could tell the difference from a real Picasso and a fake, all of those missed opportunities just so she could go to Paris and study art history, and now that she could, she didn’t want to.
“Now, Isabella.” Her mother’s voice drifted up through the open door.
“I’m coming,” she said, shouldering her duffel bag and giving her room one last glance over. Even if I don’t want to, she finished in her head, flicking her lights off and closing her door firmly.
Her father picked up her two suitcases and put them in the trunk of her white Jeep, and slammed the trunk shut with a loud bang.
“You have the plane tickets?” He said as he held the driver side door open.
“Yes, Dad, they’re in my purse.” She rolled her eyes, kissing her father on the cheek as she started the car.
“Bye!” Her parents shouted in unison, waving their daughter out the driveway.
She was only about halfway to the airport, but Isabella was already homesick. Her heart ached and her eyes started to get watery, but she kept driving, refusing to turn around. At the next red light she closed her eyes and willed the tears away.
Horns from every direction started blaring around her, and she opened her eyes just in time to see a black Honda Civic come careening toward her. Shock ran through her veins, and an echo of a thought flashed across her mind, gas pedal. She slammed her foot down on the gas pedal, just as the Honda crashed into the passenger side door. The only sounds that pierced through her panic clouded mind was the sound of her tires screeching against the road and the crunch of metal on metal, and she blacked out.
“She’ll be fine Mrs. Thompson; she is just sleeping off the shock,” said a voice that was firm but gentle at the same time.
“But she-” Her mother started, but the person interrupted.
“She’ll be fine. Isabella seems to be a strong girl; she’ll get through this just fine.”
“Mom,” She managed to groan out, her tongue feeling to big for her mouth.
“Bella!” Her mother cried, using Isabella’s childhood nickname. Her mother rushed to her side, grabbed her hand and squeezed it tenderly.
“Are you feeling okay?” Doreen whispered, rubbing her thumb against the top of Isabella’s hand.
“You might want to give her some ice chips,” Dr. Morganson suggested after seeing her try to form the words on her lips without success.*
The ice chips were cold in her mouth, but her tongue seemed to become normal size again, so Isabella didn’t mind.
“Wh-what happened?” She managed to say, the ability to talk still a bit foreign to her.
“You got into an accident, honey. You’ve been asleep for three hours and we were starting to worry,” Doreen said soothingly, brushing a stray piece of hair behind her daughter’s ear.
“Where’s dad?” Isabella asked, looking around the room for her dad.
“He went home to watch your little sister. He’ll bring her by tomorrow,” her mother replied.
Isabella tried to sit up, but she could only lift one arm, “What’s wrong with my arm?”
“In the car accident you fractured your right arm on impact, and broke your right leg,” Dr. Morganson read from the clipboard. “We were lucky that you were wearing your seatbelt and that the paramedics were able to extract you from the car so quickly.”
“How long will I have to stay here?” Isabella asked quietly, thoughts of Paris immediately coming to mind.
“You’ll need to stay in the hospital for two weeks, and then you’ll need to keep the cast on for another six weeks,” he said automatically, as if he was reading a text book.
“Why two weeks?” her mother asked, cocking her head to one side.
“There may have been some extensive brain damage done to your daughter. Don’t forget she ran straight into a lamppost and there is reason to believe that she hit her head against the steering wheel.” He pointed to the bandage that was wrapped around Isabella’s head, which, as if on cue, gave a nasty throb. “We just want to make sure she is okay and that her bones are healing all right.” He smiled reassuringly.
“What about Paris?” she exclaimed, the sudden rush of blood pumping to her head making her dizzy.
“You mortals are all alike, only worried about the little things,” a voice from the other side of the room said accusingly. “What you should really be worried about is Harold the Conqueror. Now he’s something to be reckoned with.” The voice went on and on, mumbling about the battle of 1942.
“Who’s Harold the Conqueror?” Isabella asked curiously, trying to roll over on her side to face the stranger but failing.
“Who’s Harold the Conqueror?” The stranger yelled throwing back the curtains that divided the room back to reveal a very old and withered man. “Everyone knows who Harold the Conqueror is!”
The heart machine attached to the old man went off alarmingly loud, and a chubby little nurse bustled in, disappearing behind the curtains.
“Who was that?” Doreen asked, her hand unnaturally tight against Isabella’s hand.
“That is Mr. Rockerford,” the nurse from before said, reentering Isabella’s side of the room.
“You shouldn’t talk to him, Ms. Thompson. He has Alzheimer’s; he thinks he is from another world.” Dr. Morganson said sternly, pointedly looking at Isabella.
“First off, he says there is another world; he has never said he is from there. And second of all, it isn’t very professional of you to write Alzheimer patients off so quickly,” the nurse snapped out before leaving the room.
Isabella faced the doctor and her mother, her eyelids already drooping with fatigue, “I think I’m going to go to sleep now…” She trailed off.
“Wake up, little girl, wake up,” a voice, old and weary, whispered in her ear.
“What?” She growled out angrily, swatting at the stranger behind her.
“There is no time for this nonsense, William the Victorious is going to come any second,” the voice hissed, shaking her by the shoulders weakly.
“Who in the world is William the Victorious?” She asked; sleep fading away from her mind only to be filled in with confusion.
“The son of Harold the Conqueror, you foolish little girl. Everyone knows that,” it said exasperatedly.
Mr. Rockerford, she thought, twisting her body at an angle to which she could face the man, “And why is William the Victorious coming again?”
There was some whispered words, but all Isabella could make out was ‘stupid’ and ‘what are they teaching the youth these days’
“Do you really want to know about William the Victorious?” He asked in a chilling voice.
“Yes,” she replied back calmly.
“William the Victorious is the son of Harold the Conqueror,” Mr. Rockerford said, sitting down on the edge of Isabella’s bed, “our King, his name is Fred by the by, killed Harold in the battle of 1942.”
“But what does that have to do with William coming?” Isabella asked curiously, she figured she might as well humor him, as long as she didn’t get into trouble.
“Like I said, our King killed Harold, William’s father, so now William is out for revenge. He has already claimed the South, but now he wants more. The King has sent many into battle to stop him, but nothing works.” Mr. Rockerford said solemnly.
“But why is William coming after us?” She leaned in closer, the story finally getting interesting.
“I have something William wants, and William needs this something to conquer the East. If he conquers the East, he has control of the most fearsome creatures in all the land-”
“You mean dragons, right?” She asked excitedly, thinking back to all those children’s books she used to read.
“Dragons are only myths, and even if they did exist, it wouldn’t matter, because the creatures I’m talking about could defeat them in battle five times over. I am talking about the Leviathan.” He whispered the last word, as if fearing the magical creature to burst through the walls and attack right there and then.
Isabella’s mind flashed to the course she took on mythological creatures back in junior year. The Leviathan is a creature mentioned in many biblical scriptures, often associated with Satan or chaos; now, it has just become synonymous with a large creature- that is, if she remembers correctly.
“The Leviathans are huge monsters that have been mistaken for dragons in the past, but are most certainly not. It sometimes has multiple heads, and each one of them can breath fire, some have even been known to spit acid.” His voice became low and husky, like he was telling a scary story to frighten little children.
“Does this country have a name?” She leaned back against her pillow, trying to decide whether or not it would be a good idea to go to sleep.
“Magis,” He whispered again, this time it was with a more loving tone.
Magis? I know that means something, but what?, She thought, but she couldn’t remember where she read it before.
“Wait, how did you get off the heart machine?” She asked, just now realizing the man was attached to absolutely no wires or tubes, unless you count the IV.
“Old war trick,” he said a malicious glint in his eyes.
Secretly, Isabella wanted to believe him, but the rational side of her brain would not let her. Harold could easily be explained as Hitler, especially since World War Two took place in 1942. The rational side thought, but was countered with, Then who is William? by the imaginative side of her mind.
And, what about their king, Fred? The imaginative side brought up.
Does Franklin Roosevelt ring a bell? The rational side rebutted, stressing the ‘Frank’ in
‘Franklin’.
“Mr. Rockerford,” She began, “if William the Victorious is coming, I will need my rest.
This has been a lovely conversation, but goodnight.” And with that she flipped over on her side, or at least the best she could with a fractured arm and broken leg, and forced herself to sleep.
Mr. Rockerford dragged his feet to the other side of the room, and disappeared behind his curtain.
His world can’t possibly be real, she thought, slowly opening her eyes to look around the room.
What happened to the girl that would have jumped at a chance to hear about a magical world? A tiny part of her brain asked.**
She missed her plane to Paris, her rational side replied.
Everything could be explained off by a real world person or event, even the name of the land, Magis, could be, as she realized that it was Latin for ‘magic’. Could it just be his Alzheimer addled mind, or was there something more?
“Mr. Rockerford,” she started, “what does Magis look like?” she cautiously whispered, hoping the man had not yet fallen asleep.
“Magis has and always will be, full of color, everything vibrant and glorious. Beautiful and rare flowers grow in the fields, and the cities have no fog or smoke, unlike here.” He said the word ‘here’ with such disgust it made Isabella blanch, “The air is pure and clean, and millions of tiny stars light up the night sky. Children can go out when ever they like, and no one has to worry.” He described the land for another ten minutes, each description more lovely than the last, till a nurse came in and told them it was too early in the morning for them to be up. When the nurse closed the door and her footsteps echoed down the hallway no more, Isabella replied, “I want to go there.”
“Everyone does,” he whispered sleepily. There was a loud snore from behind the curtain, and Isabella decided to go back to sleep also, and she could worry about Paris tomorrow.
----
So this story was orginally planned out to have Isabella go into a magical world through the accident, and that didn't work.
*= I also planned to have Isabella to be a candy stripper at the hospital, so she would know Dr. Morganson. It was written like this during the first two drafts, so it didn't occur to me that you people wouldn't know Dr. Morganson like I did when I deleted that point.
**=If I were to edit this, I would probably change the imaginative voice in that one scene to the tiny voice. At the time this was written, I had no clue what to name that side, so it just became imginative.
My teacher pointed out that if Isabella was out for three hours she would probably be in ICU which is very true. A peer reader (who was in another writing class) asked why her mother would be so worried if it was only three hours. Well, dead Student, if my child was hit by a car than ran into a lamppost I would be worried in the first five minutes, after three hours I would be a mess.
That's all folks! I would appreciate commentary other than just 'I love this' (and considering I am a big fan of just putting that, this is a lot to ask) as I would prefer some constructive criticism. Believe me, I am open to all comments, unless it is really mean, so don't worry.