She had Nowhere to run [NaNoWriMo]

Status
Not open for further replies.
Soñador

Soñador

New member
This is my NaNoWriMo story. Constructive criticism is most welcome :D and if anyone can come up with a better title I would be very happy.


{Part One}
She had nowhere to run. The hot stone pressed against her back; she desperately looked about for a way out, but there was none. Not a soul stirred on the on the wide and lonesome prairie land. She was trapped. She turned and met the eyes of the wolf, and locked on him in terror. The whole time he had stalked her, he had not taken his eyes from her throat. Now he stepped boldly forward and snarled as if to say:
“You’re mine!”
Another howl from the distance sent cold chills down Lydia’s spine. She covered her ears and cringed against the rock as her captor lifted up his voice in reply. Tears and sweat ran down her flaming cheeks.
I’m going to die. Someone help me, I’m going to die!
But there was no one; she knew she was alone.
Suddenly, there was a gunshot. The wolf leapt, and Lydia screamed, crumpling to the ground with her arms flung protectively over her head. Any moment now she expected to feel pain as the wolf’s teeth sink into her flesh. Nothing happened. She was afraid to look, to see if he had gone. What if he had not?
Then there came a call in the distance. Lydia lifted her head and strained her ears; perhaps she had only imagined it. The wolf was not in sight. Her heart leapt when the call came again.
“Lydia!”
She recklessly scrambled up on top of the rock and waved her arms madly. If she had been back at home, people would have taken her for a drunk, her dress was torn and dirty, her hair hung loose in great tangles, her face wild from fear and desperation.
“Here!” She cried, “I’m here!”
She frantically searched the wide emptiness around her. Then she spotted the rider, nearly at the same time that he saw her. He was not more that a quarter mile away. Fresh tears washed her face, she continued to wave and call as the mysterious rider drew closer. She jumped from the rock and ran to meet him …. A woman’s voice rudely interrupted:
“Lydia!”
The rider had dismounted; she was falling into his arms. The voice interrupted again:
“Lydia! Lydia! It’s time to get up!”
This time Lydia awoke.
 
Last edited:
As a boy, I sometimes had nightmares of being at the mercy of some predatory beast. Your opening sequence effectively brought those nightmares back to mind. What a relief--and what a legitimate promotion of the right to own firearms--when the beast was shot and the heroine was rescued!

By the way, it is a dewy-eyed myth to say that wolves never attack people. Just last summer, a man in Canada was attacked without provocation by a wolf, and only survived because he was strong and quick and had a knife.
 
One major strength I've seen so far is your ability to create a mood and build tension. That's not easy to do. It reminds me of Hitchcock's definition of surprise v. suspense. Surprise is when people are eating lunch and a bomb explodes at the table next to them. Suspense is when the audience knows that there's a bomb ticking away at the table next to where our heroes are eating and they continue to eat lunch regardless. You've got suspense, and it's working for you :D.
 
Thanks Lady Beth :)

Copperfox: I'm glad I wasn't having this dream myself! I agree with you about wolves; people now days tend to forget that wild animals are exactly that: wild.

Inkling: Thanks. ;) That's something I've been working to improve in my writing, and I'm glad it shows.

more:

--------------

She was greeted by the sound of rain on the tin roof. Her heart was still pounding.
Pull yourself together Lydia, it was only a dream.
“Breakfast Lydia!” Aunt Martha was calling from the base of the stairs. She was starting to sound impatient
Lydia groaned and rolled over to look at the clock. 5:45 AM. She smacked her forehead and hopped out of bed.
Late again!
Dull pain throbbed in her knee, and she winced.
When did that happen? She thought.
“Lydia!!”
“I’m coming!” she bellowed.

----------------------------------------------------



Rhodes, Aunt Martha's hired man, glanced up at the clock and chuckled to himself. Lydia was late again. He didn’t mind, but Martha would probably be preaching. Martha hated rainy days. When he had a spare moment, he glanced up at the window, and his forehead wrinkled in surprise. What was Lydia doing? She was coming, but she wasn’t running, at least, it certainly didn’t look like running. She zig-zagged across the barnyard, hopping crazily.

-------------

When Lydia was little, she used to back and forth between the farmhouse and barn on rainy days, pretending the she was a soldier in the trenches of WWII. The raindrops were bullets, and she would dash in fantastic patterns, trying to avoid them. At fifteen, Lydia had reasoned that she was too old to play games like that anymore, but today she was feeling glum, and besides, her knee was making her limp; she could pretend that she was wounded. It was too good to miss.
Thus, it was not Lydia half-jumping, half-running across the thick mud of the barnyard, but Private Cheney. She made to the safety of the barn just as an imaginary missile destroyed her little dugout where she had been on duty. Then she opened the door to the milking parlor and became Lydia again.

------------

Rhodes listened for her through the lowing of the cows and the rhythmic noises of the pumping machinery. Finally it came, that familiar slam.
“Mornin’ Lydie!” Rhodes called over the din of the milking parlor.
“Sorry I’m late.” Lydia started to work her row. Her hands flew; she’d learned to run the milking machinery when she was nine. The smells, the noise, the feel of cold metal and warm utter; she knew them well. She knew which cows took special treatment, which needed coaxing and prodding. This was her domain.
The parlor had two rows of stalls, Rhodes, the hired man, worked one row, and Lydia worked the other. When Lydia was late, Rhodes had to work both. Rhodes could work both rows himself, but when Lydia helped, they could take breaks in between cycles. One cycle of cows usually took ten minutes.
“What on earth were you doing out there?” Rhodes leaned against the bars and watched her with a gleam in his eye.
Lydia colored and plopped down on an old, battered stool.
“Just playing.”
“Where’d you get the limp?”
Lydia rubbed her knee.
“I can’t figure it out! I woke up this morning and it was like this.”
“Active sleeper, are you?” Rhodes knelt next to her on the dirty parlor floor. “Can I have a look at it?”
 
I HATE wolf nightmares. I grew up with a couple pretty scary brushes with coyotes, and ever since then I have coyote/wolf nightmares. They scare the junk out of me. Good job at harnessing that commen fear!

I really like Lyida's charecter. She's got some spunk. Keep it up!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top