Page 19 - Horizon 17-18

Horizon 2017
19
Marooned
The cloth in my mouth is damp from sweat and the taste is making me gag. I can feel my wrists start to bleed from the thick rope that traps my arms behind me. They spit on me. Laugh. Jeer. Pull at my clothes and hair. Filthy pirates! I think of my family sinking into the craw of the mighty ocean. Its murky green and blues swallowing them whole, consuming all of my joy, my love with them. Tears bud at the corners of my eyes.
Oh God, I think, why could I not go with them? Taken by the rogues and then to be cast off the deck to drown for the amusement of these wretched men! The captain appears at the top of the deck.
“Drop her,” he calls. The men glance about at each other before two begin to move toward me. Their pungent body odors reach me before their calloused hands do. One of them cuts the rope away from my hands before wrenching my arms back behind my back. They hoist me up for the crew to see. The laughing become merciless cackles. I feel a glass bottle shatter against my side, small bits of jagged glass sticking into my dress, poking at my ribs.
“Aye sweetie,” the one who cut me free mouths against my ear with crusty lips and breath smelling of ale, “Maybe the men will let you stay if youbegforyourlife.”Ibringmyfootdownhardonhisinadefiantstamp. Suddenly, I am flying. And then, I am falling. I plummet like a stone before smacking a surface that is hard and unforgiving.
I break the surface of the water and am shrouded in darkness. Seawater travels up my nose. I imagine the water filling my body until I am human no more, only a shell. A shell that will be filled with barnacles over time as the bottomless monster makes it claim over me. Fear takes hold of me and I begin trying to kick my way to the surface. I struggle against the weight of my heavy skirts and petticoat. Being a woman is just so unfair some- times. I shoot up out of the water gasping for air, tearing at the cloth tied around my mouth. Looking up to the sun, I see the silhouette of a rather large object falling quickly towards me. I throw myself to the side to avoid being landed upon. The large thing falls under the water before bobbing back up. It’s a boy snorting seawater out of his nose with his hair sticking to his face in brown tendrils. I hear hearty laughs as a barrel is thrown off the the edge of the ship. We both begin to swim for it, clinging to it for support. The ship hoists anchor and sails away from us.
“What happened to you?” I breathlessly ask.
“I defended you miss. I said, ‘it doesn’t seem right to throw a lady from the ship.’ And Captain said, ‘You’re right, why throw one when you can throw two sniveling ladies overboard?’ And then they threw me off,” he sputters through shortened breaths.
“Well, what’s your name?” I demand.
“Collins, Thomas Collins, miss” he responds.
“I am Helena Finn, Mr. Collins” I say. We float in silence for a little bit. I begin to fall asleep and, in doing so, almost slip off the barrel. Mr. Collins catches my wrists to keep me from falling below the water’s edge. He opens his mouth to say something, stops himself, and then starts again.
Miranda Dorsey ’18
Journal 3
Some say that deep in the woods of our town is a house. People think
that a lonely hermit lives there, others say that an escaped mental asylum patient lives there. No one knows, but today me and my best friend are going to figure it out. You see, my name is Ben and my best friend is
Violet. We met in seventh grade at a new middle school for the both of
us. We found comfort in knowing that we were not alone. We immedi- ately clicked and over time, we became best friends. We share many of
the same interests, such as computer science and the macabre. There
is one important thing about us both- To put it frankly, we are YouTube famous. We film videos of ourselves exploring never before seen aban- doned places. Recently, we have been getting spammed with requests
to explore this unknown house I previously mentioned. We were quite skeptical but you see, if we do this we will be famous. We decided to go for it. So as soon as Violet and I packed everything up, we were on our way. We planned to go at dusk. I was pleasantly surprised to find us exactly on time as the melancholy water color sunset flooded my eyes as we stepped onto the trail to this house. We felt the adrenaline coursing through our veins as we started on our journey
Amanda Nill ’18
One Plus One
One plus one equals one,
It equals you.
To the ignorant eye, you are but a single cell,
Insignificant, meaningless.
However, to me, you are the world
And a world of possibilities is before your tiny feet.
Everything is already present,
Your hair color, the hue of your vibrant eyes.
In nine months you’ll be ready,
Ready to cry and blink at the brightness.
Ready to greet the world.
And I’ll welcome you, smiling at your pure perfection.
Yet, a frown plays across my lips now.
Some refuse to recognize your perfection,
Your life.
Some believe you are a choice.
O terrible age that ever justifies this bloodshed!
There are choices that are not ours to make.
Cry, weep, for your brothers and sisters who will never greet the world. You are safe here, though.
I’ll watch you grow, feel you kick,
And love you more than I thought possible.
One plus one equals one,
Olivia Manocchio ’18