glamgirlsg
Fantastic Fan
I am an author, annoy me and you die in my novel!
Posts: 141
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Post by glamgirlsg on Sept 26, 2010 16:40:22 GMT -5
I wrote this a few years ago for a history class. Enjoy!
My name is Antoinette I am 10 and I live in France. All around me people are dying and we do not know what is going on. My father and mother are dead and I live in the streets with my only sister, Marie. All around me, I see the dead laying on the ground until they are picked up by the people we refer to as "graveworkers". My day starts as the sun comes up and the cries of "bring out your dead" start. I rouse Marie and we look for food. We usually go to the market and buy a loaf of bread and split it. We then go and try to find work. We usually end up in the graveyards putting bodies in the huge pits. It is hard and stinky work and I always feel so sick. How could this have happened? Why has God let this happen? What have we done to deserve this? My family was so wealthy and now look at us! Loading bodies into huge pits! People are dying right, left, and center.
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glamgirlsg
Fantastic Fan
I am an author, annoy me and you die in my novel!
Posts: 141
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Post by glamgirlsg on Sept 27, 2010 13:47:36 GMT -5
Disclamer: This section contains some er... remedies of the time. It will cause some of y'all to have the "Ewww" reaction. If anything is too descriptive or disgusting in ANY of this please let me know and I will change it. Please keep in mind, however; that this is historical fiction and while the characters are not real everything else is. Just had to say that. Once our shift is done at noon we go to the doctors to help administer various cures to the dying. The air inside of the office smells of juniper, laurel, pine, beech, lemon leaves, rosemary, camphor, and sulphur. We burn incense to ward off the plague. Also, if a person gets the disease, they must be put to bed. They should be washed with vinegar and rose water. Sometimes we try to cut open the boils to allow the disease to leave the body. We apply a mixture of tree resin, roots of white lilies and dried human excrement to the places where the body has been cut open. It is hard work and Marie hates it. Come to think of it so do I. Occasionally, I see a flagellant walking down the streets whipping themselves. They think that by sacrificing themselves they will rid us of our sins. They also think that our sins are the cause of this plague. They think that our noise will do no good. Their nerve! I hate the lot of them. Our noise is caused by the bells that ring constantly. We know that the plague will be warded off by noise. We also fire cannons, a relatively new invention. Marie and I went to see one the other day. It looked like a pot on wheels. The men started to load it with gun powder and grass. They touched the end of a lit candle to the fuse of the cannon. BANG! Such a noise I have never heard. The ground literally shook. The grass flew out with such a force. Then they set the cannon up by an old huge tree. They put more gun powder in and a small ball. BANG! The tree had been broken right where the small ball had hit it. The children ran forward to touch the warm muzzle of the cannon. One could barely speak with the bells pealing and cannons booming.
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glamgirlsg
Fantastic Fan
I am an author, annoy me and you die in my novel!
Posts: 141
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Post by glamgirlsg on Sept 28, 2010 16:36:18 GMT -5
Thanks for the great feedback y'all! I woke up next morning to my sisters agonizing groans. She was pale with dark circles under her eyes. I took her to the doctor in hopes that we would be able to cure her. However we never got in to see him because there were so many patients waiting to be cured too. The next day she had boils around her neck and armpits. The swellings were the size of apples. Her nose was bleeding, and I knew that she would die soon. I had to hope for the best. I again took her to the doctor. He was dry of notions for everything that he had tried had failed. He suggested with a sigh that perhaps witchcraft would help her. I therefore rushed her straightaway to the nearest sorcerer. The witch laid Marie down and placed a live chicken aside every boil. She told me to make her drink her own urine twice daily. That night we both slept soundly. The next morning she was dead, her face purple-black. I laid her carefully down in the huge hole in the graveyard. Silent tears swept down my face as I bid farewell to the one life I had treasured so dearly. I don't know when this horrid plague will end. I don’t know if I will even survive tomorrow. All I know is that death will be more welcomed than one day of life.
Don't worry. There is a little more coming.
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glamgirlsg
Fantastic Fan
I am an author, annoy me and you die in my novel!
Posts: 141
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Post by glamgirlsg on Sept 30, 2010 12:36:55 GMT -5
Last part y'all! Enjoy!
The next day I awoke in agony. I looked at my reflection in the cracked mirror aside me in my hovel. What I saw scared me. Pale as a ghost I was with dark circles under my eyes. I tried to go to work but they sent me back warning me not to sleep. I went to the doctors praying that he would have some new remedy. Amazingly he did. He roasted the shells of newly laid eggs and ground them into a powder. He then cut up the leaves and petals of marigold flowers. He put the egg shells and the marigold leaves and petals into a pot of good ale. He added in treacle and heated it by the fire. He told me to drink this every morning and night. I prayed that it would work, he did also. I went home and drank this nasty tasting tonic. It slid down my throat like slimy bog water. The doctor also warned me not to sleep, though he gave me no reason why. So I wandered the streets listening to the agonizing groans of the ill, the clanging of the bells and the banging of the canons while ignoring the dire need for rest. In my nighttime wanderings I found the remains of the house I called home. I crept closer. The government had burned down my home when my parents had contracted the plague. As I kicked my way to my old room I was forced to choke back the tears that I had refused to cry after Marie had died. When the sun came up I made my way back to the village. After drinking my tonic I wandered the streets until sun down. I laid my weary head down on the straw pallet that I called my bed and fell into a deep, deep sleep. My name is Pierre and I was Antoinette's neighbor. My family had fled the city when people started dying. When we got the news that her parents had died we decided to take the girls in and raise them. When I got there however, it took some time to find her and Marie. I found her dead on her straw pallet, pen in hand. Her story was incomplete. I took it upon myself to finish and publish it so that the world would know her story. Peuvent ils tout le repos dans la paix.* *May they all rest in peace.
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glamgirlsg
Fantastic Fan
I am an author, annoy me and you die in my novel!
Posts: 141
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Post by glamgirlsg on Oct 1, 2010 15:30:23 GMT -5
This was in sophmore year. It was funny, all the other stories had their heros survive. Mine was the only one that didn't. Anyway, thank y'all for reading it and being so nice.
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