Distillation

In the excerpt, the narrator expresses his views towards scientists and those experimenting on nature through his use of diction, imagery, and a shift in point of view. Switching from first to second person to create a tone of accusation, the narrator uses words with negative connotation (“nasty,” for instance), to help the reader understand his disapproval of the scientist, and to picture their experiments on plants and animals in which he despises. The narrator uses these techniques in order to portray his judgment and disapproval of the scientists to the reader. Throughout the narrator’s passage, he uses his writing to critique intellectuals involved in scientific experiments and let the readers understand his negative emotions on the topic.    

200 words

It’ll often be later in the evening, when the sun has fully set and above is covered with constellations and patterns of bright stars in the sky, after everyone has eaten a nice, long dinner and had time to discuss how their day had been, after they have all gone to sleep, the only noise heard is the sound of the TV which, has been accidently left on as a result of my father clocking out on the couch, when my dog has finally stopped running around the house attempting to eat everything he can get his mouth on, when the cars that usually speed destructively down the main street I live on have all settled down and abandoned the streets, when my sister bangs her fist on the thin wall that separates her room from my own, screaming at me to turn my “awful” music down because, “it’s too loud and some of us would like to sleep”, after I turned my music up just a tad louder, only for a few minutes until I turn it off, but loud enough to piss her off, after I’ve showered and taken the time to relax, right when I’m about to pass out, that’s when I remember I didn’t do my math homework.

Angry Letter

Dear Madeline,

I couldn't help but notice the skirt you are currently wearing. It's very lovely, I really like it. Perhaps, I like it so much because it's, oh I don't know, mine!! You took it from the bottom row of my side of our closet, and don't try and convince me it's yours. That trick has never worked on me before, so it definitely won't work when I had planned on wearing said skirt tomorrow. I even told you I was going to wear it!! Just because we share a room and a closet doesn't mean you can just go onto my side and steal everything I own without asking. Is it yours? No. You would not enjoy if you went to grab something and then, poof, it had suddenly disappeared. Don't try telling me you're not the one who stole it, you are the only sister I have AND it's currently ON YOUR BODY. It didn't grow a pair legs and walk off my hanger, so don't tell me you just found it lying around. And yes, I know our deal, you can borrow anything you like. But, if I do recall correctly, there were some a few things that went along with our agreement, like mini rules to go along with the main law. The first part was that, while you can wear whatever you want, you have to ask. I don't care if you want to borrow a sweater (even if it practically goes down to your knees, might I remind you I'm almost three years older than you) but you have to ask. "Hey Morgan, can I wear this tomorrow?" Now see, was that so hard? All you have to do is ask and I will usually give you permission to borrow something of mine, And the second little follow up rule is the owner of the piece of clothing (so in the case me) is allowed to say no, if they are going to be wearing said article of clothing in the near future. So even if you had followed the rules like a decent person would, I still would not have allowed you to take the skirt. You knew I was going to wear it, yet you decided to be annoying and obnoxious, and broke the golden rule. And while it sounds ridiculous and petty, sharing a room with your sleep talking self can be a pain in my ass, and the only thing keeping me from strangling you, are rules. Rules we put in place to stay away from pushing each other's buttons. Rules in which you broke. This incident has put you on closet probation until further notice, next time you should probably ask instead of just taking whatever you want. That'd be awesome thanks!

With no love,
Your Sister

Apostrophe

Consume me. Take over my already lifeless and numb body, please I beg you. The pills have already spilled down my esophagus and now I'm just waiting for you. I'm ready to leave, for you to pluck me out of this world and take me into yours. Please, Death, I beg you. 

Synecdoche

The only feature I remembered about her was her hair. Fiery, bright, and vibrant, bouncing down her spine every time she leaned her head back, laughing at something that wasn't really funny but the amount of tequila coursing through her veins made anything laughable. Red was stunning, every guy in there was watching as she stood on tables and danced. Men would keep buying her shots, hoping Red would get a little too drunk and they'd get the chance to take her home. But Red didn't go home with any of these men, witnesses all stated that they had seen her leave with the group of equally stunning girls she had originally walked in with. Red had gone back to her small apartment in Back Bay, where her friends had cleaned her up, and tucked her into bed, closing the curtains to help the hangover they were positive would hit her the next day. But Red never woke up the next morning, nor the next. The stab wounds in her chest and red-stained sheets made it obvious she wouldn't wake up again.

Unreliable Narrator or Unorthodox Point of View

I don’t think she’s showered in weeks. On the off chance I do bribe her and get her into the bath, she just sits there, shivering and curling herself into a ball. The only thing she bothers to put on anymore are oversized sweatshirts, or a t-shirt if it’s a little warmer out. Her auburn curls are matted and tangled together, all tightly knotted at the top of her head. Her jade eyes no longer light up at the sound of music on our record player, which sits next to the couch in the living room. She refuses to eat, and anything I’m able to coax down her throat just comes back up. Her body is no longer soft and delicate, it’s become frail and sharp as each bone becomes more and more prominent. I haven’t seen her smile since the accident.

“It’s your fault” he tells me. “I’m dead because of you. You did this to me, and now you should feel incredibly guilty. You’ll never know peace and happiness again now that I’m gone.” My mind screams at him, telling him to leave me alone. He appears everywhere, a constant reminder of what I have done. I’m sorry. No matter how many times I try to explain to him it was an accident, he won’t leave me alone. I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry. It was an accident, I promise. Or was it? I don’t know. He was scaring me and I was driving and the paternity test results were in his hands and I didn’t see the patch of black ice in the road. He’s gone but he’s everywhere, even when I close my eyes.

I can tell nightmares plague her thoughts when she closes her eyes. I can feel her body tense and her muscles clench beside me in bed. She tosses and turns, tears often staining her cheeks. Every time she cries out, I awaken her, but I can tell that to her, the real world is no safer to her than her own thoughts. Our son still hasn’t learned to sleep through the night, and even his wails can’t snap her out of this dark place she’s trapped in.

I hear him crying. It’s faint, and almost far away, but I can hear it. I try to block him out, to find a silence. His tears and screams only remind me of what I had done. His eyes and his little nose remind me of Mark, but tiny dark hairs on his head could only come from Jack.

I can understand why she might be depressed. The accident had been so awful. She had stayed at the office late to help her boss finish up a sales pitch they were working on. Her and Jack often had late nights, so around midnight I tucked our son in, and went to bed. The call at three woke me and the baby up, its ring piercing the silence of the night. “On the freeway,” they said, “your wife’s car flipped over.” I gunned it to the hospital, Mason in the backseat, thinking only negative thoughts about what had happened. But she was okay. A couple of stitches in her forehead, a few broken ribs, but other than that she was ok. Relief hit me like a truck, until I was asked to identify a body; Jack’s. Apparently his car broke down and she was giving him a ride to the train station where his wife was going to pick him up.

“That baby is mine and you know it,” he screams. “I have a paternity test right here, why don’t we have a look at?” Maybe I did mean to hit the ice. Maybe I wanted him dead. “You know you wanted me dead, I had the potential to destroy your perfect little life.” Go away. Leave me be please. The whole thing was a big mistake and it never should have happened. I didn’t love him, but Mark had been mad at me for a while and I was a little drunk and he was there and then we were both there, with our clothes on the ground, a set of despicable, cheating liars. We both deserve to be dead.

She doesn’t deserve anything that’s happened to her. She is beautiful and kind, a caring mother. When I saw her sleeping in the hospital, all I could feel was relief that she was ok, that I never wanted anything to happen to her, that I would protect her forever.

“No one can protect you from yourself. From what you did to me, and everything we had done. No one will ever want to protect you.”

The doctor’s told me the possible side effects. She would want to sleep a lot, the pain killers would make her drowsy. “She might be a little depressed, for a couple weeks,” the doctors said. But weeks have turned into months now, and she still won’t leave whatever she’s buried herself in. She refuses the medicine, the sight of any anti-depressant pill makes her nose scrunch up and go deeper into her shell.

Mark would never forgive me once he knows. No one would ever forgive me. We both deserve to be dead.

All I want is for her to be better, to get better. I wish she would take the pills, even just a couple. It couple help her get better, be happy. She deserves to be happy again, to hold her child and watch him grow, smiling when he wins a football game, or scolding him when his report card is not to the standards that she expects him. She deserves to dance at the sound of our record player in the living room, and to laugh at her own corny jokes. She deserves to be her old self, the girl everyone loves, the girl I love.

We both deserve to be dead.