1st 5 Pages October Workshop - Milton Rev 2

Name: Michelle B. Milton
Genre: YA Gothic Dystopian
Title: Trigger Warning
 
[PITCH]
 
Killdeer Saskatchewan sits on the blurring American/Canadian border, transformed over the decades from a little farming community to a diseased industrial city.

The Fletcher’s, industrial leaders in metal made products, run Killdeer with two other families: the Harts and the Quinns. These three families once struggled for control over the city, until the night of a horrific murder that Brooke Fletcher and sole Hart survivor, Victoria, narrowly escaped.

Nearly twelve years after that horrific night, sixteen-year-old Brooke is still harassed by the ghost of the youngest Hart child, Leo, who was once her closest friend. When an old flame tries to kill Brooke and is found dead the next morning, Brooke begins to receive texts from a non-government sanctioned cell number. Then, a strange boy moves into the Hart house with Victoria, and Victoria begins to act very erratically. When Brooke begins to uncover new evidence in the Hart house, she begins to question whether or not the real orchestrators of these heinous crimes had been caught.

In order to survive in the shadow of a civil war, Brooke must uncover the city’s best kept secrets, as childhood friends threaten to return from the dead.
 

[CHAPTER 1]
 
<i>Killdeer, Saskatchewan<i/>
 
<i>5:00PM<i/>
 
I was often visited by Leo Hart, even long after his funeral.

It was the last day before exams, and according to the clock on my cell Leo had been dead for 11 years, 344 days, 4 minutes.

A thick layer of smog had sunk down, and the last light of the sun filtered through the trunks of long dead quaking aspens, boxing in my birthday party. I stood by the lake, shivering and feeling sorry for myself. Micah said this would be ‘a year of firsts’; I had suffered enough firsts already; first broken bone, first F on a test, first dead body, and worse, first heartbreak.

The deep red lake lapped gently against my shoes. In front of me, cherubic Leo lay face up in the water. Red-gold sunlight flickered on his brown arms, like I was looking at him through a slatted door.

In the blink of an eye, the lake became the green kitchen. Blood streamed from two cavities in Leo’s chest, feeding into pools of blood on the checkered tile. He turned his head towards me and opened his mouth in silent question, his every breath a loud gurgle. Leo started crawling towards me, leaving a slow bloody trail streaking behind him. I didn’t take my eyes off him, my heart pounding. He had never reached me before; but this time he might.

As he struggled closer, the air grew cold. I watched as his hands moved from olive to lime tile as he pulled himself towards me. I didn’t move, except when risking small,

controlled,

breaths.

“Hey!”

The icy air dispersed. The green kitchen turned to pebbles and rotted logs. Leo was gone; there was nothing but the viscous water and the rocky bank of Copper Lake Park. I rubbed the goosebumps on my arms.
 
“I’m talking to you, Brooke. I’m starting to think you really are just my lame cousin.”
 
Beside me, Micah squinted at the lake in the dying light. He’d mastered the art of looking purposefully disheveled; and paired with the distressed jeans and the acoustic at his feet, Micah fit the part of working class Romeo perfectly, though he’d never worked a day in his life. In this light, his skin practically glowed, a look I certainly didn’t inherit from the family.

Back when we were five, Micah was inseparable from Leo, even more than I was. I never had the courage to ask him if he ever saw Leo too.

Micah sat on a nearby log.

“Come here,” he said, and I joined him. “Look around! I delivered. This will be the best party of the year; just make sure people remember it’s yours, not mine. Do something interesting.”

He swept his arm theatrically towards the party. My terror was replaced with shame.

Last week I’d begged him to help me out, and in exchange, I ghost wrote his now infamous A grade essay ‘Breaking the Final Chains of British Rule: Pharmakon’s Emancipation of Canada’. I had wanted this party <i>that<i/> bad.

And Micah had delivered. The speakers on the beach were finally pumping out music from the deep archives. Illegal bonfires were erupting all over the lakeside. Ten cases of soda, twenty cases of non-alcoholic champagne, seven cases of non-alcoholic beer… and the opportunity to get Riichi Cole alone!

This party was secret, exclusive, and well worth the risk of terrorist attacks. And as for the authorities, any academy classmates who blabbed would be discarded from Micah’s social life.

But despite all this, I wasn’t in the mood. And not just because the police crashed the party an hour ago, and I had to bribe them, or that Leo was forcing me into rigged games of red light green light: I’d recently learned that perfect, kissable Columbina Adams didn’t want me around if I didn’t put out. Nothing about our relationship was right. I ended things; then she stopped coming to school.

Micah’s ‘can do’ attitude fizzled out as we sat in silence. Maybe Columbina was right: I was impossible to please.

“I need to say something.” Micah rubbed both his hands on his face. “Things aren’t good between Bean and me. It’s our three-year anniversary–  I haven’t heard from her in two days– and I can’t believe she’s missing your party!”

My eyes watered.

“Maybe she got lost,” I shrugged.

I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and texted Riichi, casually wiping the edges of my eyes:

<i>*Are you here yet? *<i/>

Between Leo and Columbina, the Chairman should change my name to Waterworks.
 
“Let’s just enjoy your party, okay?” Micah said, punching my shoulder gently. He had zero clue that Columbina was my first everything. I forced a smile.

“I don’t know. Tonight’s sucking hard: you promised no supervision.” I said, pointing to Executioner Hart, sitting just past the furthest bonfire.

The twenty-three-year-old sat in the dark, illuminated by the light of her cellphone. She was never in a party mood; someone from the city council must have forced her to babysit Micah and I. She wasn’t even bothering to keep an eye on us, but the police stationed around the park certainly were.

Micah rolled his eyes; “I’m not the one who told Riichi I outsourced my essay. I bet you he’s the one who told your granny-”

“The Chairman,” I corrected, “and I doubt it.” Riichi was terrified of the Chairman ever since he came over to study that one time.

“Whatever- the police knew where to find us. Riichi’s a rat: he’s dead to me.”

Text Message from: RIICHI COLE

<i>*On the dock. What’s up? If its about Micah, you know how serious I am about being Valedictorian. There can only be one; hashtag sorry. *<i/>
 
Micah put his hands on my shoulders as he normally did when he was going to impart some piece of useless wisdom.

“Listen,” he said in an undertone, “there’s a blind spot in their surveillance at the shed. Have fun tonight. Please.”

“Ok,” I said. Micah gave me an over-enthusiastic high-five.

I quickly spotted Riichi skipping rocks on the surface of the lake. Micah would makeup with him within the week. I replied:

<i>*There’s a shed on the other side of the lake. Meet me there ASAP. *<i/>
 
“Yeah virgin, go to the shed with someone gross so you have a chance.”
 
It was the first time we’d heard her voice in days, and it sounded off.

Columbina stood in front of us, arms crossed over a black sequined party dress, with a smoke and ash eye shadow that left me uncomfortably aware of her eyes. She was wearing black! She always wore bright colours; she said dark colours were only to be worn at funerals.
 
“Bean!” Micah said, getting up. “I was getting worried!”

“Don’t touch me,” Columbina pushed him away when he tried hugging her. “Who were you texting, Brooke?”

“I’m glad you made it,” I evaded, hopeful I could smooth things over.

“No you’re not,” she said sharply. She then gave Micah a passionate kiss, glancing up to make sure I was looking.

I really hated her.

Text Message from: RIICHI COLE

<i>*I’ll be there. *<i/>

I could hardly look at her. I stood up, anxious to leave.

“I’m going to take a walk. You’re not invited.”

“We’ll be here!” Micah said, kissing Columbina again.

Columbina avoided him, looking back at the dock. Large air bubbles jostled the water as I turned away.
 
Eat shit, Columbina Adams.