IMPORTANT!!: Please note before you read this that it has mention of violence, some fear elements, and self unaliving, so if you don't feel comfortable reading this, please don't. Also, please don't report I have warned all readers and am submitting this for homework. I'm sorry it's barely five pages! (I don't think it should count but I could not make this story any longer, it was already very stretched out as it was). I'm sorry it took so long and is still not even long enough! Anyways, I think it's okay, not my best writing, also I don't why I wrote this. Also, it messed up some formatting when I copied it, it does reach at least five pages (bare though). Some words are spelled wrong (k=c, s=c -h) just cause the bad word detector was mad, also sorry if it's too much for you. Short story (~5 pages) for Moody’s Novel Writing Class - 28 November, 2024 Prompt: Long Lost Brother Untitled Story Dyani Moore 97 Pearl St. Boston, Massachusetts January 22nd, 2010 Dr. Howard Browne 106 Bird St. Ithaca, New York Dr. Howard Browne, That day was normal, until it wasn’t. I can’t forget it, it unnerves me, day after day. I am constantly haunted by the memory. I cannot get rid of the feeling that… nevermind. If I am going to tell you this story I should do so instead of ranting on about how I feel. It starts here, in Sunrise Coffee Cafe where I am writing this now on April the thirteenth. I was sipping my morning coffee, reading the morning paper, when a strange man sat down next to me. He wore a long black coat and leather black glove, his eyes were ice blue, cold and harsh. “Hello, Dyani. Dear sister, you are in danger and a whole lot of it too. Now I want you to go home and bolt your doors, don’t open them for anybody. Blind your windows, don’t take even the smallest peak. I want you to be prepared for anything, protect yourself at all costs!” he said, lighting a cigarette. The voice was familiar, though the words struck such great fear into me all the same. “Why might I listen to a strange stranger who spits out strange advice and warnings, what incentive do I have to believe you?” I replied, hoping he wouldn’t have a good answer. “I would beg you to remember what happened to our parents.” And with that he left, leaving me quite unsettled. This feeling was due to a few things, first of all he knew my name, Dyani. Yes, I lived in a small town, but anybody who knew my name was told by me my name, and I had never seen him before. This was very creepy. Second of all, what he had told me, “You are in danger and a whole lot of it too…” which is not something too comforting to hear. Third of all, his voice was definitely one I’d heard before, yet I don’t know where from. Finally, his warning about what happened to my parents. Few knew anything about my parents, for I felt it was a sensitive subject that didn't reveal the occurrence to most people I met, even some of my closest friends. When I was sixteen, they disappeared completely. No evidence of anything out of the ordinary was ever found. Even more unsettling than that, he said our parents, and I didn’t have a brother. The only one I ever had died at birth, he had been named Dyami and there was no way this man could have been Dyami. But at the same time, he had called me sister and his eyes were ice blue, the same color mine were and my mom’s had been. And if it hadn’t been for this, I would have just taken him for some random person who wanted to scare me, but I could not ignore his warnings because of it, so perhaps that is what saved my life. I left the cafe, being sure to watch my back. What if someone followed me? What if they cornered me and killed me before I got home? What if they had heard my conversation with the man and knew they had to kill me before I got home? I was truly scared for my life, like I had never been before. Thankfully, I made it home safely, and once I was I did exactly as the man had said, I bolted my doors, shut the blinds of my windows and prepared for anything. I couldn’t help but to barricade the door with furniture and turn off all of my lights to make it look as if nobody was home. I still needed light, so I lit one of my Christmas candles and used it as my light, but in the end all these precautions only made me more terrified. My home was usually light and a happy place to be. Wildflower bouquets decorated every table. Lacey napkins and nice silver forks layed on the table as if ready for a family meal. Sunlight shone through the glass windows, letting in beautiful views of my garden and the meadow that extended past my backyard. It was like a fairytale. But now, it felt like a nightmare. It was dark and gloomy, though it was the middle of the day. I was alone, just waiting for my life to be taken and my fate to be decided in fear, in a horribly terrible fear. What a sorry way to die! Curled up in the corner of my kitchen, with tears streaming down my face while I pity myself.
I must say that at this point in time, I was completely convinced that I was going to die, right that very day at the hands of some terrible serial ciller or another, and it was an absolutely horrible state of mind. In fact, at one point I considered cilling myself, taking too much medicine or something painless like that, if I was going to die, I’d rather do it painlessly than have a chance of facing a most painful deat, but I was never truly cuicidal. It came time for lunch, and I quietly stood up and scavenged the fridge for something to eat, but in the end I was too scared to eat anything, and if I had forced something down my throat, it probably would have just come back up anyway. Hours passed on like this, and this was definitely one of the worst days of my life. I kept thinking that I saw shadows of big bulky men, but it was really just from the tree outside of my window moving with the wind. I started crying, I couldn’t take it anymore, I couldn’t bear to exist like this. I walked over to the medicine cabinet and found a sedative, and swallowed it. It took a while for me to fall asleep, but I did, eventually, after lots of tears. I woke up, laying on the cold floor. I looked at my watch, it was April fourteenth, and I was alive. I let out a breath that I had been holding, I was safe. I was safe. I was alive! What had I even been worried about? Some stranger telling me I was going to die? Why how stupid was I? I rushed out of my house, running to the coffee shop. I’m not sure why I did this. Perhaps it was because I thought I might see the man again there, or perhaps I wanted to pick up my life exactly where I had left off. When I got there, I bought the newspaper as usual. It was the same boring things, until I saw something quite interesting. It was the man, but not in the way I had expected to see him. He was in the newspaper, and it was because he had gone missing. He had completely disappeared off the face of the planet. Gone, just like that. But his disappearance was not the most unsettling thing, the most unsettling thing was that his name was Dyami Moore, the name of my brother. Now I was even more scared than before. I was not safe. Something awful had happened to my parents, and now it had happened to my brother, a brother I had thought had died. Somebody was out to get my family. For what reason, with what means, to what outcome, I was not sure, though I did know this: I was the last surviving member of my family and therefore I was next. Ever since this day I have lived with caution, always locking my doors and never staying in one place too long. It has now been eighteen years and I am still here. Every day, my thoughts are constantly haunted. I am miserable and cannot go on like this, and I ask for your help. I want to be free of my fears. Sincerely, Dyani Moore Dyani Moore disappeared on January 25, 2010. This letter was sent to Ithaca three days before she disappeared, it is the only evidence we have for any of the disappearances of the Moore family, which started with the disappearance of Dyani’s great grandmother, Cheyenne Moore in 1969. No relatives of Dyani Moore remain alive, and we are no closer to solving the case of Cheyenne Moore than we started. In 1970, her case was closed but then reopened again in 1972 when her sister Chenoa disappeared. For whatever reason, somebody intended to get rid of the Moore family, and we intend to figure out why. This case involves the disappearance of thirty-six people over a span of forty-one years. One question I personally find quite intriguing is why was Dyani fooled into believing that Dyami had died? In 1968, Dyami Moore was born, he was then shipped off to live with his aunt and uncle in Wyoming, the reason for this was unknown. At this point in time, nobody had disappeared. Something I also ponder at, how did Dyami know that there was a threat? If only he had escaped that night, we might have all the answers, but these criminals are too handy for that. I believe that the people who are responsible for the disappearances of the Moore family, are the same people who we are fighting against. This case may be our path to success.
