Rewrite of BlueBeard
Creative Writing
Annika Hilbrich
10/9/10
Behind the Perfect Walls
It all started when my Father died. 17 years ago. It came as a surprise to the whole family, everyone except myself. I saw it coming. He was so unhappy, we were all so unhappy. We just came off as happy people, a perfect family, to the rest of the world. My childhood was basically a disaster behind closed doors, and a fairytale out in the open. All my friends talked about my wonderful, perfect life and how they wished they had it too. News flash – we were anything but perfect.
I got married when I turned 26. I thought I could close off my past life and start a new one, with an amazing man I met 7 years before we wed. He was everything I ever dreamed off and more and I thought that with him, we could have the perfect family that everyone thought I always had and this time, it would be true. It was always a fantasy of mine, and when I married Jason on October 25th, 2000, my fantasy become reality. Everything we did was perfect in my eyes.
Man, was I a fool. Jason and I were happily married for 6 years, and that’s when it all began. The cries, the screams, the horror. It had become apparent that Jason’s father had been murdering women for the past 8 years and had never been caught. Jason knew about this and didn’t tell anyone. I saw a body in the attic one Christmas while I was looking for lights. Jason’s father threatened to kill me if I ever told anyone. I couldn’t take this, this was too much, who would ever want to be involved with something like this? I divorced Jason that year, with no regrets, (and obviously called the police). Jason and his father were taken to prison for life.
A year later, I heard that Jason’s father had been murdered in prison. Can’t say I’d miss him.
Annika, this piece rang home for the first half. It’s true; we all long for this idea of perfection and companionship, but rarely find true love or happiness. I felt as though this girl built her idea of a family off of everything her family was not. She never took a moment to realize that perfection does not exist; as a result, she sought to create the nonexistent family and got burned. It’s not to say I feel she should have lowered her own sense of family, but everyone has skeletons in their closet; thankfully, most have figurative skeletons, not literal, yikes!
ReplyDeleteThe story turned and I had wished I heard more about this perfect family that this girl had created with Jason. She seemed so excited and happy to move on with her life, but wound up in a worse situation that when she was with her family. Funny how life changes and makes you appreciate the past over the present. I cannot say I wish to learn the same lesson via finding a dead body and having my alleged perfect husband taken to jail with his criminal father, but all the same, good lesson.
This story is comical and powerful in that it teaches a lesson, but through using a very drastic situation. Nice job thinking outside the box and keeping me yarning for more detail.
Annika,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed this paper. I really like your version of the blue beard story. I like how you still covered the main points, like the girl is escaping her old life for something seemingly perfect and better and the murders, but turned it into your own story. I really like the beginning of it because so often we only see things on the surface. No one is perfect and no one lives perfect lives. There are so many people that others may be jealous of, but there is always something going on in those people’s lives that others don’t know about. Everyone has secrets. And just like the main girl’s past life had secrets, her husbands past (and current life) had hidden secrets as well (both literal and figurative). It is sad that the character was so happy with her new life for six long years and then she had to find out such terrible news, especially in such a scary way! I think it was really strong of her to leave and call the police. I would have liked to hear more details about her finding the body in the attic though, it sounds really scary and it would have been cool if you had shown the scariness more. I really like how all of your writing is so relatable and straightforward while still telling such interesting stories. Great job!