Young Writers Society

I hate historical fiction, but I was told to write this for school T-T. It turned out okay, though.

Destroy it.

A Peaceful Morning
by Joe Duncko http://joeduncko.com/

The alarm rung. Its repetitive stream of the clashes of metal upon metal echoed into my dreams. I jumped from my bed to the window, hastily opening the curtains, the sweat building up on my brow. The sky was blood, the clouds were smoke, the sun was an explosion, just as I had seen in my sleep. It had come.

I turned around in a panic, searching around my room for a place to hide from a blast that would inevitably turn everything and myself into nothing. I stood there, like a deer staring into headlights, and prayed to God to forgive every sin I ever committed, until a clunk broke my concentration, accompanied by the ceasing of the alarm.

I stared in wonder at the alarm clock on the wooden floor. It took a minute for mind to process what had just took place, but once it had I could only smirk at myself for acting as I had without examining the situation beforehand.

After wiping my forehead with my sleeve, I pulled the curtains closed again. Several minutes later I emerged from my room, meeting my mother downstairs, the kitchen table already filled with food and my three siblings. I arrived just as the group sang goodbye to my father, who was always off to work before we even left for school.

As the oldest male left in the house, I took the scattered sections of the paper from my younger sister and twin brothers, reorganizing it so that I could read it as I ate the pancakes that were already set out for me. I answered my family's pleasantries halfheartedly, as my focus was on the front page of the newspaper.

Not a day before the whole United States thought their lives were coming to a close. As one of the few who actually bothered to live one of his last days in school, I had repetitively dived under my desk and books during drill after drill. But as one of the older schoolkids I was told the cold truth by my teachers: if a nuclear missile did come and hit our town, no drill would protect you, and if it did you were better off dead because of the fallout the would stay ever after the blast.

I felt like I had some sort of secret knowledge that not even my family knew. I safeguarded my secret, not wanting to scare my parents or my little brothers and sisters. It had slowly been getting to me. Even my sleep had been invaded by the Soviets.

I held my breath as I scanned the page.

“Nuclear War Avoided, Cuban Missiles to be Removed” was what was written in big, black, bold letters on front page.

A sigh of relief flowed through my body. My world had been saved.

EDIT

Hey, what colour do you think a sunrise is? ^-^ It's not... red some days, is it?

Hey!

This was an interesting read. It's easy to think of the cold war as something distant thing that happened ages ago, and I like how you made it seem so real and urgent, and how at first it seems like some distopian future, before you realise that it's something from our past.

I have just one nitpick:

a blast that would inevitably turn everything and myself into nothing

I don't think the "and myself" is necessary here. Seeing as "everything" encompasses all things, surely the narrator is included in that already?

Aside from that, the only thing I didn't think really worked in this was the beginning where the MC had a dream about waking up, and then woke up. That's a pretty confusing situation and you didn't really explain what was going on, so when I first read it I assumed that they were looking out of the window, and the apocalypse really had arrived. So then with the newspaper headline at the end I was like, "Huh? But if the crisis was averted why was the sky blood red?" That part might make more sense if you make it more clear that the view from the window wasn't real.

But overall I liked this a lot. Keep writing!

Hello!This was interesting to read. It was nicely written. I loved the first paragraph. It explained so much and set the tone for the entire story. The useage of verbs and adjectives were nice and well written. I especially liked the "sang goodbye to my father." Overall, it was good. I enjoyed reading it.
~Ballerina

Hey there! This was a great read for me, and was very well writen. This story I think kind of speaks the truth if a nuclear war would ever break out, and because of that this story really touched me. Again good story, keep on writing!!!

Hello, I loved this story. A boy living during the Cold War at the end of the Cuban Missile Crisis, I love this setting! The story touched me as I was born in Hiroshima, the first (and one of the only) cities ever nuked. It describes the fear one might feel in the wake of a nuclear war. Spelling and grammar are fine (as far as I can tell), all I can really say is keep writing!

Hey,

I really loved this piece, the whole setting really gets your attention when you start reading it. I think the emotions you used really bring across the intensity of the situation. I really do love this story!

This is interesting. I confess to be not really knowing much about the Cold War (is this the time period? 0_o), but this was good. I like the way you said the enemy had even invaded your sleep. Nice metaphor. Anyway, generally good work.

good. Just watch some punctuation. But over all I thought it was good.
And don't be to hard on yourself (silly thing for me to say seeing as I push myself further than my limits in writing and expect an extremely high standard of writing from myself).

I liked this story. I especially liked your phrase "Clashing metal on metal". Otherwise, a few grammar errors, but nopthing else. I think could expand this and work it into a bigger picture, maybe a mixture of prose and diary entries?
Whoopiedoopie.