[pirate witch]: 524.Short Stories.Sanguine

A short story I wrote for English Class. This is the first draft, I dunno if I will go anywhere with it.


    Beth left the night before the earthquake.  No one knew if she was aware that is was going to happen or if she had a bad feeling about staying in town. Maybe she left for an entirely unrelated reason. She did beg her brother, Darren, to go with her. 

“Don’t stay here! Come with me!” Beth pleaded. She was packing up her car with her suitcases.

Darren refused. “Isobel is here. I’m not leaving Isobel.”

“Why not? She will be safer if you leave her.”

“Safe from what?” Darren screamed. “Why are you leaving and why won’t you tell me what it is that we should be afraid of?”

“Telling you won’t help at all. But if you are so bent on staying here with your precious Isobel so be it. At least the two of you are in love.” Beth handed Darren a scrap of paper with an address on it. “This is where I will be. If you change your mind, you are welcome. But don’t tell anyone, anyone at all, where I am. Promise?”

Darren didn’t know why he had to promise, but he didn’t want to disappoint his older sister, so he promised her not to tell anyone where she was going. Beth gave him a quick hug and then got into her car and drove away.

Eight hours later, the earthquake started. It lasted for almost an hour, and by the end of it, most of the small southern town was in ruins. Buildings were dashed in the dirt, and a lot of people had died. All of the bodies were found, except for one.

“Our house wasn’t hit that bad. I don’t understand why Isobel disappeared.” Isobel’s mother cried to Darren as they stood with all their neighbors surveying the devastated landscape. “Did she say anything to you last night?” 

“No. I spoke to her on the phone at around ten o’clock. We were going to go,” Darren stopped himself. He was about to mention going to see Beth at the place she was hiding, but then he remembered his promise. Darren never broke promises, and he never thought that anyone else should break promises either. They were some sort of unspoken law, and only the lowest of the low made promises they wouldn’t keep. “We were going to go on a road trip.” It was truthful enough. 

Isobel’s mother started sobbing again. “It doesn’t seem fair that on the day our entire town is destroyed by an earthquake my daughter should go missing as well. Of course, you must be sad to. You were going to be engaged. Feel free to stop by the house if you need anything. It’s one of the few buildings still standing upright.”


There was a girl, much younger than Darren, sitting on Isobel’s doorstep. She looked up as she saw him coming. 

“Hello.” Darren said kindly to her. Everyone had started being nicer recently, natural disasters do bring communities together.

“Hello.” The girl said. “Are you Darren?”

“Yes. How do you know me? Have we met before?” Darren could not remember ever seeing the girl before.

“No. Are you Isobel’s boyfriend?”

“Yes. I am. Do you know Isobel? Do you know where she went? She is missing since the earthquake.”

The girl laughed. “You ask a lot of questions mister. But I’ll answer them for you. Yes, I recently have met Isobel. Yes, I know where she is. And very soon you will know too.”

Darren almost laughed with happiness. This girl was going to help him find Isobel! “Thank you! Can you take me to her now?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, we are setting out on our way this instant.” The young girl, who had previously looked rather innocent, pulled a revolver out of her coat pocket and pointed it at Darren. “You and I are going to see Scarlette. I’ll take it you know who Scarlette is.”

“Is this the Scarlette who was thrown out of the highschool five years ago?”

“The very one. She’s quite anxious to see you. The earthquake provided the perfect opportunity for her to snatch Isobel from the noses of everyone in this tight knit community of yours.” The girl didn’t sound very fond of tight knit communities. She gestured violently with the gun. “I don’t know if you are aware of this Darren, but your sister, Beth, did something to make our Scarlette here very upset. They were in the same grade, and their senior year Beth took something that was rather important to Scarlette.”

Darren remembered. Beth had come home late on night five years ago, terrified. A girl in her class had tried to kill her. Darren wasn’t sure of the details, but it seemed like a boy that this girl was in love with was in love with Beth. The girl got very angry at Beth for “stealing her man” and made a rather pathetic attempt on her life. The girl was thrown out of the school, and for several months Beth was under the protection of the Police Department.  After a few months, the girl disappeared from the town, and life for Darren’s family became mind numbingly routine again.

“The boy Scarlette was in love with loved my sister. Is that what this is about?”

“Sort of. You see, Scarlette is mostly over that boy now. I think he joined the army or something. It doesn’t really matter, I was in fourth grade at the time. The point is, she is still rather upset with Beth. Very upset with Beth. So she would like to have a small chat with you, the kin of her foe.”

Darren laughed out loud. This girl was talking as though Beth had committed some serious crime against Scarlette, when in reality Beth couldn’t have cared less about that boy. The little girl didn’t like the sound of Darren’s laughter. She jabbed the gun into his back.

“We will have no one do any laughing while I am holding a gun. Got that?”

Darren immediately swallowed his laughter. This girl was serious. What kind of crazy scheme was this. Then he remembered Isobel, and how much he loved her, so he continued walking. He had to find Isobel.


Darren walked for nearly two hours, and the girl held the gun in his back the whole time. They passed grocery stores and business offices and houses, all crumbled onto the ground. It really was a depressing sight. The train bridge had split in two, and the two halves looked like they were reaching for each other, only to be disappointed. 

Scarlette was sitting on the top of the train what used to be the train bridge. There was no doubt that this was the woman. If her signature long skirt and arrogant posture hadn’t given her away, the figure next to her would have.

“You must be the slowest person on the planet.” Scarlette called down to Darren. “Either that, or you don’t care much for your dearest Isobel.” Pointed down to the girl slumped beside her. A musket was trained on her by a boy of about seventeen. He didn’t look smart, but he looked like he could pull the trigger and hit his mark. Darren ran to the bottom of the train bridge, where he had to look up at Scarlette to talk to her. Now he could see Isobel’s face. She had obviously been crying before, but now her eyes were dry. She looked limp.

“Your betrothed went crazy around
three hours ago.” Scarlette cackled. She really was enjoying this, she thought to herself. It gave her such a feeling of authority, to be holding all the cards while other people had to physically look up at her.

Darren didn’t take his eyes of Isobel. She looked right through him, and when he tried to catch her eye she slowly turned away. “What did you do to her?”

“I drugged her. Percoset. Found it in an old hospital that survived the quake. You may have noticed, the medicine makes her rather out of it.” Scarlette examined the chipped paint on her nails as if she didn’t have a care in the world. As if she wasn’t holding someone Darren was in love with hostage. “Are you ready to listen to my demands now?”

“You get demands?” Darren called up to her in disbelief. What was this girl talking about?

“Yes. I have demands. And I think you will find them quite reasonable. Especially if you are so bent on saving this lady love of yours.” Scarlette lowered her voice to a stage whisper, even though everyone could hear what she said next. “She may be drugged, but she can still hear everything that is going on.” She resumed her loud drawl “So! Are you ready to listen to my one, very reasonably simple demand?”

Darren nodded. Of course he was. And he would comply to the demand too, because Isobel was on the line. “I’ll listen. Just let her go once I do what you want.”

Suddenly, Isobel snapped to attention. She looked right at Darren and screamed, “Don’t tell her!” The boy aimed the gun at her, but didn’t fire. He needed Scarlette’s command to fire. “It won’t help anyone if you tell this crazy woman anything!”

“What are you talking about?” Darren called up to her. “What would I tell her?”

“You would tell her about Beth! Beth called me from her car as she was leaving. She told why she was running away. She was leaving because Scarlette was back in town and would probably be looking for her! This lunatic had some crazy notion of revenge in her head and wants to kill Beth. Beth knew that I would be in danger if you stayed here. Why didn’t you listen to her?”

“Because I cared about you!” Darren shouted. The boy with the gun didn’t shoot Isobel, he just clubbed her in the head with the stock of the rifle, knocking her out. Scarlette didn’t like jokes being made about her mental state. She sat down on the bridge once again and resumed her relatively pleasant tone. “Now then, Darren my young friend, what say you we take this conversation inside where there aren’t so many...distractions?” She pulled Isobel down with her as she jumped gracefully off the bridge. “I’ll have my boy here look after your girlfriend. Don’t worry, he’s quite a good guard. Very quick on his feet.”

Darren agreed and the two began to walk to one of the few buildings that were still completely standing. This one was a police station. There was a flock of geese flying low over head, and the boy who had knocked out Isobel took aim with the rifle and fired. The goose at the front of the V fell down with a thunk. The boy smiled as he looked at the dead bird.

“Now then, you and I are reasonable folk. We both know that your pathetic lover was speaking madness back there. If you tell me where your sister is hiding I will not harm Isobel in any way ,shape, or form. I promise you, I give you my most solemn vow.”

Scarlette didn’t sound like she was lying, and she had promised. Darren held people to their promises after all. He shook hands with her, wincing at how cold her hands were. Two more shots rang out through the air. Scarlette went to the bullet proof door to the station and shouted at her comrade. “Stop shooting birds and make sure that girl doesn’t go anywhere!”

“She isn’t going anywhere boss!” The boy shouted back. Scarlette rolled her eyes but shut the door and returned to her seat on the chief of police’s desk.

“Lets not waste any time here.” She said to Darren. “You want Isobel back and I want revenge. Tell me where your sister is and we can both be on our merry way.”

“This is still about getting revenge on Beth?” Darren scoffed in disbelief. “Didn’t you already try to kill her five years ago?”

Scarlette’s face lost all the pride and arrogance at these words. She looked furious. “Yes. Five years ago. This is something that I remember from before you even knew that Isobel existed. And, for the only time in my life, I was the victim. Beth deserved to die, Darren, and she is finally going to die. Tonight, one way or another. Either you tell me where she is and you and Isobel leave together, or I kill you both and keep on killing until I find her. Your choice, but people will die. You just get to pick how many. And, noble as you are, I’m sure you would want to save as many people’s lives as possible. So tell me where she is. Now.”

Darren made the decision without thinking. It didn’t seem like he had much of a choice, and Isobel was the one aspect of his life he would do anything for. He told Scarlette where Beth was hiding, the exact address of the shelter. He didn’t even think twice about betraying his own sister to a lunatic with revenge issues.”

Scarlette smiled a toothy grin from her perch on the desk when he finished talking. She had written the address on a warrant for someone’s bygone arrest. “Thank you Darren.” She drawled. “You really are such a noble and trusting soul.”

The sound of a gun cocking preceded the jab of a rifle barrel in the back of Darren’s head. “Give the order ma’am?” The rifle boy asked from behind the now very frightened Darren. The boy was hoping with all his heart for a shoot command.

“No!” Scarlette got up quickly and opened the door to the deserted town. The boy pushed Darren forward with the gun, and the three of them began walking down the road. “He comes with us. I don’t believe he would betray his dear sister so easily, especially when he had nothing to gain.” She was beginning to sound mocking, and Darren was confused. He was saving Isobel. That was certainly something to gain.

“What are you talking about Scarlette?”

She cackled with glee. “Such a trusting young lad. It makes you wonder if he ever suffered in his life.” She turned to Darren, walking backwards now so that she could face him. “Beth took the person I loved away from me. I want to kill her. I want to make her suffer. But that isn’t enough.” She stopped suddenly, as though she had stepped on something while she wasn’t looking where she was going. “I want her to feel disappointment before she dies. And anger. And betrayal. The sad part of this plan of mine is that Beth is so goddamn understanding. She would understand if you betrayed her to save Isobel. That would be the noble thing to do. But if you betrayed her for no reason at all, if you weren’t really saving anyone, that would really be a downer don’t-cha-think?”

Scarlette stepped to the side, giving Darren a clear view of what she had stepped on. It was Isobel. Or rather, the body of Isobel. She had a hole through her head.

“Yes.” Scarlette said, as unfeeling as ever. “I do think that would do the trick.”

Darren had never been so angry in his life. That bitch! She broke her promise. She was evil. Lunacy or obsession weren’t good enough excuses for Scarlette, she was just pure evil. He wanted to kill her, because she killed Isobel for no reason. He had given her want she wanted, and she had killed Isobel anyway.

“You promised.” Darren managed to choke out. “You promised you wouldn’t hurt her!”

Scarlette seemed to find the whole situation highly amusing. “Did I hurt her? Think carefully Darren. It seems to me that my hired help killed her, and he never made any such promise. Try to be less trusting next time you enter into a bargain with someone who holds something dear to you over your head. Trust only gets you into trouble, as does love.”

Darren ran for Scarlette. His hands were almost around her throat when the boy with the gun took aim and fired. He didn’t miss.


“You know, I didn’t give you the order to fire.” Scarlette told her thug.

“I know.” He said. “But it seemed like the thing to do at the time.”

“Sometimes your judgement does deserve applause.” She admitted, digging into her skirt pocket for the address Darren had given her. She stepped over the two bodies unceremoniously as she continued down the road. “Such a shame them, Beth knew. She knew from the beginning. But the idiot was just too in love. It really does ruin you. Too trusting as well.” She surveyed the two bodies again. “It’s almost romantic, if you like that kind of thing.”

Scarlette kicked Darren’s body out of the way as she walked on, humming to herself and thinking of the most dramatic way to present this to Beth.