Do you know that moment when the sky looks like it’s going to fall apart? Your perfect image of the world has been completely erased. It feels like the wind and the water beneath my feet are the only thing keeping me afloat; as the gas seeps through the one crack of the wooden prison. A breath of relief escapes me for finally I can see my end in the shape of a gaseous poison designed to kill. Designed to wipe away the remaining memories of a 16 years old’s history.
It all started on April, 1, 2013 the first day we heard the sirens, and the last day of normalcy. Men tore through the front door throwing my mother and youngest sister to the ground. Their bodies becoming all to personal with the concrete. “Wilbur! my mother screamed waking my father without thinking he quickly ran to cover me.
“Hide here,” he said; his voice coaxing me with the warmth of summer. I waited silently patiently for any sign that all was well, but instead I was met with the violent thrashing screams of my mother and sister. I saw the blood spatter across the hallway walls before I heard his name.
“Wilbur!” Time froze as the scene replayed repeatedly in my head.
“Dad” I cried out tears swelling in my eyes. There was no pain just an empty void that would never again be refilled I saw his name flash across my eyes before settling deep in my throat never again to be respoken.
“Get them in the van we haven’t got all day.” A soldier shouted. “Stop crying get up,” he said pushing the butt of his rifle into my mother’s left shoulder.
“Leave her alone,” I spat at the guard. He his landed on my cheek, but none of it mattered because I felt nothing.
“Get up.” The guard spoke in a hiss.
Mother stayed weeping on the floor, unmovable. Her hands clasping my fath...
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... and even in the dead of night she looked like a innocent angel.
“Our resting place,” The bitter man bellowed out. “They are going to take us all out and shoot us. It was nice knowing you.”
“Shut up. I don’t care if you feel hopeless, and bitter but don’t subject my kids to that. Sully, and Toby come sit next to me.” I had never seen my mother so angry, and hurt at the same time. The wound from my father’s death was still fresh in her heart.
“We will be taking a detour here. Children and woman will stay on board. Man follow the guard in the blue uniform.”The guard, commanded “now.” He immediately began shoving the man off of the caravan. When the other guards touched the bitter old man. He hooted and hollered screaming “I’ve got children,” We all looked at him incredulously, and he must of noticed because he immediately followed up by saying. “Well, I could.”
Dialogue and characterization are effectively employed by Ruta Sepetys to create a forced atmosphere where choices are limited. Told from the perspective of an adolescent girl, Lina, the excerpt portrays a character who combats between appearance and her own ‘reality’ through her artistic expression. Her drawings are “very realistic” because she draws them based on her view of the world (Sepetys). In the ‘real world’, however, they appear to be rather unflattering and therefore, although she “longs to draw” it as she sees, she is forced to conform (Sepetys). In Between Shades of Gray, Ruta Sepetys, through the utilization of dialogue, imagery and characterization, conveys the contrast between reality and appearance in the protagonists’ artistic interpretations in order to convey the contextual setting of the novel.
...h narrators see more horror than they could imagine was possible. Each day is quite likely to be their last and they are under no illusions what sort of horrific death could be lurking over the top of the next attack.
I walked into the room on New Year’s Day and felt a sudden twinge of fear. My eyes already hurt from the tears I had shed and those tears would not stop even then the last viewing before we had to leave. She lay quietly on the bed with her face as void of emotion as a sheet of paper without the writing. Slowly, I approached the cold lifeless form that was once my mother and gave her a goodbye kiss.
The boy reached for his blanket and covered half of his face in fear. The footsteps continued, getting louder every step. “It’s just mom and dad” he told himself. “No need to worry.” Footsteps were heard getting closer and closer to his room door. LOUD but slow, fear was uprising into the young boy’s heart. Suddenly they stopped and started going away.
When I walked inside the front door something didn’t seem right. The feeling of sorrow overwhelmed the house. It was so thick I could literally feel it in the air. Everyone was motionless. They were sulking;I was befuddled. The most energetic people in the world, doing absolutely nothing. I repeatedly asked them what was wrong. After an hour or so, my dad pulled me aside. He said that my Aunt Feli had passed away last night. My mind went for a loop, I was so confused. I thought that he was joking, so I replied “You’re lying, don’t mess with me like that.” and punched his shoulder softly while I chuckled. My dad quickly started tearing up and said, “There...
Tears flooded my face as I let her hand go. I love my mother dearly, but without father I had to be the head of the house. The one to take charge in times like these. She was in not in a good place of mind to be rational. Why had father forsaken us like this, why couldn't we just go home and be with him. The thoughts swirled around my head but the next thing I knew was mother laying on the ground in pain. Her face crinkled and puffy as she clenched her stomach in the delicate hands.
After Som and his father came out of the shower room the soldiers immediately put them to work. Som’s feet, hands, and back shook from exhaustion. Som stood up to stretch his back but a soldier hit him on the side of the head and yelled: “Get back to work!” Som wondered why the soldiers were so mean. Maybe it was all the hot dirty uniforms they had to
'For all the smoldering emotions of that summer swelled up in me and burst-the great need for my mother who was never there, the hopelessness of our poverty and degradation, the bewilderment of being neither child nor woman and both at once, the fear unleashed by my father's tears.'
I groaned and held my head because of my pounding headache. That’s when the day's events came rushing back to me. My eyes adjusted as a maid scurried into my room with a tray of food and laid it next to me and hurried out of my door. I grabbed the tray as I realize how hungry I really was. I munched on some french toast and studied the room I was in. It had 4 large glass windows and it was painted a midnight blue with furniture. I shoveled the rest of the food into my mouth and drank some milk, when a beautiful boy opened the door. In a gruff voice he said “ Follow me.”Who does he think he is for kidnapping us then telling us what to do? A voice in my head said. I felt the crazy anger that I long ago stored a way. I let the very well known darkness take over. “What’s happening to me.” I said while tugging at my hair.Without me knowing the boy grabbed my hand tugging me too the
The reader feels happy for her as she finally gets some time to relax with her family at the park,” Nicolas Lockhart described her in his analysis of the story. However, this mother encounters an opposite different scenario. Not only, had the incident ruins her weekend, but also, the conflict force her inner undervalue feelings towards her husband to come out and to confront him "You and who else?" as well, she scuffled her son Larry "Stop crying," she said sharply. "I 'm ashamed of you!" She felt as if all the three of them were tracking mud along the street. The child cried louder.” She “despises her husband 's weakness. When he criticizes her for not disciplining their son effectively, she attacks him. Thank God, her husband decided to end everything and return home. “Then Morton turned his back on the man and said quietly, "Come on, let 's get out of here."” Now begins the conflict within the character of the mother. “Her first feeling was one of relief that a fight had been avoided, that no one was hurt. Yet beneath it there was a layer of something else, something heavy and inescapable. She sensed that it was more than just an unpleasant incident, more than defeat of reason by force. She felt dimly it had something to do with her and Morton, something acutely personal, familiar, and
... at the man, the unbidden memory of my parents’ lifeless body in the open casket washes over my mind. My head begins to throb. I fight back tears, screaming in agony.
Then all of a sudden, he began to choke, and blood dribbled from his mouth and got on my jacket. "What the hell?!" I yelled. I grabbed his shoulders and stared, astonished, at his face, as he silently pleaded for help. I couldn't handle looking at him anymore and I was frozen in shock, so I let him fall to the ground.
Outside, it is cold and bright. I ask a general if I can stay with the wounded, explaining that I’m a doctor. I beg him, but he only laughs and pushes me onward. “The Americans will take care of them, there's nothing to worry about.” He forces me to abandon my brother.
I went to see Dorris and Charley at-least every other day, watching Dorris's life fade, and Charley's heart break just a little more each day as time passed. In the wee hours on September 28th, of this year, about 1 o-clock in the morning I had received a horrid phone call. Charley's desperate, crackling voice called to tell me, “Mom just passed away honey”. I was hit with sadness as a tear rolled down my cheek the more I listened to Charley. I wanted to leave my house right then to go comfort Charley but with school coming so early in the morning I had to wait until later that
The sniper is injured and must find a way to escape, and that way is by killing his brother. "He stooped to pick the riffle up. He couldn't lift it. His forearm was dead. "I'm hit," he muttered" (112). The sniper would have never been shot and injured by his brother if there was no war. War tears families apart as the entire time two brothers are fighting against each other without even knowing it. "The distance was about fifty yards--a hard shot in the dim light, and his right arm was paining him like a thousand devils. He took a steady aim. His hand trembled with eagerness. Pressing his lips together, he took a deep breath through his nostrils and fired. He was almost deafened with the report and his arm shook with the recoil" (113). The sniper had to...