Daily Prompt: Banshee

Daily Prompt: Banshee

Jul 10, 2021

Photo by Stefano Pollio on Unsplash

Banshee  

Banshees are masters of one of the most powerful storytelling tools. Foreboding. Planting dread in your mind before the tragedy strikes. When done right, it makes it all the more painful. We saw it coming, we had a premonition, but in the end, there was nothing we could to do stop it. Foreshadowing, more generally, can serve several functions. It is a dangerous technique when applied poorly as it can build a reader’s expectation. If this isn’t met or subverted with skill, then a whole narrative can fall flat. This is why editing is so important, as foreshadowing can rarely be executed in a first draft. Most of the time a story changes as it is written. Writers can’t fully comprehend it, they are too busy inhabiting the scene, and rightly so. All this is to say, don’t be afraid of the banshee. You can edit in their crying later.

Now, back to writing. I’m not a huge horror fan and writing ghost stories doesn’t appeal to me all that much. As a result my ideas very much steered away. To start out, I tried to write an abstract piece on the moment of death extending into eternity. Small things. Anyway, the image of a balloon popping led me to another idea. Instead of continuing, I started over. Here is the result:

Voices do not exist here. Not even their vibrations. Change is no more. It is not a vacuum, it is full. A brimming bursting balloon. That first time you cry on your birthday. Only three years old, the balloon could almost lift you up. Bang. To you, it sounds like a gunshot. Nothing like a pop. It was an assault and you couldn’t hold in anything either, bursting at the same time.

   

You were only four years old. It was your birthday. That didn’t mean much to you. What caught your attention were the balloons. One in particular. Green with a smile printed on. There was a cut through the lip where the ink had faded. That’s why you liked it. It looked like your brother. Even at four, you could recognise him. He was twice your age but acted ten times. A better father than me. Inseparable. He and you were always in the corner together.

    That day, you had the balloon. It could almost lift you up. We left you to it. It was better than the present we got you, whatever that was. You charged about on some kind of expedition. All you said was “baddy”. The two of you, you and your brother that is, were always fighting against the monsters; him against the big people and you against the little. Together. He hadn’t had much of that till you came along. You knew his face since birth. I don’t know if you remember any of this. What it meant to him. It never looked strange to you. 

    We were arguing in the kitchen. You probably understood more than we thought. Kids aren’t stupid. I learnt that too late. It was a hot afternoon. All I wanted to was sit down with a beer, a cold one. You were making yourself dizzy, and me too. You had been quiet for the whole month. Neither of us understood why that balloon brought you to life again. We had been quiet too. I didn’t like sound anymore. Not of you, not of her. 

    This is fucked again. I never know what to say. That day was the most important of your life. I knew then too, but I didn’t want to admit it. Your face was trying to teach me something I didn’t want to learn. The more you played the harder it was not to pop it. You were still clumsy on your legs. Knocking into the table, the lamp and me. You had found him where we couldn’t. 

    At the end of the day, you sat with it on the sofa. The game was on. You kept squeaking. The rubber stretching and squealing as you hugged it. I told you to knock it off. Your mother had gone out. She’d had enough too, of me more than you. I still don’t know why she left you. I think for the same reason I...You were sat there. Next to me with your brother. His face...


Here are the notes:

   

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