Failure

This story I just sat down and wrote. I had no idea what I was going to write when I started, I just did it. Anyway, it probably needs some work.

Last week I said that I would be writing a longer story in installments on my blog. However, I have come to realize that NaNoWriMo is starting in just a couple of weeks and when it does I want to be able to focus on the story that I have been thinking about. That is the one that I will be posting in installments on this blog. At least, probably. Since I'm going to fully participate in NaNoWriMo this year, I need to make sure that it isn't against the rules to be posting the story here as well as wherever I'm supposed to post it. (For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, it's National Novel Writing Month every November. The goal is to write a 50 000 word novel in 30 days.) Anyway, enjoy this short story and I'll have more for you next week.

The hallway was silent and dark. Four pictures hung along one wall. Pictures of happier times. Alice walked slowly down the hallway, her expensive shoes clicking loudly on the hardwood floor. She paused for a moment by each of the pictures on the wall.

The first was of her grandparents at their wedding fifty years ago. It was black and white and faded, but the happiness shining out of her grandmother’s eyes as she clung to her new husband hadn’t faded in all the years since.

The second photo was of her mother on her wedding day. Her mother wore a beautiful ivory white dress. Satin and silk draped over her body and flowed down the red carpet that lined the isle in the church where she had married her husband of thirty years. She smiled like she had a secret.
The third picture was of her older sister. She had been married on a magnificent day in July five years ago. The sun shone brightly in the sky and it seemed that the flowers had all bloomed just for her that day. Roses and carnations and lilies. Pink and red and orange. Not a single cloud marred the perfect blue sky. It was all for her.

The last picture that she stopped at was her own. She smiled at the photographer with such exuberant joy. It had been barely eight months since the happiest day of her life. Alice scrutinized the image of herself, laughing in the arms of the man she had married. They had been so perfect for each other.

She reached up and removed the picture from the wall.