By Elena Smith, Year 11
Thick grey weeping clouds fill the sky, along with howling wind bringing life to the once silent and eerie air. Heavy raindrops splattered on the edge of the towering precipitous cliffs, which on the left-hand side had steep, rusting metal stairs leading down to what seemed to be an abandoned beach, which showed no sign of human life having visited for quite some time. The sand was grey and dull, and all that could be seen was an old lifeguard chair that had been spray-painted with the words “the end” in electric blue. A flock of birds sheltering from the storm on the top of the cliffs in the thick branches of an old oak tree suddenly fluttered up, startled by a blinding booming bolt of lightning that hit a nearby tree, causing it to collapse onto the ground with a loud thump.
By this time, it was high tide, and the Prussian-coloured ocean at the feet of the cliffs fought against the raging gale, and tall monstrous waves relentlessly crashed on the sides of the rocks. The lifeguard chair was dragged underneath the waves, buried in the depths of the grey sand, hanging on for its life. Every so often, the chair reappeared on the surface, its metal bars slammed into the sharp edges of the cliffs, and old dried graffiti paint chipped off little by little and dissolved into the water like sugar. By midnight, the storm had slowly come to an end, the rain was a soft shower, and no longer came down like thousands of tiny sharp daggers. The once black clouds filling the sky were now a pale grey, and revealed the millions of dazzling stars that had been hiding. The ocean now seemed charcoal black, glistening in the moonlight, and waves slowly crept ashore gurgling gently as they moved. The trees were still, the ocean was tranquil, and soon enough the unsettling atmosphere was back.
The storm settling down revealed a woman standing on the edge of the cliffs staring intently towards the ocean. She was wearing a blood-stained white wedding dress, soaking wet and torn up at the bottom. She stood right at the edge of the cliffs; one gust of wind could have tipped her off the edge. Her face was so pale it was not sure she was human, and although it could have been an illusion, it seemed as if her feet were levitating off the ground. As she looked down, a second figure appeared on the beach. On the lifeguard chair, there was what seemed like a human sitting as still as stone. The moonlight shone on the figure to reveal a man in a black suit, with a dead rose hanging from his pocket square. As he looked up at the woman, he revealed his face, lifeless and empty. From on top of the cliff came a loud cry, and the woman fled, disappearing into the forest. From her dress, a blood-covered dagger fell out gleaming in the moonlight. Blood drops slowly fell down the cliff’s edge, trickling down like honey. The man watched the drops of crimson blood drip down in glee and maliciously grinned until the last drop had fallen onto the sand. He looked into his shaking hands which were clasping onto a ring that was split in half.
As the moon slowly disappeared and the golden sun began to rise, the figure in the chair was no longer to be seen. As the tide went up, the blood drops were washed away along with any other trace of any unnatural occurrence ever having taken place.
