Tragedy in Ashburn (eBook)

B.A. Betterman (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
280 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3509-9336-3 (ISBN)

Infos

A small-town teenager embarks on a spiritual journey through the afterlife in this moving piece of literary fiction. Follow her as she encounters people who help her better understand herself, her impact in the world, and her relationships with others.

B.A. Betterman is a small-town writer from Pennsylvania who wishes to remain anonymous. His life experience of loss and imprisonment drives his creative writing, adding a unique philosophical perspective to his work of fiction. He hopes that his readers will be able to derive positivity from his writing, giving them a fresh perspective on their own lives.

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Scilla Beneciello, a local teenager from the quaint town of Ashburn, meets a tragic end one summer night in July of 2024. Awaking with amnesia in the afterlife, she desperately struggles to recover her memories. After meeting a mysterious Egyptian man named Osiris, Scilla embarks on a spiritual journey in strange and new territories to rediscover who she is. Along the way, she encounters people who help her better understand herself and the impact that her life and death had on her family and friends. However, while attempting to unravel the mysteries surrounding her life and her death, she is confronted by dangers and dark forces which seek to keep her from the truth. "e;A Tragedy in Ashburn"e; is an astonishing work of fiction that will leave readers questioning their perspectives and the choices they have made in life.

Textauszug

Chapter One:
Beginning of the End

Saturday, July 13th, 2024

The cool breeze blowing in from the window ajar felt refreshing as it gently caressed the warm skin of her honey-colored cheeks. She drew breath inhaling deeply through her nostrils as the steady zephyr of crisp air rushed into her face. Naturally, the lids of her eyes closed and for a moment she allowed her mind to slip free from burdening thoughts. This was the first time in a long time she felt any sort of peace and it helped to assure her that this was what she truly wanted. There would be no turning back.

With the air stored in her lungs expiring, Scilla parted her lips in preparation for its calm release. Her eyes opened as she exhaled, and her attention was drawn to a single blackbird perched high on a thin branch of the massive burr oak tree residing outside of her bedroom window. For some time, her gaze remained there, fixed on that peculiarly lonesome bird. Something about it seemed so familiar to her, but she couldn’t figure out why. While intrigued by the mysterious feeling her mind started slipping away into the subconscious nether. First came the absence of clear thought, then the fading of her vision. She shook her head rapidly in an attempt to jolt herself awake and it worked, but her eyelids were still heavy from the lack of sleep she had gotten in the past few weeks. As her thoughts raced back from the darkness of her mind, she saw the bird’s wings spread wide. They beat hard as it took flight, leaving a feather or two behind in the process. Branches of the oak rocked, its leaves ruffled together, and before they had time to unwind, she watched as the beautiful blackbird flew away gently into the night.

Thump…

Click…

She forcefully closed and locked the old window which had become warped over the years, making it difficult to shut. Pieces of tiny white paint chips flaked from its wooden frame as her fingers ran over its top. Glancing out through the dirty glass panes one last time, Scilla welcomed the tranquility of the night. The light of the full moon shimmering off the massive tree swaying restlessly in the breeze helped to calm what remained of her nerves.

It’s almost time.

Turning away from the window she walked swiftly to the black dresser positioned across from her bed. It was the one she had painted with her friend Brianna almost four years ago during the summer break leading into their seventh-grade year. Brianna and she were close for as long as she could remember, but recently their relationship took a turn for the worse. Something tragic had happened and when she needed her best friend the most, Brianna did the unthinkable. Instead of being there to help, she only added to the hurt. Her betrayal was like twisting a serrated knife into an open flesh wound. They hadn’t spoken since.

Sitting atop the dresser were three separate pictures of her siblings, framed and standing upright among a mess of other family photographs upon which she took a moment to reflect. The first was older brother T-bone, standing proudly with a football in his right hand. He had a look of self-pride shining in his eyes and the brightest of smiles stretched across his face. He was much taller than her now, but there had been a time when he wasn’t, and she used to enjoy teasing him about it. That was before high school and before he became the star linebacker on Ashburn High’s football team. He gained a lot of muscle mass in those years and popularity with his female peers, especially the cheerleaders. They would practically be drooling over him at the games, and it used to annoy her greatly. None of those skanks could ever have been good enough for him, but it wasn’t hard to see why they gawked in his direction. He was a handsome young man with dark green eyes, silky black hair, and an exceptionally tan skin tone. What teenage girl wouldn’t daydream about a guy like him? Anyway, he was only a couple of years older than she was and the closest to her out of all of her siblings. She had shared just about everything with him as they grew up together and he was always there for her when she needed him. However, as she got older, she started keeping certain aspects of her life to herself. There are some things brothers just aren’t meant to know about their younger sisters. However, despite the secrets she kept from him, their close relationship never faltered. He acted as her protector, always remaining loyal and kind to her, but things were a bit different in the past year. Recently he moved away to some fancy college on an athletic scholarship. So, she only got to see him when he came in on break for the major holidays. She was happy that he had created such a great opportunity for himself through his football career, but she missed him deeply and often wished he was around more.

The middle picture was of her youngest sibling, Charlie. Within the picture, he held a snapdragon in his left hand and a fistful of dirt in his right. When the photo was taken, he was wearing a fire truck red T-shirt along with a pair of grass-stained blue jeans and toddler-sized working boots. She always got a kick out of seeing him in those little shit-kickers. They made him look like a little man. Every time she saw him wearing them, she would ask if he was going to work and his reply was always the cutest. “Yep!” he would say, “Going to make some moneys.” She absolutely adored him. He was only about two-and-a-half when she took the picture, but she could still recall the events of that day as if they had happened yesterday. It was close to two years ago now, that day at the park. She had taken him because her mother and John had gotten into a pretty heated argument over bills. Whenever something like that happened, she found it best to leave and get some fresh air, which is exactly what she took Charlie to do. They only had to walk a few blocks before reaching their destination and after they did it was all fun and no worries of the argument at home. They ran and laughed and played games like tag and hide and seek. Although, he didn’t quite understand the concept behind hide and seek too well. She took him down the slides and pushed him on the swings and when her energy couldn’t keep up with him anymore, she took a rest on one of the bleachers and watched him run around on his own. This is when the photo was taken. Charlie, having much love for her, had picked a wild snapdragon after digging around in a patch of dirt and brought it over to her as a gift to show her how much he loved her. The gesture melted her heart, and even though they only shared one parent, she knew in that moment right before she snapped the picture that she would always love him the same as the others, if not secretly more.

The picture to the right of Charlie’s was of her sister Rose. It was taken in black and white, and contained a certain degree of elegance that a colored picture could never hope to capture. Rose, the eldest of her siblings was a beautiful young woman with hazel brown eyes and a smile that could make any man weak in the knees. She looked up to Rose and her beauty more than she did anyone else. Her sister was a social butterfly. Making friends was second nature to her. A quality which they did not share but one she would have liked to have. She always hoped one day she could have been as brave and charming, but that day never came. Rose was about seven years older than her, and no longer lived at home. She wasn’t lucky enough to go to college like their brother T-bone. Instead, she started working full time straight out of high school, cutting hair in a beauty salon, and spending all her free time with her fiancée Eric. That’s who she lives with now, and even though she admired Rose greatly, they were never as close as her and T-bone. Their opposing personalities often clashed, and they didn’t share the same social interests. The difference in their age probably had something to do with it, but now the distance in the relationship was undoubtedly due to Rose’s absence in her family’s life.

Scilla opened the top drawer of her dresser to get changed out of the silky white nightgown that she had worn to bed. Grabbing a matching set of black underwear, socks, and bra she reflected once more on the pictures of her brothers and sister. They all looked so happy. A single teardrop broke loose from her left eyelid and ran down the side of her face. She couldn’t help it. Under her breath, she mumbled, “I’m so sorry,” and with the drawer still open she slipped her underwear on beneath the nightgown. Turning so that her back was towards the window she grabbed this silky night dress near its shoulders, quickly lifted it overhead, then threw it into the basket of dirty clothes near the foot of her bed. She proceeded next to slide her arms through the bra, clipping the straps behind her back and adjusting her breasts properly within it. Sitting down on the edge of her bed she put on her socks, left first and then right, and when she had finished she stood up, rotating back towards the dresser to shut the top drawer. Pulling the bottom drawer open, she noticed a pink sticky note stuck to the top of her folded pairs of jeans. On the sticky note read, “Make sure this is what you want, there is no turning back.” A note she had left herself the morning prior. She pondered the note for a second before picking it up and crumbling it. My mind is made up. She nodded her chin reassuringly and tossed the note into the garbage pail near her desk. She proceeded to take out a pair of faded black jeans with...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 28.2.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Kinder- / Jugendbuch
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3509-9336-3 / 9798350993363