Here I am. I don’t know the day,
the time, or the year… I don’t remember the last time I saw daylight. I’m
trapped. Every morning I wake up to a horrible smell in this strange room. As
soon as I rub my eyes and stretch everything begins to look familiar again, and
I realize I’m still here, but there is blood on my hands.
I’m trapped
in this god-forsaken room with dreadful yellow wallpaper that makes me want to
scratch my eyes out until they bleed. It’s falling off the walls, ripped from
every corner. How I loathe the color yellow. It reminds me of how I haven’t
seen the light of day! How I haven’t felt the grass in days, months, years! And
the smell is so putrid, like rotting corpses, yet I’m used to it because I can
no longer smell it.
I had a husband that used to care for me
everyday; he would bathe me, feed me, talk to me, and be there for me. But why
has he abandoned me? I know that I don’t deserve him. I know that I am crazy!
But deep down I thought he cared, but where has he gone? He’s left me in this
room. I think that I am recovering, I feel like I am getting better. But these
walls are closing in on me. I feel myself slipping again. I start to spin; I
spin to forget that I am here. I want out, but I cannot go.
No I am not getting better, I am
still sick. I have always been sick. I know deep down in the pit of my soul
that I have done something awful. I start to call out to my husband, John, “Oh
John! Where are you? Can you hear me? John, please answer!” To no avail, he doesn’t
answer. I start to fill with rage, how dare he think he can leave me; I am the
best he’s ever had, and will have! No one will love him like me; I love him to
death.
These walls barricade me; they have
become my new friends. They know all my secrets. I tell them everything- they
see everything. They know me better than I know myself, because I cannot recall
a single act as soon as the night falls. I see the walls breathing when I
breathe. We are one.
I talk to myself and the walls
answer me. I no longer have any shame, because who is watching? No one. No one
is watching me so I must rely on my own devices. I no longer care whether it is
day or night. I never sleep for more than a few hours, but every time I wake up
it seems as though I am still in a dream world. I have no prior knowledge of
what I have done the day before. Everyday I am reborn.
The blood on my hands makes me
question my sanity. Where did it come from? Is it my own blood? Couldn’t be.
But whose blood has shed at my expense?
I then realize I am covered in
blood. My nightgown, my hands, and my face are all blood red. It starts to sink
in. This is not my blood, I am sure of it. My head feels like it’s going to
spontaneously combust. It’s imploding from the thoughts I have tried to suppress.
I am spinning again.
It seems that I have fallen in to a
deep sleep. I do not remember much. I never do. I’m not sure how long I have
been asleep for. Today I feel well rested, today I feel brand new. Something is off though the room feels
different. It feels cold and dead. The walls are no longer breathing; I feel my
heartache. I start to scan the room to see if something has changed. Everything
looks normal… until. I tilt my head to some how reassure myself that what my
eyes have just seen is real. The blood is everywhere, not only on my clothes,
but also all over the walls. One spot in particular the blood has soaked
through the walls. There’s a huge red circle, a huge red bleeding circle on the
wall. I start tearing through the wallpaper. I must find what is lingering
behind these walls. So I tear, I rip, I scratch, and the ungodly smell is
getting more pungent. Suddenly a loud thud comes from the wall. I cannot
believe my eyes.
I have finally torn through all the
wallpaper to finally reveal my darkest secret yet. And there he lies cold,
lifeless, and dead. I exclaim, “Oh John, you have been so close to me this
whole time!” I shake him, although I know he’s dead. I feel a sense of relief.
Here I am thinking that he has gone away, that he has left me. He’s been by my
side this whole time. It all makes sense now. I know that I have committed the
ultimate crime, but you must understand there is a method behind my madness! He
was ignoring me, I just wanted out of this house, but he never cared. I would have
done anything for him. I loved him more than I loved myself. This was the only
way I could keep us together. I had to make sure he never left me.
I have fed on his corpse so he will be with
me, forever inside of me. ‘Til death do us part right? But who knew he’d die by
my hands.
Very interesting take on the story. I feel as though you really got into Charlotte's mind and did an excellent job describing her feelings. She became so obsessed with this wallpaper that it took over her. Ultimately, she went crazy enough to take her husband's life so he would always be with her in some way.
ReplyDeleteI really liked how you interpreted the death of her husband and how you decided to kill him off. I also feel as though you did a good job explaining the woman's feelings and how frustrating it is to feel insane and have nobody understand how you feel. Overall I feel it was a good representation of the original story and had excellent use of descriptive vocabulary.
ReplyDeleteOK, Morgan, another girl rocks "The Yellow Wallpaper!" I'm quite intrigued by ALL the stories based on this story, and the women who dared to write them! I like them all a lot, and this one had me wondering right up to the end what you were going to do next. You built tension very nicely, and as Allison says, you really built up strong detail, as well. I don't really see much I'd ask you to change.
ReplyDelete