Lit Device Short Story

My name is Jackson. I am 36 years old. I reside in Orlando, Florida, and I am the head of the biggest law firm in the nation. Some would call me a workaholic, but this is the norm for me. I get less than 5 hours of sleep. I don’t have time to do anything else without risking my job. The only thing I had going for me in my life was my job. I don’t have anything to love or hope for, anymore. All of my family members had been killed. I walk the streets afraid, because I know that there is someone out there who shot my family.

When I was a teenager we were celebrating my sister coming home from the war and a man in a clown mask came into our house and shot everyone. The only reason I survived was because I was on my phone in my room. I had been in an argument with my parents about what we were having for dinner, so I got sent to my room. There hasn’t been a day that has passed by since where I didn’t hope that I had been in the family room with them. Not only that, but when I pray, I reconcile about how it was technically my fault. If I had been there to stop it then my life would be so different. Not only would I not be a lawyer, but I would have something to think about besides my sins.

But here I am. I wake up every morning and make the same pancakes. I take the same walk. I make the same amount of coffee. One drop more is not okay. If anything isn’t the same, I would get so angry that my plasma 4k TV would melt. Every night I think about how it should be. My goal was to make sure that everyone knows my name. Now everyone does. But it’s all worthless. I don’t have anything to look forward to when I get home, besides sleep. This isn’t the way things should be. In everybody’s life they have a dream job when they’re younger. Well, mine was to be a pilot. I guess that went down with all of my other aspirations.

I woke up the next day to understand that a cheeto was our president.There was also a headline about someone being found missing.  What really caught my attention though was where the person was being kept. It was my former address.

I haven’t been back there since the night. As soon as I heard the gunshots I jumped out my window. I started running and still haven’t stopped.  

I had to go back to check out what had happened to my former home. I drove my Veneno to it. When I arrived, I observed that the neighborhood wasn’t as developed as it was 25 years ago. The buildings were run-down, and you could feel rodents running through your feet. There wasn’t any modern looking buildings and all of the bricks were vandalized. My house was a tiny quaint cube. It wasn’t an apartment, but it was definitely close to the size of one. There weren’t any cars parked on the driveway, so I assumed no one lived here. I walked in and started comparing everything that wasn’t here twenty five years ago. When I entered my former bedroom, tears started to come to my eyes. I walked into my room and  lying on my bed was the mask of the clown. My window was open. I turned to the door entrance, and there was an elderly man standing there, looking over me. He seemed to know who I was and said, “Your family wasn’t who you thought they were.”

I tried to throw words at him, but all that came out was a croak. I looked at his left hand it was missing. In his right hand he held a pistol pointed straight at me. HIs hand was so steady I thought there was a string attached. It obviously wasn’t the first time he had pointed a gun at someone.

I closed my eyes and just waited for the sound to happen. CAPOW! SHWING! The bullet ripped through my chest. The last thought I had before I couldn’t feel anything anymore was how similar that man looked to my father.

The flashback contributes to the story because I needed to have a backstory for Jackson that explained everything about his family.

He said he would get so angry that his tv would melt which is a metaphor. This adds to the story because it kind of shows the type of person Jackson is and what his personality is like.

Being found missing is an oxymoron because they are opposites. It contributes because it brings up the topic of Jackson’s house which he hadn’t thought about.

It’s ironic that Jackson says that it isn’t the first time the clown man had held a gun because he had killed his family.  It contributes to the story because Jackson is obviously nervous but is using observations to keep himself calm.

The onamonapia contributes to the story because instead of directly saying that he was shot it makes the sound of a gun.