(This series of posts originally appeared, in a slightly different form, on my Deviantart journal.  I’m putting them here so they’ll be easier to get to.)

Hiya. I’ve decided to make fun of a story I wrote when I was fifteen. We’ll see how that works out.

My reasons for doing this are threefold: First, I think it’s always good to remind yourself of how much you’ve learned, and how much you’ve still got to learn.  Second, it’s also good to remind yourself that just because somebody has written a terrible story, it doesn’t automatically mean that they’re a terrible person. Even if somebody has written a terrible story with awful moral implications, it might just mean that they weren’t paying attention to how they might come across to other people. I know I didn’t.

Third, I just thought it might be funny.  So there’s that.

So let us begin. The following story was initially called “Memory Lives On,” but was later renamed “Memory” after I realised that “Memory Lives On” didn’t make much sense. Still, I thought it was pretty clever at the time. It was supposed to be a title with a double-meaning, since it was about a group of people who’d inadvertently faked their own deaths.  “See, the newspapers are always going on about how their memory will live on forever, but little do the papers know that their memory living on will help them solve the mystery of their attempted murder! Oh, I’m so wise.” In the end, though, the main characters’ memories don’t have all that much to do with how the plot is resolved. The villain more-or-less self-destructs while the heroes spend their time wangsting about their problems. This was before I learned how plots actually worked, of course.

Anyway, enough preamble- here’s “Memory Lives On”:

“Anja Cleary is a tragic loss to her family, to her friends, and to us. The fact that a loyal, caring, intelligent, hardworking teenager could die such a tragic death is a sign of the carelessness of our times. The world needs to use the memory of this smiling blonde beauty to ensure that this kind of hideous accident never happens again. Anja’s parents and brother can now only be comforted by the thought that they now have an angel in Heaven looking down on them. Rest in peace, Anja.”- 25^th October 200_

I’m not sure where I got the name “Anja Cleary” from. Or why I felt it was so important that I didn’t say which year the story took place.

The story started off as a Mickey-take about how tabloids cynically shovel on the treacle when talking about major tragedies. It’s a bit unfocused, because at the time I didn’t actually know much about tabloids and their inner workings. If I was to write it now, I’d probably emphasise the falseness of it, or bring in a few more elements about their focusing on the pretty, middle-class, white victims over everybody else. Either way, though, the whole tabloid-satire theme is quickly shoved to the side in favour of a really dull murder mystery and an even duller romance subplot. Priorities!

What a load of rubbish. I can’t believe someone would actually print that in a newspaper. It’s so saccharine it makes my teeth ache, plus it’s all wrong.

In the words of Pearl Jam, I’m still alive, but the person who wrote the article can be excused for not knowing that. The whole country thinks I’m dead. Only five other people know I’m not, and some of them are meant to be dead themselves. But Mark and Estelle’s house couldn’t be called Heaven without anyone laughing. It’s pretty cool, as houses go, but they aren’t the neatest people in the world. Mind you, I don’t think they were expecting four guests, so I’ll let them off the hook.

That’s three or four subject changes in the space of one paragraph. My English teachers must have been so proud.

The Pearl Jam reference is there purely for the sake of having a Pearl Jam reference. I did this a lot.

While we’re on the subject, people don’t become angels after they die, even really good people. Angels are completely separate beings. I learnt that in RE. I think the difference is that they don’t have free will. And besides, Satan apparently started out as an angel, so being one isn’t a guarantee of good behaviour.

This has nothing to do with anything. See what I mean about the lack of focus?

There, that’s the first and last time anything I’ve learnt in school will be applicable to real life.

Frankly, I think “applicable to real life” is stretching it a bit even there.

Although the chances of my ever seeing the inside of a school again are fairly small. So there are advantages to everyone thinking you’re dead.

One of the disadvantages is being made out to be sweet and innocent in the papers.

Is “never getting to see your loved ones again” another one?

(Seriously, that barely comes up in the story. I didn’t mean to make my main character come across as a sociopath.)

I could hardly be less sweet and innocent if I tried. Gary’s sweet and innocent, I think. I haven’t known him that long. But I’m pretty certain he’s more sweet and innocent than me.

I also didn’t mean to make her sound drunk.

Incidentally, Gary is the love interest. His two character traits are a) expressing love for Anja, and b) weeping over his tragic past. I’ll leave it to you to decide which of these is more irritating.

In fact, I told Mark earlier today that Gary might as well have had his picture plastered all over the newspapers instead of mine.

“Yeah, but you’re the obvious choice, aren’t you?” he said, “You’re the youngest and the only girl. You’re A Young Life Cut Tragically Short, see?”

“And Gary isn’t? He’s not much older than me.”

“Well… Oh, I know. You’re cuter than Gary.” As you probably know, once you get to the age of fifteen it’s very annoying to be called “cute,” but I let Mark go on. “I mean, you’re textbook cute. Gary looks cute, but he looks weird as well, so they can’t make him their Tragic Accident poster kid. Weirdness and cuteness mixed would bother the public,” he said knowledgeably.

OK, I still quite like the phrase “Tragic Accident poster kid.” But I’m not sure how often men refer to each other as “cute.”

I don’t really think Gary looks all that weird, but maybe he looks different from all his photos. I know I do. Three days before the crash, I dyed my hair strawberry-red, and there weren’t any photos taken of me between then and now. So all the photos of me give the impression that I’m blonde.

This is a bit of a handwave on my part. Apparently, dyeing your hair a different colour means that absolutely nobody will recognise you, even if they’ve known you for years.

One more thing. There was another mistake in the article.

The reason we’re in hiding is that what happened wasn’t an accident. The only accidental thing was that we all survived.

SPOILERS- There’s actually no good reason for them to be in hiding. They could easily just tell the authorities that they’re alive, go home, and let the police handle it. But then there’d be no story, and we can’t have that.