• Member Since 17th Jun, 2017
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The Red Parade


Cars are still parked outside. If the rapture had happened, why was it unrecognizable? Why was the sky blue? Why did no one tell me? Do these things not announce themselves?

Comments ( 14 )

don't really understand the ending but ok

A good story is a story you can't keep out of your head. That goes for authors and readers and this definitely hits the mark for me as a reader.

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Yeah I’m not sure what I’m missing but I can’t figure it out either.

I don't quite follow, for a minute I thought the stranger was alcoholism or something but that don't quite add up, maybe it's cause it's late and I'm not quite thinkin str8 enuff to figure this out

...What the Tartarus was that all about?

Spooky, but at the same time a bit hard to follow.

Now she sits in the rocking chair downstairs and tells us stories of our parents. Tells us about how things used to be, cooks us dinner and teaches us the best ways to harvest the crop. Like she’s always been here.

Forgive me if I'm way off, but is this supposed to reference Granny Smith?

I'm trying to figure this out. I'm catching that the white, green, and earthy is mold, but it's also Granny Smith maybe? Is the stranger death? Decay? Rot? Cancer? They dug up Granny Smith's body then Big Mac murdered his father, Bright Mac? I'm not sure I really understand the cherry pit imagery, either. Is it just a reference to their cousin's death, or is there some wider meaning I'm not understanding?

I suppose what I'm getting at is that I really like this story, but it's confusing as heck.

Well, tried to look for a metaphor with the stranger, but I'll be damned if I know what it is. Still, this was very evocative and creepy.

i liked the horror of it - but what it means or what the metaphor is eluding to is beyond me.

The stranger sits between Momma and Daddy at the dinner table. It stares at us and doesn’t ever eat. Just stares.

well that is certainly disconcerting!

AJ always looks tired. She spends most of her time in Momma’s room, the two huddled up by the curtain. Daddy hasn’t left the kitchen in awhile. At night I hear him shuffling downstairs and opening the fridge. Sometimes he cries.

extremely disconcerting

Now she sits in the rocking chair downstairs and tells us stories of our parents. Tells us about how things used to be, cooks us dinner and teaches us the best ways to harvest the crop. Like she’s always been here.

It’s been two years since and I’m still alone.

and ooh, Granny Smith as a stranger that was never there before? the “light green and white” thing that was growing before. reading back, then 

One night I went downstairs and found Daddy in the living room. He had taken all the pictures and photo albums from the mantle and the wall and dumped them in the fireplace. He told the stranger that what's done is done, and the stranger burned all the photos.

reads as agreeing to burn the evidence that Mom and Dad were around long after their deaths in what was presented to us in the canon. so the ends of the stranger were to replace the existence of Big Mac’s parents with a false history to explain the presence of Granny Smith, who herself is the source of some strange inconsistencies in the canon timeline anyway. that is a very fascinating idea, and the uneasy atmosphere is well-rendered. though i admit i’m not sure what the significance of cherry pits are here besides the imagery of a sweet, blood-colored fruit surrounding a hard pit that can kill you (or is that it?). anyway, thank you so much for writing!

Fascinating and certainly horrifying. Concrete answers are the anathema of most horror—understanding something makes it that much less scary unless you know there’s truly nothing you can do about it—but this still might have been too vague for its own good. It’s a gripping downward spiral, yes, but I feel I’m missing the deeper meaning. Still, thank you for it and congrats on the judge prize.

Hello! A belated courtesy note for my review of this. Not for the first time from you, I got a little frustrated with the opaqueness. However, there was a very clear sense of unease and (if this is a word) disconcertingness throughout. Enough for an upvote despite my slight frustration.

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