Narrative - A Horrifying Discovery

            Hidden deep within the forest was a rustic yet beautiful cottage. A lovely couple lived there. Recently, there was a new addition to the family. Their 3-month-old son, Daniel, inherited his mother, Althea’s dark brown eyes, her luscious blond hair and his father, Jacob’s smile. He was loved dearly.

 

            As Daniel grew, his father became distant as Althea spent more and more time with Daniel. Althea barely noticed the changes in her husband’s behaviour. One day, Jacob decided to open up to his wife, only to be cut short by the wail of Daniel. “That darn baby!” he grimaced. He decided to try one more time later when Daniel was asleep. To his surprise, Althea listened and even promised him that she would try to spend more time with him.

 

            However, Althea did not keep her promise. Weeks went by and she did not even give a single ounce of the attention that Jacob had been craving for. When one night Althea forgot to prepare dinner for Jacob because she was busy taking care of Daniel, it was the last straw that breaks the camel’s back.

 

            The next morning, he went into Daniel’s room and noticed his wife was sleeping with Daniel again. He glared at the child with disgust. Careful not to wake him, he hugged him and brought him to the red vehicle that was patiently waiting outside the house. He hopped in and drove off. He didn’t care where the baby ended up, as long as he could get rid of the baby. Once he found the perfect spot, he tortured the baby, making sure he felt the pain in every inch of that small and frail body. He later buried the body, feeling satisfied and he jollied back into his car and went back home.

 

            At home, Jacob went directly to the bathroom to rinse his body, removing any trace of evidence. “Honey, where are you?” his wife shouted. “I’ll be out soon, my dearest!” he replied in a tone so sweet that his wife had never heard from him before. When he came out, his stomach dropped. “What do you think? Isn’t he adorable?” his wife giggled while holding the baby in her arms.

 

369 words 

written by Maria Keisha Atasha Gumatay Pacuribot, 7L, CCMS, in 2021

edited by Mr. Tan

            Justin and John were brothers. Their parents passed away when they were still toddlers. They had been living with their strict grandmother for ten years. She was cruel and would sometimes starve the siblings for a whole day when they misbehaved.

 

            “I hate this place! I wish we could escape from this misery!” complained John to Justin one day. “We could ask uncle Dylen to help us escape!” suggested Justin. There was only one person in the world who ever cared for them. It was their neighbour, Dylen, who would often secretly give them delicious homemade food, tell them wonderful stories and help them with their studies. They crept downstairs to check on their grandmother but were surprised to find no one there, which was very odd because their grandmother would never leave the house. They took this as a sign and ran out to uncle Dylen’s house.

 

            They knocked continuously on the door until it opened. To their horror, it was their grandmother who opened the door. “What are you doing here?” asked their grandmother angrily. They couldn’t tell her the truth, so they lied. They told her that uncle Dylen promised to teach them something that afternoon. “Where’s uncle Dylen?” asked Justin. “He has left town,” said their grandmother coldly.

 

            The siblings did not believe her, so they dialled his number. Soon, they heard the sound of a phone ringing upstairs. Before their grandmother could stop them, they rushed up the stairs, following the sound to a closet. What they saw inside traumatised them – there laid uncle Dylen with his body cut half open and clearly was on the verge of dying. With his last breath, he told them their grandmother was a fraud and their real grandmother was long dead, killed by this fraud. Then, he told them to call the police with his phone. The siblings swiftly did as told and the police arrived moments later to arrest their fake grandmother. This horrifying discovery had left the sibling scarred for their whole life.

 

337 words 

written by Abhinav Thuruthiyil Raj, 7L, CCMS, in 2021

edited by Mr. Tan

            Lily was a nineteen-year-old girl who lived in Auckland, New Zealand. She enjoyed most of her childhood in Auckland but moved to Australia because of a terrible incident that occurred to her when she was only seventeen years old.

 

            It was a cool overcast afternoon when she and her friends, Jonathan, Jordan and Clarice, were hanging out. Out of boredom, they decided to venture into the woods to hunt the ghost that was the talk of the town. Apparently, the ghost was a girl named Amy who went missing two years ago whom everyone assumed was murdered and buried somewhere in the forest.

 

            The girl went camping for three nights in the woods on a school trip. On the second night of the trip, when all the students and teachers were fast asleep, the girl’s ex-boyfriend, Daniel, lured her to a secluded spot far from the camping site. There, Daniel murdered Amy in cold blood by continuously stabbing her with a knife until she could no longer move. He then hid the body and went back to camp. The next day, he told everyone that Amy was sick and had gone back home.

 

            A few months after the incident, she was still not found and Daniel had evaporated before anyone could suspect him. The people of the town turned this case into a ghost story – Amy would possess any couples who wandered in the forest.

 

            Not long after, Lily and her friends breached the security that was set up at the periphery of the forest after the incident. One of them spotted red strips of cloth tied onto the branches of the trees. They followed them until they reached a tree which was marked with an X. Instinctively, Jonathan began to dig a hole under the tree with his bare hands. A few minutes later, he uncovered pieces of old clothing. Digging deeper, Jonathan touched something hard. He unearthed a skeleton that, we assumed, belonged to Amy. They screamed hysterically and quickly ran away. Once they had calmed down, they dialled the police. They reported about the skeleton and were asked to go to the police station to be questioned.

 

            In the police station, they told the police about what had happened. After all the questioning, they were sent back home where they got lectured by their parents. After this horrifying discovery, they all received psychological therapy for the trauma they experienced; and later on, Lily immigrated with her parents to Australia.

 

409 words 

written by Annabelle Foo Mei Ling, 7L, CCMS, in 2021

edited by Mr. Tan

            “I don’t think we are supposed to be here,” said Janice worriedly. “Don’t worry. We’ll just get the evidence and we’re done,” Tony replied reassuringly. As they advanced deeper into the cave, their legs became sore from all the walking, so they took a rest.

 

            Fortunately, they had leftover trail mix, just enough to keep the both of them going for the journey. Tony looked around and started taking pictures. He could not wait to show them to his classmates. He kept wandering around and he suddenly noticed an object protruding from the wall before them. It was an arrow and as they looked around, flashing their lights in every direction, they found more arrows and several tripwires. This cave was obviously dangerous and hiding something valuable. Despite their safety, they ventured deeper into the cave all the while keeping their eyes on their surroundings to prevent stepping into the booby traps.

 

            The temperature was now freezing. There were no sounds other than their footsteps and their heavy breathing. Faced with a dead end, they looked around, searching for clues that might lead them to the treasure. After searching for hours on end, they finally discovered a hidden entrance that was revealed when Janice accidentally sat on a stone. They crawled inside and at the end of the passage, they found a scroll and a stash of gold coins and jewellery. Rejoicing in their success, Tony took out his camera and took dozens of pictures to keep as prove.

 

            After that, they retraced their steps to go back to the entrance of the cave. As fate would have it, they were lost in the cave. Somewhere along the way, to their horror, they found a decaying body of their recently missing classmate, Megan, who was rumoured to have ventured into this very cave, but they didn’t believe it until that horrifying discovery.

 

            Realising that their fate would end up like Megan’s, they gave up hope and let fate take its course.

 

331 words 

written by Yong Shi You, 7L, CCMS, in 2021

edited by Mr. Tan

            On the fourth of December 2020, Scoot and his friends went on an adventure to hike a mountain. They had been planning for this trip for quite some time but never had the chance to do so because of their busy schedule. It took them hours to reach their destination as it was far from the city they lived in.

 

            Upon arriving, they saw a ‘Danger’ warning sign hanging on the fence surrounding the mountain but they ignored it. Soon, they found the path leading up to the mountain. Halfway, they encountered a broken bridge that they had to cross to reach the summit. In the face of adversity, they wouldn’t give up because they had set their mind on watching the beautiful mountain top scenery. They began to look for another way up. A few minutes later, one of Scoot’s friends found a cave and assumed that they could reach the top by passing through the cave.

 

            Knowing that they had no other choice, they entered the cave. It was dark so they switched on the flashlight app on their smartwatch. Suddenly, one of Scoot’s friends tripped on something hard and fell into a pile of something white. Everyone went to check on him to see if he had hurt himself. Then someone stuttered, “Th-there are bones on-on the ground!” All of them looked carefully at the things scattered on the floor where the friend had fallen. True enough, those were human bones. Frightened out of their wits, they ran as fast as they could out of the cave and rode back to the city to the police station to report on what they have found.

 

            After months of investigation, the police found out that those were the remains of the victims involved in the crazy homicide few months back.

 

302 words 

written by Wong King Hsien, 7L, CCMS, in 2021

edited by Mr. Tan

            It was the school holidays. George and his friends, Fred, Lee and Angelina, were camping in the jungle. Initially, George’s parents were very much against the idea, deeming the jungle dangerous and terrible. Nevertheless, George still managed to get his parents’ permission after throwing a hissy fit.

 

            They had just finished setting up their tents when they realised they had run out of water. Therefore, George went off with his best friend, Fred, to search for a water source. After walking for what felt like hours, they finally reached a raging river. They then walked further down the river, to a slower-moving section to refill everyone’s canteens safely.

 

            Once the canteens were refilled, George looked around and saw Fred standing quite far away from where he was, admiring some stone masonry. The stones made up a small village house, like the ones we see in The Hobbit. There were no windows, just an old, wooden door with a rusted handle. George walked up to Fred who was carefully opening the door.

 

            As soon as they opened the door, a rotten stench came wafting out. It took a while for the both of them to adjust to the darkness of the little stone hut. Fred screamed. George looked around the room to find a skeleton, with some decaying flesh still left on parts of the body, sitting on a chair facing them. They swiftly ran out of the hut, not bothering to close the door of the old stone house, clutching onto the water canteens. They teared through the bushes, not even stopping to take a breather. For a few times, they lost their way, but they got to their tent in the end.

 

            Shakily and out of breath, George warned, “We have to get back home. Now!” Lee and Angelina were clueless about what had happened, but upon seeing how shaken they were, they did not argue and did as told. They left the jungle immediately. It was only in the safety of George’s living room that George and Fred gave an account of what they had discovered. After hearing the story, the four friends had never gone to the jungle again, or anywhere that was secluded, for that matter.

 

369 words 

written by Meghan Hon Le Xuan, 7L, CCMS, in 2021

edited by Mr. Tan

            Carrie Shaw, lived in a small house near a forest. She was a woman in her mid-twenties who liked living alone but was very easily frightened.

 

            One day, when Carrie was in her kitchen preparing lunch for herself, she heard a peculiar sound above her. It was like something sliding on the ground. It continued for a while then stopped. Carrie didn’t think much about it and dismissed the noise as the sound made by the leaves being blown across the floor by the wind.

 

            But then, as Carrie started to hear the noise more often, the thought that maybe it was something else crept into her head. Finally, she decided to check her attic to see if there was anything out of the ordinary. She hadn’t been up in the attic since the realter last brought her there before buying the house, as she thought it was dark and scary.

 

            Pulling down the ladder to the attic, she took a deep breath and began to climb up. When she reached the top, she switched on the torch she had brought with her and shined it around the attic. At first, she didn’t see anything…until she turned around, and there, before her, was a huge, long snake, all curled up in the corner, looked as if it was sleeping. Carrie let loose the loudest scream of her life before climbing down the ladder as fast as lightning. After she pushed the ladder back up, in case the snake decided to crawl its way down, she rushed to her phone and dialled for the fire brigade, the first thing that came to her mind.

 

            When the fire brigade got to Carrie’s house, she quickly brought them to the ladder and pulled it down for the men to go up and catch the snake. In just a moment, they tranquilised the snake and brought it down from the attic. They told Carrie the snake was one of the longest they’d ever seen and deduced that it must have slithered in through the broken window and into the attic from the tree next to her house.

 

            After Carrie’s horrifying discovery, she moved in with a friend who lived in the city far, far away from the forest.

 

374 words

written by Jedidah Charis Liew Wen-Ai, 7L, CCMS, in 2021

edited by Mr. Tan