Hi, can you give me some suggestions on this one? This is not my usual style of writing (I hate writing sad stories) but I am trying out something new for my exam, so please help me with it!
Thank you!
John admitted to himself that he had been unreasonable. He had taken a few drinks too many and he knew that he should not have shouted at his wife. However, his remorse came too late. It was already too late to apologise.
John was never a habitual drunk. In fact, he seldom drank. However, that day, he had met two of his best buddies since high school, who insisted on having him to drink. He had protested in futile as his friends dragged him into the bar. At the bar, it was as if a different person had taken over John. He had poured his heart out complaining about his depressing life, his boss who had not given him a promotion for five years, his jealous colleagues and his son's increasingly expensive tuition that he might not be able to afford. He had drunk enough for two or even more. He had become 'high' in just an hour there, and had had no idea how his two friends brought him home.
His eyebrows knitted in anguish as he tried to recollect the details of the night. As soon as he stumbled into his house, his wife had started to grumble. In the midst of his drunkenness, John still could make out that she had been speaking about him being an irresponsible husband. Blood boiled in his veins. Not her too. His house was supposed to be a shelter, a haven, but now it had become just another battlefield for him. He willed his mind to shut out all his wife's complaints, but the accusations she had been raining at him had just been too much. He had been working double-shift for months; he had been taking a second job just to earn more money for her, for this family. Had not all that been enough? Had he lost his right to unwind himself a little just one night? Frustrated, his fist came down on the table with a loud bang.
He remembered the piercing sound of glass shattering as his wife smashed all the glasses on the table. All had been broken, all had been shattered. "Is it really what you want?" her wife had resounded in his already spinning head. His wife started to sob uncontrollably. "I knew it. Our marriage is a mistake. It is irreparable!" Her shriek brought John and all his senses alive. A mistake? He had been speechless. Had she not said marrying him had been a mistake? Had she not meant that having their son had been a mistake as well? His wife's words had sliced right through his heart. John felt cheated. Betrayed. All his efforts to keep this family together had crumbled into dust. In a fit of anger, John had slapped his wife and pushed her to the ground as the he himself had been plunged into unconsciousness.
John had got up the following day only to see a desolate house facing him. His wife had gone, bringing his dearest son. Without her and their son, his once cozy house had looked ever so empty. He had tried to call all her friends and relatives; everybody sounded really sympathetic, but nobody seemed to know where his wife was. It was all a lie, John knew it. They were all in the plot of his indignant wife.
He dragged himself through; each day seemed like a century without his beloved ones. He did not go to work, but just sat there and stared at the paintings of his five-year-old son. He jumped at the phone every time it rang, and snapped at everyone calling after he had ascertained that it was not the voice of his beloved ones. After one week, a letter came from a lawyer, saying that his wife had been filing for a divorce. He was no longer wanted. He would do anything for a second chance to regain his wife's trust, but why had she not let him explain? John staggered to bed, desperate tears scalded his eyes. This punishment was beyond what his "crime" had warranted. He did not deserve to lose his most beloved ones like that. Soon, he willed his mind to shut out the outside world. As he drifted, he dreamed. He dreamed of the day his wife and son would come back to him.
A few days later, his neighbours reported to the police that there was a stench coming from John's flat. When the police broke into the flat, he found a bearded, untidy man lying on the bed. Clutched to his chest was a picture of himself with his wife and his son; on the back of the picture were the scribbled words 'Forgive me, I love you!'- the final message he had left to the people he had loved the most in his life.
