Photo Project
Background: This was written for a school assignment where one was given a photo from the Great Depression. You had to use this photo to inspire the creation of a character and their backstory, that you would then “interview.” I got quite caught up in this project and ended up writing a very short brief story that put you in the shoes of the people in this photo (above).
“Derrick Blackstone, please come to the counter.” A voice that shook your world resounded and your fate was sealed. The bank counter before you was an executioner’s block. A bloodied block that had severed the livelihood of many, and sadly, you weren’t exempt from the suffering.
As the greed of humanity had dived too deep, your money fell into the oblivion that they dug. Packed shoulder to shoulder with those bruised and starving fellows that are just like you, you still sit alone in a sea of dirty faces. A salty broth, buttered bread, and the charitable smile of those serving you is your only meager salvation. The watery mixture is unable to satiate the ever-growing hunger of a thirty-year-old man searching day in and day out for a scrap of work. The water going straight into forming the tears that you bleed at night, as you remember all you lost.
Dark skies were all you could find on the horizon, and it was seeping into your heart. Seeping up your ragged clothes as you trudge through streets full of people that appear only half alive, and half grieving. Empty buildings of a street-bound metropolis sprawl about you. With their eyes unlit, they watch you, hoods and axes prepared to draw you in, yet the roofs seem to offer relief.
You stare at the doorway of one such building, torn open as darkness and cold flowed forth. You try to pull some golden memory of your past career and life out to fight against this harsh reality. A time when shining cars and brilliant smiles rolled off a conveyor belt. But in every smile and every shimmer, the reflection of darkness stared back. The doorway you slowly paced into was as dark as the coffin your wife was buried in but a few days ago.
A shattered roof below your feet, with an inviting ground in your eyes, you step to the edge of all you know. You stand there, shivering on a warm day, as the sun faded and darkness was everywhere. Tears roll down your face as you wish for relief, but a chain tied to your heart wouldn’t let you jump off at that moment. The blood pumped and tears spilled, flowing into your starving mouth. The salty tears, briny but as bland as that charitable broth extracted you suddenly from your grief-ridden trance.
As you sit again in that soup kitchen, you remember the fateful day atop a dark house. You still see darkness festering in the reflection on the broth, and you still miss your love dearly. But with every salty sip, you realize that your tears and grief won’t save you. You pull yourself out of the stool and prepare to set off on another day of finding work or begging.