I Found a Bike by Kezia Frost
I found a bike, propped against a tree covered in dead lichen, deep into my woodland walk. Rustic, painted a pale mint but the colour was chipping, chain rusted. Tied to the handlebars, with bright red ribbon, was paper. A letter.
I edged closer, wary of the mud begging to swallow the bike’s wheels, and slid the folded paper from its place.
For whatever reason, my fingers were shaking and trembling, just a little,
I opened the letter.
The handwriting was elegant, that kind of slim swirl that’s barely legible but looks nice. I squinted in the dying summer sun, the golden hour filtering through the trees.
It was a love letter. Of course it was, the scene barely warranted anything else. Vaguely, my mind drifted to wondering whether or not it had been delivered.
I had decided it was so, because the first words were addressed, ‘My Love’.
Except as I continued, it changed.
The moment I realised, the paper drifted from my hands into the mud.
It wasn’t a love letter—at least, not a romantic proclamation.
It was a suicide note.
Like a knife plunging into my stomach, it struck me and elicited a shuddering gasp torn from my throat, where my hand fluttered.
What I’d assumed were spots of weathered rust on the bicycle… the brown lichen on the tree behind…
Blood.
Which meant they were here. Standing right here, whoever…
I shifted, an anxious step back.
Crunch.
Kezia is a sixteen-year-old aspiring writer studying English combined at college, with hopes to get a creative writing degree at university. She enjoys writing fiction in a variety of genres and lengths, having written several novellas for her own amusement.
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Wonderful. Very vivid.