Creative Short Story and Analysis - Hunter Stokes

                                                                     An Angel at Midnight 

Enzo put his headphones in and walked down the dim lit street as he did every night. But this night was different; he needed to clear his head.

The air was clear and the stars were out, it was the perfect summer night.

Enzo had just gotten in the biggest argument with his father, because he had not chosen a school to attend to in the fall just yet.

USC, Florida State, Clemson? They were all awaiting an answer. What team would have the number one prospect in High School football come August.

This was the most stressful decision that he had ever faced. But he knew exactly where he wanted to go.  Enzo had dreamed of playing at USC since he was young. He was aspiring to be as good of a running back as Reggie Bush.

The problem with this was not where he wanted to go, it was where his dad wanted him to go to keep the family tradition alive.

Enzo’s father had played football at Clemson in the  80’s and wanted his son to follow his footsteps since Clemson had given him such a good offer, but that is not where his heart was taking him.

It felt wrong.

He had never disappointed his father, and without his coaching, Enzo would not be in the position that he is in.

Enzo began to run, the music blasting in his ears, his heart pounding.

Sprinting down the street with all the pent up anger, the frustration and guilt. The overwhelming stream of emotions just hit him like a tidal wave.

He ran, and ran until he couldn’t feel his legs moving anymore and he collapsed on the concrete.

“WHY!” Enzo yelled

“Why cant he just be proud of me?”

At a bench in the middle of town is where he had collapsed, desperately trying to catch his breath.

When a figure appeared from the shadows of the street light.

Walking towards him was a feeble old man, who was trembling, and used a cane.

“You’re quite the runner son.” The old man said

“You remind me a lot of myself when I was your age.”

“Who are you?” Enzo said quietly

The old man just brushed the question to the side as if it was never asked. He proceeded to walk closer and said “What’s troubling you?”

“Nothing” Enzo said sharply

The man knew he was lying, and just continued to question him.

“Hell of a running back Enzo”

“How do you know?” Enzo was so confused, how did this man recognize him to be the running back.

“I’ve been following your high school career, you run just like your father did, with more heart though.”    

Enzo quickly shouted out “How did you know my father?”

The old man began to tell Enzo a story.

“I knew your father very well Enzo, I was his high school football coach. Your father was one hell of an athlete, but had no idea how much untapped potential he actually had. He was always skipping practice, mouthing off to the other teammates, if it wasn’t his way it was the wrong way. When the college offers started rolling in your father showed no hesitance to choose Clemson since his father had played there. But when your dad got to Clemson he was not given the starting job, and remained a backup for all four years because of his attitude towards the coaches. He would’ve really been something else if he had just chosen his own path.”

Enzo was completely shocked at all this man knew about his father, and his past, and was very surprised to hear that his father had so much potential that he had wasted because of this decision.

But mostly he was frustrated that even after all of this, his father would want to have his son make the same mistake that he did just to get a re-do through the eyes of his son.

The old man looked at Enzo and said, “ Son, make the right decision for you, where you think you will have success, where the offense fits your style of play, and where the coaches, players, and staff will try to harvest your talent. But most of all choose a school that will give you a good education and understanding of how you can be successful after football, because trust me son the playing days end.”

Enzo still speechless and finally able to catch his breath looked up to the man and said “ Thank you Sir,” “Thank you so much for helping me through this, I needed advice but never knew who to ask.”

Enzo got up, shook the mans hand, and started to slowly walk back towards his house.

“Ill be looking forward to seeing the next chapter in your life Enzo. Surprise people, break the rules, and enjoy the California sun.”

Enzo got home that evening and went to bed as his mind was exhausted from the day he had just experienced.

The next morning Enzo and his father were sitting at the breakfast table when Enzo said “Dad, I am going to be committing to the University of Southern California to play football this fall.” Expecting a smack to the head Enzo nervously looked for a response.

His father calmly said “ Son, do what your heart desires. I will be proud to sport a USC hat to every game.” “I like the idea of California anyways”  he said with a smirk.

Enzo said “I just thought you would be so angry, but last night I was jogging and came across your high school coach, he told me so many stories, and really opened my eyes to show me I needed to do what my heart desires or I will live with a life of regret.”

Enzos father looked shocked; confused even.

“Son you must be confused, my high school coach passed away not long after I graduated from Clemson, but I hadn’t heard from him much after high school. You must have met someone else.

Enzo looked at his father in disbelief, “ No dad it was him he knew everything about you, he knew about college, about me, he even knew I wanted to go to USC but I hadn’t said anything about it.”

Enzo thought for a moment, and realized he had not said one thing about going to California, yet when he was leaving the old man, he knew exactly where I was planning on going.

“Someone must be watching over you son.” Enzo’s father said as he picked up his glass of orange juice, “Maybe it was a blessing in disguise.”

                                                                       Analysis 

When I was first starting to do the draft for this story I had no idea even where to start to think of a topic or even a main character, but the first thing that I wanted tot think of was a main characters name. I ended up deciding to name my main character Enzo, which is my cousins’ name. It seemed unique enough to fit in my story. The original Idea that I had was completely different than my final idea, but It ended up having some of the same elements like the idea that my character was going to have to make a very important and stressful decision. I was planning on writing a different story up until the moment I started typing, and at that point my idea completely changed and a story started flowing out.

            I honestly was not sure where I was going with my idea when I started typing but as I typed the first sentence a new story was just emerging In my mind and I just thoughtlessly typed sentence after sentence trying to be creative in how I developed the story. The original Idea I had was to make my character go somewhere late at night and find 2 pills marked in a bag, one would unlock his brain and give him the highest IQ one would give him 10,000,000 cash in his bank account by the next morning. This idea sounded really interesting but I was not sure how I would add any secondary characters or develop it beyond this, but I just continued to type and by the second sentence my new idea had changed. I kept the same character, the high school kid named Enzo, but made him the top high school running back in the country, and he was stressed about his college decision. This made for a much better story, and by the end I even put a mystical twist to his night of thinking. I was able to incorporate his father into the story as a character and also his fathers high school coach, who comes to him to give advice in the middle of the night, but what Enzo does not know at the time is that the man who visited him was actually not there, he was an angel, or ghost trying to lead him down the path that his heart wanted to go. I think that this story will appeal to peoples emotions in that they will feel bad for Enzo at first but towards the end of the story they will be glad he is making the right decision and also shocked that the man was not actually there, just a spirit sent to guide him.  I feel that I need to improve on my creative process and be more organized in my thinking, even though my thoughts were sporadic I feel that I could have been better at writing each thought down and piecing together a story that was a little lengthier and built up more to create more suspense for the reader. I would want to make sure that the readers felt like they had to keep reading and my story was reeling them in enough to where they did not lose focus on the sequence of events. The story I feel was overall successful, but If I had a chance to re do this assignment I think that I might add one more character and build into the idea that this man was a figment of his imagination or a spirit to come give him guidance so that It did not seem so abrupt at the end.

            This process taught me a lot about how difficult it is to be a writer, how easy it is to write 2 pages of a story and how fun it is to develop your own fictional tale. I can understand why writer enjoy it so much because it is almost like writing a movie on paper, I could vividly see my story developing in my head and it was a very enjoyable process.