Revision

I chose my personal narrative because I enjoyed writing this story and I felt that I could develop the ideas more and use better word choice throughout the essay. I went through the essay looking for unnecessary words and replaced them with stronger, more descriptive words. Also, I developed my ideas more, explaining my thoughts, feelings, and actions more throughly. The word choice and developed ideas allowed the paper to become more suspenseful and real for the reader. 

Peace Defeats Fear

            When I was 13, I woke up to a door slamming and quick, loud footsteps going down the hall. I knew it was my dad because he was coming home late that night. I opened my eyes and checked the time. 12:37. I had to get up in eight hours to go to an AAU basketball tournament. I heard my dad’s deep voice yelling from the kitchen, “Nobody move, stay where you are, do NOT turn on any lights.” So, I did what my father told me to do. I didn’t know what was going on, and I knew that he did, so I stayed in my bed. Suddenly, light was streaming through my window and illuminated my room. It was too bright to be from inside my next door neighbors’ house. The intensity of the light resembled a flashlight, then someone was banging on my window. I keep an old softball bat under my bed just in case, and to me, it was that time of just in case. I was scared and confused, so I grabbed the cold, green, metal bat and held it with both hands as if I was going up to the plate to hit a softball. My mind was racing with horrible thoughts, like what if this person busts through the window and attacks my family. Different scenarios flashed through my mind like horror movies. I sat there, slowly breathing in and out, facing the window, like a statue with fear painted all over my face.

Eventually, the light went away and my room was pitch black dark. At that moment, my bathroom door started to open, and I could see the outline of a person on the ground. They looked tall and muscular. The fear rose inside of me like a boiling pot of water and I thought that my worst fear had come true…there was an intruder in my home. Then I knew who it was by his silhouette, it was my dad. He army crawled silently across my carpet until he reached my bed and sat next to me. “This is all my fault,” my dad said.

He told me he was driving down Gardere and someone pulled out in front of him out of nowhere, and he slammed on the breaks. His car barely touched the car in front of him, but he got out to make sure no one was hurt because that is kind of person he is. They said they were fine, there was no need to call the police. So, my dad got in his car and pulled away and drove home, but they followed my dad home and now they are at our house. After he told me this, he got back on the carpet and told me to stay there and not move. I watched him crawl back through the bathroom door, just like the way he came, towards my little brother and my mother. I thought to myself, Why is he leaving me all alone? Jackson has mom, I have no one. Plus, I am really scared right now. It is dark, I am sweating and I am worried about Mom and Jackson.  I realized that my dad knew I would be okay on my own, and my mom and Jackson needed him more than me.

The sound of fists banging on every window and door in the house continued for what seemed like forever along with the bright light from the flashlights beaming through the windows. I was still scared and knowing what happened made the fear cut into my stomach even deeper. Suddenly I heard the hum of a car engine pull up into my driveway. My curiosity was unreal, Who is pulling up? Is it their friends? Is it someone I know? Through the fear and curiosity, I noticed blue and red flashing lights barely visible through the crack under my door. The police were here.

I heard the police getting out of the car and walking up to my front door. They knocked on my front door. No one answered or made a sound, which was odd. The silence in my house made it seem like it was a ghost town. Another knock. Another and another and then there was a knock on the back door. I heard an unfamiliar voice say, “Open the door. We can see you.” My dad opened the door and there was an exchange of words in muffled voices that I could not understand. My door flew open, and I leaped out of my bed. My wide-eyed, scared little brother was pushed into my arms and my mom slammed the door behind him. I looked into my brother’s green-blue eyes, which were filled with tears and absolute gut wrenching fear. We walked over to my bed, turned on my lamp and sat there trying to understand the muffled voices of our parents and the strangers in our house.

A sound of a body being shoved against the wall filled our ears and our hearts raced. Many hurried footsteps were coming down the hall towards the door that leads out into the dark night and away from my brother and me. I then heard a familiar deep voice say, “This is ridiculous. I didn’t do anything wrong.” It was my father. It was the army crawling, six foot six, deep voiced father who was the sound of the body being slammed against the wall. They arrested my father. I looked over to my brother who was wrapped in my fuzzy blue blanket. He looked up at me in disbelief and started crying again. Through the sobs, he asked, “Can you read something from the Bible?” I was taken by surprise by this, Jackson had never been keen on reading the Bible but I replied, “Yes Jay, I can.”      

I reached over to grab my blue bible and I picked it up. I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to read, but I had a profound feeling that I would open to the right page. My brother put his big head on my shoulder and followed the words I was reading with his eyes. As soon as I started reading, a certain feeling swallowed us whole. It was a feeling of comfort and peace. I have never felt so safe. I read and read until the tears on our cheeks were dry and gone. I didn’t even realize I had been crying. The peace and comfort stayed with us for a long time after that. It probably still is with us. My mom came in a few minutes later, she looked nervous and upset like she had to tell us something horrible. She stared at me with loving eyes and then looked to my brother with the same loving eyes. She said, “They took Dad. He should be back soon. Don’t worry, he did not do anything wrong.”

My dad did not return until the next morning. When he walked in the door I ran up to him and hugged him really hard. I could smell his cologne and feel the softness of the purple LSU shirt he always wears. Once again I felt safe. I still do not know all of the details of what happened between the times he walked through the back door. What I do know is that my dad went to court and the judge let him go after hearing both sides of the story and he was sorry for how he and the rest of the family were treated. A few weeks after this, I was walking to my brother’s room to tell him to do his homework. As I passed the door, I noticed a hand print on the top left window pane in the door. No one had knocked on our door since that night.

This experience allowed me to become aware that family is everything and my family is now closer than ever before. The fear we all experienced brought us closer, but the peace that my brother and I felt made an even stronger bond between the two of us. Fear and peace are both very intense emotions, yet they are very different. Peace always defeats fear in a battle just like family will always win a war.