Letters To Myself (#Nanowrimo2017 Winning Novel!)

25,

Dear Myself,

I seriously want to start writing horror stories, can't you tell? After myself and Michelle ended up discovering some creepy facts about a beach online and then actually going to it for a day out with her family, how I'm going to sleep at night I really don't know. But a horror novel could be my next writing project for Nanowrimo in November this year, it's perfect for Halloween after-scares and for reminding others that I like to scare, thanks Diary!

Both of us decided to have a little mini sleepover but obviously since we are still living together with her family, we can do this every night if we wanted to. But just for the laughs, we baked our own little cupcakes and watched a movie on her MacBook called Monte Carlo starring Selena Gomez in it. The locations of Paris and Monaco looked so exciting and pretty that maybe going on a European road trip could form my total life bucket list. The supermarket popcorn Michelle had tasted gross until... We dipped it in chocolate! Yep, you heard me correctly. Lots and lots of chocolate. It was past midnight by the time we wanted to settle down and since my room is quite quiet and away from the bustle of the stairs, we could still speak in normal voices and not wake anyone up.

Being in the mood to scare, I joked to Michelle that we should look up some stories of local haunted places that we didn't know were haunted and sure enough, a beach we had both loved as a child came up in the internet searches. Called Knocking Beach, it boasted to have beautiful, golden sands and safe waters to swim in. Dogs were allowed on the beach during the cold winter months but not in summer. There were food huts situated across the stop points along the shore. Not cheap prices though. My girl then clicked on a link to a random documentary of the beach on YouTube and what we watched completely flipped us both out.

The beach itself has three spooky things about it. The first is that on New Year's Eve every year, the colour of the waves by the sand turn a bloody red (Like a period joked Michelle), next, one of the huts is supposedly built on top of someone's grave but the final thing of all is the scariest. Just before dusk during the summer months, a deathly white figure of a young girl can be seen walking down the shore in broad daylight and then vanishing into thin air. But this girl was murdered by a local man because she wouldn't marry him or so the legends say. The anxiety caused me to have visions of someone trying to harm me so once the documentary finished, I snuggled up next to Michelle and wanted her love to protect me and shield me from the demons. She's such a brave and inspiring person who continues to amaze me every day. We went to sleep around two and up again at eight with the sounds of car doors slamming. It couldn't be my family right?

Michelle got up in her underwear over towards the front window to look out and said it was only her parents putting some bags into the car. I smiled, nice way to start off my morning. Then her Dad yelled up the massive staircase to say we were heading out for the day to the beach. At this word, I felt shivers down my spine. Watching my girl run downstairs to hear more details about the travel plans, I changed into some clothes and grabbed a beach bag of items together. Her expression said it all, we were going to the haunted beach! :0

I had to draw a little face in there because literally, that announcement scared the heck out of me. After a few weeks away from my family (who I am still not in contact with), this was the first time I'd felt truly scared over something. Quickly jumping into the car, I held her hand and spoke away about my goals for the future. On my iPad, we downloaded a film called The Artist which is silent but released only a few years previously. The fashion really appealed to me with Michelle searching online for any vintage clothes sales that were happening locally to stock up on supplies. The credits of the film were just starting as we arrived in one of the three car parks Knocking Beach had to offer. Switching it off, the four of us all climbed out and raced each other towards the sea. The cold water splashed between my bare toes as I spotted her ripping off her checked t-shirt revealing a bikini top which displayed a pattern of some sort. I didn't really have any swimwear of my own but out of her bag, she produced a bikini set just for me and in my size, I was thrilled.

Getting changed behind a bush out of sight from those enjoying a sit down on the sand, Michelle jokingly wolf-whistled as I revealed myself and twirled around just to show off how pretty the design was. After setting some blankets down, we both left her parents alone to sit down and chill as together, walking along and trying to spot any boats out at sea. Finding a spot by the far side overlooking some hotels and bars across the way, I embraced her passionately but being careful not to attract the attention of others nearby. She said I look beautiful which I whispered back that she was the beautiful one. That game lasted for ages until we noticed a small bathing pool full of fresh seawater that was unoccupied. On climbing in, the temperature wasn't too bad and not deep enough to cause an issue with the swimming. Her hands grabbed onto my hips gently as our movements created ripples within the water. We could have stayed like this forever had we not had to go back and have some food with the parents.

On doing so, drying off in the hot sun, I noticed something out of the corner of my eye which caused the neatly made sandwich to drop. Tapping Michelle on the shoulder, her smile faded when she spotted what I was pointing at. Walking along the shore was a young girl, looking first down at the ground then out towards the sea and repeating those actions over again. She was exactly what was described to us. Luckily, she didn't approach anyone or look in our direction but just a second later, she had gone from view. It wasn't even dusk yet but it looked like that story was true as a witness to it.

Save this little letter entry for Halloween! *Quickly sets reminder on phone* I will be back soon.

Yours,

Morwenna.