No killing kittens!

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The Cup – by Kiana (kikimarie1993)

I stood outside the display of the museum. The cup was really an average sort of thing. It was well preserved, being black and white. Being that it was made of horn, it had an irregular shape to it. No one would have made any assumptions about it. No mere cup could stir this kind of emotion in me, but this one was different. I began to reminisce as I thought of it and the man who once held several that were like it. Suddenly, my eyes drifted to where I saw a small set of initials. My mind didn’t want to comprehend what I saw. What I saw was three tiny letters engraved on the side of the cup. They were initials. They were his initials, to be exact.

ADM. Absalom Daniel McGuillvary.

Before I could completely process this, I turned around to see one of my children staring anxiously. My palms had started to sweat and I looked extremely nervous. My sons, Rory and Daniel anxiously looked up from their phones. My daughter though, was the one who acted. Sensing that I was upset, my daughter Maeve placed her hand on my shoulder. Maeve too was staring at the cup. The boys did the same. She seemed drawn to it in some fashion.

“Mama, are you alright? Should we go home? Are you ill?” Maeve asked.

“I’m not ill, darling. I-I just saw something that reminded me of someone that I used to know” I replied.

“Someone you used to know? Like our father? Was he into this sort of thing?” Daniel asked.

Rory, Daniel, and Maeve turned to look at and gesture towards at a reenactor who carried a tin cup, not a horn one, as the reenactor paced up and down the hall of the museum with his family in tow.

“You might s-say that” I replied, with a slight stutter that gave away my nervousness.

Only, their father hadn’t been a reenactor. He had been the ‘real deal’ as some people would call it. He had been a sergeant in the continental army, and I had been his 21^st century wife.
My younger son, Daniel, and his sister reached tentatively towards the glass of the museum case that surrounded the cup. The cup was black and white, about six to eight inches wide, with a base that was about five inches across. It was a light thing, meant to be carried with a person while they traveled.

“I almost wonder who made such a cup” Maeve mused.

“Your father did,” I murmured.

We had been forced apart by fear and death. The triplets did not know our story. I never told them about him, but now I realized that I had to. They knew so little of him that it was beginning to break my heart, but how would they take the truth? It was becoming too much! I started to sweat and panic some more! Everything started to spin as I lost control of the fragile hold that I had on my emotions and my body. All three pairs of eyes went wide with shock as I fainted and collapsed onto the floor.

Critiques February 3 2017

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Categories: Critique Group

Tags: Author, How to write a novel, Novel, Writing, Writing a Novel, Writing Lessons, Writing Tips