Short Blog of a Short Story

It should've been me. I'm supposed to be "the oldest", "the leader", "the one he looks up to", "the role model"... It's all bullshit. Pranal can pave his own way. I see the way he looks at me now, scared of who I am, like he's watching an animal at a zoo exhibit, not knowing how to properly tap the glass to get their attention. We'll be fine, it'll just take some time. But sometimes I would wake up and see my parents' feet in the door gap of my room, slowing down every time they passed, the pause of hesitation as if they were about to knock and check-in. They rarely did. Now they've just been hovering around me. I wonder, does Pranal see me the same way they see me? A disappointment?  They all practically shunned me when I told them the news. But it's not true. I didn't fail. Although I was never the brightest student, breezing my way through everything like Pranal, I could cheat - very well too. Honestly, ...

"She didn't want this; she didn't want for Mom to know her like Mom had gotten to know Caroline and Mini; she didn't want to become these weird monosyllabic love-zombies like them, them with their wonderful families - how dare they complain so much, how dare they abandon them for this creature?"  - Kim 68; 453-453 Ronnie's awareness throughout "Mothers, Lock Up Your Daughters Because They Are Terrifying" shows a great distinction between Caroline and Mini's perspectives on their relationships with their families and birth mothers. Ronnie notes that the other two have been completely sucked into Mom's "love", suggesting they're lacking that guidance and support in their adopted families - which we can see throughout the story with Caroline's school and ballet pressure and Mini's parents' divorce. While these two are completely focused on skewed love from parental figures, Ronnie's focus lies in Alex, her adopted f...

In 'The Fall of the House of Usher', the narrator finds the Usher household creepy. And rightfully so, everything about the family is gross, from the incestual family line to the grimy building. The mansion, in "crumbling condition", showing "discoloration of ages" and "minute fungi overspread the whole exterior", hints at negligence (179). The family line itself is also dying out, leaving only two heirs to the bloodline, Roderick and Madeline. With all this being said, would it be so bad to forget about their existence....? Understanding the magnitude of this family's wealth and power in the past is crucial. Although the narrator and Roderick were family friends growing up, they grew apart and Roderick hasn't made friends since, saying the narrator is "his only personal friend" (178).  The Ushers, not even integrated into society and just having all this money in the middle of nowhere, can even be considered selfish, even detrime...