GoodWrites discussion

Hiya Loves <3

Here is the writing prompt for this week!
"Center your story around someone’s public image and private self colliding."

MIAcat <3

Hiya Loves <3

Wrote this short story in my French class so haven't had much time to edit/proof read, let me know what you think and if I can improve any sections. Xx

TW: Murder Scene

Elowyn Prescott was the queen of the Vesper Gala. Draped in a silver gown that caught every glint of the chandelier light, she floated through the crowd like a force of nature—calm, commanding, untouchable. The press circled her like sharks, eager for a soundbite or a scandal, but Elowyn gave them only the perfect smile, the polished charm of a woman who had been raised to rule. For years, she had built her public image with surgical precision: ruthless CEO, loyal heiress, flawless icon. Behind the scenes, she was a different story entirely. Tonight, beneath the glittering veneer, her chest tightened with anxiety. Her father’s closest ally, Julian Vesper, was due to arrive any moment. Julian was more than family business; he was the keeper of secrets—secrets Elowyn wished would stay buried. As she accepted a champagne flute from a waiter, the room erupted into chaos.
A scream, sharp and sudden, sliced through the music.
The crowd parted, and all eyes turned toward the grand staircase. There, at the foot of the marble steps, lay Julian—his silver hair matted with blood, eyes wide open in a frozen final stare. For a heartbeat, the world stopped. Then pandemonium. Guests stumbled back, whispers rippled like wildfire, and the gala’s delicate spell shattered. Elowyn’s smile vanished. Her heels clicked hard on the marble as she pushed through the throng, reaching Julian’s side. The cold reality of death pressed against her skin like ice.
“Call security!” she demanded, voice sharper than she intended.
The room buzzed with fear and confusion. A murder at the family gala—a scandal to rival any corporate collapse. The police arrived swiftly, flashing badges and clipped commands. Detective Mara Lang surveyed the scene with a keen eye. When she turned to Elowyn, the heiress’ calm facade flickered, revealing the storm beneath.
“Ms. Prescott, did you have any recent conflicts with Mr. Vesper?” Mara asked.
Elowyn’s practiced voice was steady, but the hint of something raw surfaced in her eyes.
“Julian and I had disagreements—business is complicated. But murder? I never imagined that.”
Inside, Elowyn’s mind raced. Julian was the last man who held the power to unravel her empire with whispered truths from the past. As the police swarmed the gala, secrets began to spill like blood from a wound.
A series of anonymous messages hit Elowyn’s phone:
“You’re next.”
“The truth will come out.”
Her pulse thundered. The woman the world adored—the unbreakable heiress—was trembling behind closed doors. That night, in the silent expanse of her penthouse, Elowyn stared out at the city lights, her reflection a ghost in the window. She reached for the whiskey bottle, but the liquid tasted bitter, like defeat. Her phone buzzed again—a message from an unknown number.
“Colton knows.”
Colton. Her brother. The one person she had buried beneath layers of resentment and silence. Years ago, he had walked away from the Prescott name and all its poison. Now, he was back, threatening to expose everything. Her breath hitched. She hadn’t seen Colton in over five years, not since their father’s funeral, when accusations flew like knives and their fragile family broke apart. The doorbell rang. Her heart stopped. She wasn’t expecting anyone. Opening the door, she found Colton standing there, face hard but eyes tired.
“Elowyn,” he said quietly. “We need to talk.”
She stepped aside, swallowing the lump in her throat. Inside, the air was thick with unsaid words.
“You don’t know what’s coming,” Colton said. “Julian’s death is just the beginning.”
Elowyn felt the old wounds crack open. “I built this empire. I kept us alive.”
“By hiding everything,” Colton snapped. “By crushing anyone who stood in your way.”
The years of silence exploded between them.
“We’re not the perfect family you pretend we are,” he said. “And your public image? It’s a lie.”
Elowyn’s eyes burned with tears she refused to shed. “Then what do you want? To tear it all down?”
“No,” Colton replied. “To find the truth before someone else gets hurt.”

The following days blurred in a haze of police interviews, media frenzy, and shadowed threats. Every corner of Prescott & Co. was under scrutiny. Board members whispered of betrayal; employees looked sideways, waiting for the empire to crumble. Elowyn played her role flawlessly in public—controlled, untouchable—but inside, she was unravelling. Secrets she thought buried rose like ghosts. The truth was a knife through butter. She found herself in Julian’s private office, now sealed by police tape. She stared at the photographs pinned to the wall—her father and Julian in younger, happier times, their smiles hiding something dark. A file left on the desk caught her eye: financial records, forged signatures, secret transactions. Her empire was built on sand. She sat down, head in her hands, feeling the crushing weight of legacy and lies.

One night, late in the office, Elowyn’s phone rang. It was Colton.
“I found something,” he said breathlessly. “Evidence that someone’s been sabotaging us from within.”
They met in a dim café, voices low.
“We have enemies inside Prescott & Co. Someone who wanted Julian silenced and will come for you next,” Colton said.
Elowyn’s stomach twisted. The woman the world knew as a powerhouse was trapped in a deadly game she never wanted to play.
“Then we fight,” she said, voice steady despite the fear. “Together.”

Weeks later, the gala was reopened—a memorial to Julian but also a stage for Elowyn’s resurgence. She stood once again under the glittering lights, the world watching. But this time, the smile was different. Not just a mask. Something raw. Something real. Elowyn Prescott was no longer just a public image. She was a woman shattered and fierce, the collision of her private pain and public power finally breaking free. And in the shards of her glass kingdom, a new empire was rising.

MIAcat <3

I really like your story, it was great and it feels like the beginning of a novel. It feels like the rest of the story and her future are just around the corner waiting to be told.
The only critique I have is too minor to mention.

Here’s mine for the week.

 LOOSE ENDS

 Sweat beaded from Adam's brow as he stood at the pulpit, staring out. A sea of strangers melding together into an abstract painting. One stranger bore into him, standing in the auditorium, gazing at him with those piercing green eyes, unforgettable eyes, somehow familiar.
 A tremble threatened at the edges of his limbs, what did he know, this man. Could he have dug up his one transgression from the grave of the past. Here on the faculty, nothing was more important than presentation, and up until now he moved with the precise modulation of a royal orchestra. Harmony and rhythm carried him through his classes, through interactions with students, and other members of the faculty.
 The crowd in the auditorium stared on, confusion passing over their faces, as he just stood there looking dumbfounded. The man with the green eyes rose, he quirked a half smile at Adam and tapped the lens of his camera with his index finger before turning to leave. Adam felt his body constrict, what he witnessed, no partook in, and failed to act on would come to light. The intense stress caused him to collapse behind the pulpit, the sea of parents gasped collectively.

 )))

 Open house was a debacle and not only that, but now Adam was hospitalized. He suffered a stroke on stage in front of the parents of tomorrow's bright minds. Weakly he lifted his hand reaching for the water cup on the table, just there.
 Adam found himself being blocked and looked up to see—
 There was that man, peering into his soul with that cocky grin and those eyes.

 "What do you want?" he stammered, "why are you here?"

 "Such hostility Mr. Pinsky, I'm only here to offer my condolences," he said.

 These words didn't fly over his head, they were carefully chosen to incite fear.

 "Condolences?" he repeated in a weak whisper.

 "Yes, Adam, condolences."

 With those ominous words, he turned his back on him for the second time and departed from the room. Adam sat upright in his hospital bed staring at the TV mounted on the wall, he was reeling.

 That settles it, the night that I witnessed that crime, the crime that I was a part of, he must know. Could he possibly have pictures, how could that be. Clearly he means for some form on harm to come to me.

 "Condolences," he said to himself.

 No more than harm, he aims to kill me. He must have a close personal tie to the one who...
I have to warn Taj.

 Adam looked around for his phone, not finding it, he picked up the receiver on the table and dialed Taj’s number. As it rang he downed the water in the cup and cleared his throat. He was feeling weak, but luckily the stroke did not cause any paralysis. 

 There was no answer on the other end, and he returned the phone to its cradle. He was growing worried, what if that man paid a visit to Taj first, and now he was cleaning up loose ends. 

 “Shit, this isn’t good,” he muttered.

 On the TV he noticed a movie playing, one he hadn’t seen in a long time. It was startlingly relevant to his current situation. Four teens stood in the middle of a road looking down at a man they had struck with their vehicle. Later, they would be stalked by the fisherman one by one and meet a horrible fate. 
 What about Mandy? How long had it been since he had spoken to her?
 As he reached for the phone he noticed a damp slip of paper on his lap. Gingerly he picked it up to examine it.
 In bright green neon ink; which began to spread from the condensation of the cup it had been stuck to, it said “I saw you that night in the woods, blood is on your hands.”
 That pinched it, all his worries were coming true.
 Ten years ago, during their senior year, he, Mandy, Taj and Isabel committed an act that had haunted them for all these long years.
 For Taj it had been the worst, it was his idea to begin with.
 Adam picked up the receiver and dialed out to Mandy. The line was busy.
 Since when do phones have busy tones anymore.
 All that remained was Isabel, he hadn’t thought of her in a long time and he didn’t have her number. He would have to try and track her down. 

 )))

 The next day he was released. Luckily for him, he left behind a detailed syllabus for the sub who covered the first days of his class. Part of him felt it was likely too late for Isabel and not only that but he was expected back at work. He could hardly go on some wild goose chase tracking down his high school sweet heart.
 The danger was at the forefront of his mind, but he would have to shelve it for later. Now, he needed to get to school and prepare for his class. 
 Adam arrived at his office in the English department and prepped for the second day of advanced placement literature. Hopefully the sub stuck to his syllabus, if he did, there wouldn’t be any issues. As he walked in the dark through the classroom to his office, he felt apprehensive. 
 There’s nothing there, your just worked up.
 The smell of iron pervaded his nostrils, it was coming from the other side of this door. 
 A loud buzzing sound greeted his ears as he walked inside the dark room. There was a flashing blue light just on the other side of his chair. Now he could smell not just the scent of iron but something like roasting meat. He let out a gasp of breath and slowly approached. Rather than rotating the chair, he walked around and immediately let out a shout of terror. 
 There in his office chair was the decapitated body of a woman, a bug zapper, sans the cage had been shoved into the cavity of her neck. 
 On the woman’s hand there was a tattoo of a bumble bee. That was Isabel alright. This mad man really was killing them off, and he was certain that he was the last in line. 
 Adam cautiously turned on the light to his office and as he did this, he saw a dozen photos enlarged and taped to his walls. It was the four of them standing over a body in the woods. Various different angles and them tossing the body into a hole. Them covering the body in dirt.
 Then it hit him, that boy, he had the same piercing green eyes as the man who threatened him. Those piercing green eyes that haunted his dreams.
 There in Isabel’s hand he saw a folded slip of paper. On it, was three words in that same neon green ink, “Photos with police.”

 That was it, his career was ruined, his old friends were dead. His life was effectively over. 

 “We should have talked him out of it,” he murmured under his breath.

 The door to his classroom slammed, it was too early for students to be coming in. 

 “You and I both know that there would be no talking Taj out of something when he set his mind to it Mr. Pinsky.”

 Adam ran out of his office in shock. 

 “You.” He saw it now, so clearly.

 “Yes, me.” 

 It was Eugene’s twin brother Richard. How had he not recognized him, he used to be a member of their friend group before it all went down. The five of them used to pick on Eugene, until Richard’s conscience got the better of him.

 “You four killed my brother and buried him in the woods,” he stated, “I followed you out that night having seen you grab my brother and toss him into your car.” He looked Adam in the eyes as the sun started to pour in through the windows. “I went inside a store to use the bathroom and when I came back there you were.”

 “After all these years, why now?” he asked.

 “Why now?” he repeated, “its the ten year anniversary of my brother’s death. I am just as guilty as you four, I watched, I didn’t try to stop it from happening and I didn’t turn you in. I just stood there too terrified to move and snapped photo after photo.”

 Richard moved closer to Adam closing the gap between them. 

 “I plotted my revenge, pouring over every detail. It needed to be perfect. I had to make sure to kill every last one of you. Now say your prayers, because this is where it all ends. You robbed my brother of his life,” he stated, “now I will return the favor in dividends.”

 Adam fell backwards over a chair as he backed up.

 “There is nowhere for you to run. You are the worst of all of those cretins,” he spat, full of venom.

 “What do you mean Richard?” he asked, but inside already knew the answer.

 “Eugene, you and myself, used to be like the three musketeers before those other three came along. You left Eugene like hot trash and lured me into that new group. Made me believe that my brother didn’t deserve to be a part of it. We made his life a living hell, and I betrayed him, then you killed him.”

 Adam was speechless as Richard approached him, he slumped his shoulders accepting his fate, because he knew that Richard was right. 
 And Richard drew the shades.