Laurie Lynn Drummond Alive

Have you ever been in a scary situation one that puts you on edge? And after the fact were you ever really able to put how you felt into words? For many of us we actually forget most of what happened to us, these things are small details but they add up to help solve a lot. In the short story Alive by Laurie Lynn Drummond the narrator is talking about the trip she is taking to Baton Rouge where a serial killer is on the loose and her interaction she had with a strange man.
The exposition begins by the narrator setting up the story letting us know she is on a trip to Baton Rouge to see her family where a serial killer has killed three women and abducted four others. The author sets the scene as a gloomy fall afternoon this foreshadows to the …show more content…
She has just pulled into a parking spot at a gas station where she plans to stop and get a paper. She looks up and there is a strange man in his truck backing up but staring at her at the same time. The tension grows even more here with the description she gives of him. “A nice-looking man bald, early thirties, dark shirt-in a green Chevy Blazer.” She describes him in a professional way a way she would have if she was still a cop about to report him. By doing this she is using familiar wording to draw the reader in letting you think something big is about to happen just like in most stories when a police officer describes a suspect. She goes on to say how he begins to stare at her while she gets her things and gets out of the car. She even calls him a creep under her breath. To me this is interesting because she says he’s nice looking but he is still a creep. This is the first time the theme or underlining message of the story comes into play. Because she is a woman and because she is a high risk target in Baton Rouge she must have up a defense that just because someone seems or looks nice they still the potential to harm her. The author is trying to make the point that anyone can be a victim and a criminal and not to let the idea of “nothing bad can happen to me” get in your head. In the next major part of the story the narrator has internal conflict arguing with herself …show more content…
She builds the action by stating that the man is one her heels following and matching her pace step by step. She talks about the changes in her body the shaky hands, pains in her stomach, and the sweat dripping from her brow. These forms of imagery not only let us see how the woman is acting but it makes us feel exactly what she is feeling. The anxious feeling the dire need for the narrator to hurry up and be safe again. We are relieved as well as the narrator when she makes it to her car safely and she locks the doors and the bald man drives away. She sees him leave from a far exit and takes another direction, satisfied she leaves on her own way. But the author does not let the suspense drop for long as soon as the narrator is relieved and thinking she is in the clear she looks in her rear view mirror to see that the bald man has just pulled up behind her and has begun to follow her. Using more previous knowledge and common sense the narrator writes down a description of the man and his car. She comes up with a plan to stop at another store and call her old detective friend Ike. But before she has to worry about finding one they approach the interstate entrance and the bald man veers off and leaves. The author is actually giving a good life lesson in this part of the story by letting woman know what they should do if