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For no reason other than finding them together in the same old trunk I post the original pages of my 1965 short story "The Last Eight Hours" on the Child Study Club site. The story made it into the junior high's literary digest (Dart Digest) that year and my 9th grade English teacher (Doug Denbow) appended all sorts of comments when he graded the paper. Reading it again 60 years later I was relieved that it is not as cringe worthy as feared.
At the time I wrote this (9th grade - age 14) I considered taking a modest supernatural direction. Perhaps having Stan spiritually connect with some legends in the cemetery who would ease him into death. Think "Don't Fear The Reaper" although in 1965 that song was 11 years into the future. But I felt it unnecessary .
An option which I did not consider at the time was an Owl Creek Bridge twist in which Stan is pulled back from his walk around town by beeping heart monitors and it is revealed that he has never left his hospital bed and his last hours have been a compressed time dream. I had not seen this 1964 Twilight Zone episode nor Carnival Of Souls (1962) but in a alternate timeline it would be interesting to see the story with such a twist.
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