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Your Lips On Mine
Your Lips On Mine

by emma.b in Dramatic Poetry
Young Writers Society Forum Index » Other Fiction

This thread was created on July 6, 2008
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Fragments and Ribbons

Topic ID: 32670
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Clo   View This User's Portfolio
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 07, 2008 1:49 am    Post subject: Fragments and Ribbons Reply with quote

This doesn't really have a title yet, so I just put that for now. Also, this is just a sort of introduction and more is explained later on, so I understand if it's not specifically clear what's going on yet. *shrugs* Another idea I'm playing with. Hopes you likes it!

I

The world had shattered into fragments and ribbons.

She had been sitting in her apartment, her hands folded in her lap, her thoughts ticking too loudly in the cavern of her mind. Then a hissing sound had whipped up a great distance away and all the thoughts were pinned up. Her eyes shot to the window and light consumed everything.

It was a brilliant stark yellow that simmered to a dead white.

And then the world broke. Or so it felt like to everyone with their feet on the ground. The vibrations rolled violent and sharp through the earth and the light pulsed. The surface world was meeting with the sky, and nothing was in any specific direction.

When the first wave of this horrible earthly shudder passed, she found herself on some flat surface. Her breath was coming in little spastic bursts. She had fallen off the couch and now her apartment seemed a shivering little box. The air hummed, reverberating and ringing in her ears. She slid her elbows underneath her and reached for something - anything. Her fingernails scratched lines in the wood.

The first whole thought finally unpinned itself in the following seconds:

Where is he?

This question settled in her mind as she crawled along the floor. The coat rack had fallen over and she stretched for it, pulling his coat from it, her hands clawed and frantic. She draped it over herself and sank into its fabric, knowing it was cold outside, this fragment of sensibility peeling off somehow in the jumbled mess her mind had become.

There was a pop sound, from somewhere up high, and the ground dropped out from underneath her. Her chin smacked the floor boards. Her shaking arms pulled her body up and blood dribbled from her lip.

Where is he?

This thought blossomed. One other unfolded: What the hell is going on? But then it drifted off and more layers of the original raveled off, and her panic suddenly became a blessing. This collapse of the world around her, or whatever it was, immediately became a wondrous opportunity.

For escape.

Breaking away. The walls were breaking, the floorboards snapped. And now she could break away. This was her chance, this sudden collapse of the town around her, it was signaling her time to flee the living horror she had trapped herself in.

Because he wasn’t there.

She was alone in her trembling apartment, and she could run and maybe the disaster - that white, white light - would hide where she had gone. And he would never find her. Never.

Another shudder took the earth. A thing that was hardly a scream choked out of her and she scrambled across the floor toward where she believed the door was. Panic was making her chest sting, her heart beating much too fast; adrenaline was singing through her blood vessels. If there was ever a time she was capable of this, it was now.

Pulling the coat tight around her, she flipped her hand down the door knob; the door clicked open and bitter cold air filled her lungs. She coughed, hacked, wiped blood from her chin. She slid down the first two steps before she rose to her feet, like a toddler would. She felt top heavy, like her legs were matchsticks or straws. She realized she had forgotten her shoes but she was already almost to the street then and there was a light in the sky that was sending colors across her vision.

Her toes stung in the powdery snow but her house didn’t seem to exist anymore behind her. Or she was not allowing it to exist.

The suburbia was a storm now. The perfect rows of houses had been set off kilter, and all of the tiny quaint families were out in the streets just as she was, staring up at that orange, yellow, white pulsing sky. They clung to each other, to the ground, as the earth shivered and quaked, an epileptic fit.

And she pushed past them. She wasn’t quite sure where she was going - where there was to go - but her feet were suddenly taken then with that burning, lovely desire to flee.

The suburbia ate her up and images flashed by, things her mind didn’t register. She reached a point when she no longer recognized her surroundings but she kept diving forward, pushing through these unknown sights and running toward…

Where am I going?

She stumbled briefly; snowflakes caught in her hair and there were a few people screaming in the doorway of a corner store at the end of the road.

Away.

Life is supposed to be systematic to a point. Some things just do not happen to you. This doesn’t happen to you. The world doesn’t just begin to shake and fall apart as one sits on the couch and ponders over their life situation. But it was happening, and what was she doing?

She began to run again.

She had reverted to simple instinct; why was her first instinct to run?

The desire to run had been sitting dormant in her for two years now. She hadn’t realized what energy this desire had to it though, because her legs were pumping underneath her, numb yet carrying her along.

If he found her now…

The city popped and rolled and the lights flashed and dimmed around her.


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PostPosted: Mon Jul 07, 2008 12:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote


Breathe In


Ok, ok this was really intense. I felt that I was rushed into a world of slipping and falling; confusion. Sometimes this would be bad but here its perfect. This story has a kind a drive that keeps me interested. But this is is. If you're continuing this (which you should) don't use this technique again. Explain, connect thoughts. Breathe in.

Skyway Avenue

I felt that the MC was walking out on a limb which is ok but maybe you should make her a little bit more coherent. She seems like something really bad happened to her but really it doesn't show. A little more description would be nice.

Run this city
Ok we're getting somewhere! She's outside, which is major. Run this city as if you were there. Make the MC's surroundings come alive. As I said before..More Descriptions!

The Piano knows something I don't know

I like how you showed that you knew what was going to happen but you didn't flaunt it. What I mean is you point out that there is someone she's trying to get away from but you necessarily don't lead on to why. I know she's bleeding and what not but really, she seems to be in love with this guy... the way she's clinging onto his coat. Maybe she's just a battered wife who loves her husband no matter what or maybe she's dating a guy whose father abuses both of them. I don't know. You left me wondering, waiting for more. Good job.
Do you know what I'm seeing?
I saw a lot of great sentences but I didn't see any mistakes. A couple of my favorite lines are:
Quote:

The world had shattered into fragments and ribbons.

This was a great way to open this piece of writing. Its dramatic, scenic, fantastic, beautiful...its magnificent. I felt that I had to know more because this was the perfect first sentence. So keep this sentence and you'll be fine.
Quote:
The suburbia ate her up and images flashed by, things her mind didn’t register.

This line really captured the MC's confusion about the whole scenario. It fit perfectly where who wrote it and it just sets the tone for so many other things that will follow.
Stop and Stare
Hmm...after rethinking and thinking again I think that this has promise. Just work on a little bit more description and don't use the same technique on blurring and running in the next piece. Basically, just stop and stare at your work and ask yourself "Does this explain everything that happened in the first part?" All in all,
Good Job and Keep writing,
Angel Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy

P.S. This critique was brought to you in the form of song titles. Some of the stuff might be weird but I'm feeling creative today. Very Happy

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PostPosted: Mon Jul 07, 2008 3:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wow, I love this =] I'm sorry I can't be very helpful if you wanted to improve this, because I can't see anything here that you needed to improve. I love your descriptions, particularly
clograbby wrote:
The world had shattered into fragments and ribbons.

She was alone in her trembling apartment, and she could run and maybe the disaster - that white, white light - would hide where she had gone. And he would never find her. Never.


I love the -white, white light -

You're brilliant =D I'd love to read the second chapter when/if you do one.

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PostPosted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 12:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yay! More Clo stuff. ^_^

I absolutely love this piece--it's just surreal enough to be awesome without being completely unrecognizable. It's something that's familiar, and though the situation is fantastic, it's frightening. Besides which, natural disasters + suburbia = epicwin, fictionwise, no matter which way you slice it.

WHERE SOUL MEETS BODY

I had to read the beginning over a few times because it felt a bit disjointed, and I think I know why! It took me a minute to look it through, but at the very beginning, there's a sort of delay between when events happen and when your main character reacts. It's like that satellite delay that makes the people being interviewed on the news pop in and out, awkwardly--there's too long of a gap between the stimulus and the reaction, so it looks a little weird.

Solution? Take out the very first line and mix 'em up.

Quote:
And then the world broke. When the first wave of this horrible earthly shudder passed, she found herself on some flat surface. The vibrations rolled violent and sharp through the earth and the light pulsed.
Her breath was coming in little spastic bursts. The surface world was meeting with the sky, and nothing was in any specific direction.

She had fallen off the couch and now her apartment seemed a shivering little box. The air hummed, reverberating and ringing in her ears. She slid her elbows underneath her and reached for something - anything. Her fingernails scratched lines in the wood.


That's just moving a few lines, but you see how it's a little more cohesive? You're less of a lazy person than I, so I'm pretty sure you can whip them into shape. ^_~

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Quote:
Life is supposed to be systematic to a point. Some things just do not happen to you.


What is it with you and quotable lines? Good grief. I love it. XD

*boogies down* You know where to find me if you have any questions. ^_^

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PostPosted: Thu Jul 17, 2008 2:19 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Very nice. I like it alot.

I agree with Sam when she suggests that you mix up the intro a little. I do like that first sentence, though. But maybe it should be added towards the end.

That guy. That mysterious guy. I have to know who he is. I have to know why she's running- escaping- from him. I have to know! Great job on that part!

I really can't give anything constructive... sorry about that. But what I can say is:
I Want More!

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