Figment II

This definately took me way too long. In Australia, I just finished the equivalent of my Junior year, and I was in an epic struggle to flunk out the entire last semester. Yeahhhh. Unsuccessful. =/ So this took me forever but I hope you like it. It's a little short, but it sort of introduces you to the next section of the story so it's pretty crucial.

Enjoy. =)



I can feel the muscles of his stomach beneath my hands, his breath hot on my ear and both of our hearts beating against skin and bone as if they might escape. What little air there is between us is warm but not stifling – the open window lets in a gentle breeze and the sounds of the druken and impatient commuters alike.

He murmurs something in my ear, and my breathing hitches because it sounds desperately like “I love you”, but by the time my lips open to reply, the scene has evaporated into thin air.

This is the third time I have woken like this; my body covered in the same thin sheen of sweat and my pulse jumping and leaping in my ears.

I want to cry until I’ve expelled every last drop of liquid in my body.

Instead, I cross to the open window and slam it shut. The commuters are silenced.

The next morning, my mind is hidden under a thick haze; the haze of too many hours spent awake. I believe the expression my mother would use is ‘slap happy’.

“Morning, Emily.”

“Morning, Dr. Schuler.”

She eyes me speculatively. “And how have you been, Emily? How was Europe?”

How hypocritical - no matter how much she tells me to speak my mind, she's still hiding what she really wants to ask. Her true meaning is simple: David. How is David? Gone? Or still present?

I consider last night’s dream; the way I woke aching to be back there, with him.

Apparently, though I had conciously accepted that David didn’t exist, my subconcious was a little clingy.

“Europe was nice. I’m fine.”

“And did you miss your friends?”

“There wasn’t really anyone to miss.” My tone is dark and her eyebrows raise the smallest fraction. For the first time, I note that one is slightly thicker than the other, though why I noticed I couldn’t say.

Dr. Schuler pounces. “Would you say that you’re lonely, Emily?”

No, I just invented an imaginary friend because I needed someone to water my flowers. “I would say so, yes.”

“Do you crave affection?”

“I would say so.”

“Did you ever have a pet, Emily?”

“No. My mother was allergic to most animal furs.”

She nods once, the shrew, and notates something on her ever-present clipboard. “I think you should get a dog.”

“A dog?”

“Yes. You need something you can control.”

The rest of our forty-five minute session passes in little more than a boring, mind-numbing phase, in which the good doctor asks me all about my feelings and I grunt monosyllabic replies as I count down the minutes.

A dog? Me?

I hated children, hated animals, and generally hated company… Well, company that I didn’t actually invent myself. There was no way in hell I would be purchasing something soft and fluffy to pee on my carpet, chew up my furniture, and wreak havoc on my life.

The next morning, my body and brain are both running on empty. It’s a hot summer day and I have consumed no water, no food, and had no sleep. It’s a sure-fire recipe for disaster and I stumble from lecture to lecture with limbs that feel uncooperative; maybe even disconnected.

When you sleep, you dream, I remind myself, and when you dream, you cave. Sleep is for the weak, and you are no longer weak. You no longer require someone to sweep you off of your feet… Not that David really could sweep you off of your feet, because technically, he doesn’t even have arms…

Three Red Bull’s and a blueberry muffin later, I realise that what I’m feeling isn’t heat exhaustion, or even just-plain exhaustion; I’m just being a Debby Downer.

“Emily!”

On some level, I register that I should reply – at the very least, I should nod in acknowledgement – but I simply stand, grabbing my worn-out messenger bag and watching my equally-as-worn-out tennis shoes as I plod away from the student quad.

“Emily!” The voice calls once more, this time a little closer. I know the face the voice belongs to.

“Hi, Matt,” I murmur.

“You, uh, dropped your notebook,” he says nervously, rubbing the back of his neck in what must be a nervous habit. His hair is scruffy in that typical university-boy way – I wonder if he’s too cheap to cut it, or if he wants to look like he doesn’t care. His hair is straight and of a non-descript colour, whereas David’s dark, floppy curls contrasted with his pale, pearlescent skin.

He’s not a perfect physical specimen like David was, either. In fact, he’s just another boy of average height and average looks wearing jeans he’s probably had since high school and a shirt he probably bought at a surf/skate store with his mum; the kind he would have picked out quickly and without much thought lest his friends or footy mates walk in and spot him picking out matching ensembles with his mother.

His voice isn’t husky; it’s not barbed wire coated with velvet or the sting of a fire ant soothed with honey. I can’t really think of a metaphor for it… It’s just a voice. He stutters though, which David would never do.

But David doesn’t exist either, so I suppose the comparison is unfair.

“Thanks.” I take the book from his hands, and he seems so utterly relieved that I’ve broken the drawn-out silence between us.

“It’s no problem… Guess I’m your knight in shining armour now, though.”

“I guess.” I grin momentarily, thinking of what I would say to David. I would simper and giggle with glee that he was still hanging around; still talking to a girl like me. “I guess I’m just eternally indebted to you, good sir.”

Matt pauses, and then his grin widens. I concede that he has really even, nice teeth – they remind me of Tic-Tacs and letters on a keyboard. “Really? Awesome! How… Would like to, maybe, repay some of that debt?”

As opposed to explicit fantasies about my own creation, you mean? “Love to. Meet you at Gilligan’s tomorrow? Seven?”

“Sounds great!”

I smile curtly and turn on my heel, preparing for the long walk from the campus on Smith to the pier at Eagle where I’ll catch the ferry home. When I pass a pet shop I pause to look at the dogs in the window.

Chihuahua’s – not really what I’m after.

I keep walking, head held high. I don’t need a dog. The companionship of dogs is like sleep – reserved purely for the weak.

Hey there cherylkate, and welcome to YWS. Naughty girl for trying to flunk your semester

What little air there is between us is warm but not stifling – the open window lets in a gentle breeze and the sounds of the drunken and impatient commuters alike.

So what do the drunks and impatient commuters sound like?

He murmurs something in my ear, and my breathing hitches because it sounds desperately like “I love you”, but by the time my lips open to reply, the scene has evaporated into thin air.

What do you mean by "the scene has evaporated into thin air"?

I want to cry until I’ve expelled every last drop of liquid in my body.

This is just exaggerated. If she cries till she has expelled all the liquid in her body, then she'll be dead since water is vital for keeping our bodies moist and functioning. Why not just say something that's more down to earth?

The next morning, my mind is hidden under a thick haze; the haze of too many hours spent awake.

Err so why was the narrator awake instead of sleeping?

Her words are a double-edged knife.

This is cliche. This saying has been overused by many to the point that it sounds so bland and old.
Find some other way to express this idea.

Apparently, though I had conciously accepted that David didn’t exist, my subconcious was a little clingy.

Nix "my subconscious was a little clingy".

I hated children, hated animals, and generally hated company… Well, company that I didn’t actually invent myself. There was no way in hell I would be purchasing something soft and fluffy to pee on my carpet, chew up my furniture, and wreak havoc on my life.

Why?

He’s not a perfect physical specimen like David was, either. In fact, he’s just another boy of average height and average looks wearing jeans he’s probably had since high school and a shirt he probably bought at a surf/skate store with his mum; the kind he would have picked out quickly and without much thought lest his friends or footy mates walk in and spot him picking out matching ensembles with his mother.

So what's wrong with that?

Overall impressions:

You seriously need to fill in the logical gaps that are in this piece. Some of ideas in the piece doesn't even make sense. Why is sleep for the weak? Why is companionship for the weak? Heck, many people in the world sleep and require companionship. So to the narrator's logic, they are automatically labelled weak when they are simply trying to live more comfortable and happy lives? Why is the Doctor implicitly trying to mock the narrator? Give reasons and explanations as to why these ideas/events occur or your story will be nonsense to experienced readers.

You should also focus on who David is and their relationships. You haven't given specific reasons or examples as to why we should sympathize for the narrator. So what of the meeting at the bar? So what of the sex? This along with the logical gaps in the narrator's mind actually repulses the experienced reader from your narrator rather than be engaged in what she has to say. Even if David is a figment of the narrator's mind, there has to be some sort of attachment that the narrator has (not just physical attraction) that would make the narrator ( I assume that she's an adult since the doctor was happy to give her a free holiday) so bent over heels for him. I'll admit that I've dreamt about making out with some attractive looking girls a few times in my life, but you don't see me going all lovey dovey about it. Even if the same person kept coming back in a person's dreams, realistically, it would be more of an annoyance than a free ticket to satisfaction (having someone haunting your dreams over and over again, no thank you. I want to be able to get a restful night sleep so that I'm ready for work and anything else that life throws at me if I'm an adult). I would even go as far to say that the doctor is irresponsible for sending the narrator on a holiday instead of actually making an attempt to figure out the cause of this.

I'm not going to talk about the actual themes of this piece as I think you have a lot to worry about at the moment. Suffice to say, it focuses more on the superficial idea that love is about physical attraction and doesn't provide much for the reader to search for.

But really, you should be paying more attention to this piece as this actually has a lot of potential to it. Think it through more carefully when you are editing this.

Good luck.

Andy.

Hey Squall/Andy

To answer most of your questions, all I can really do is recommend you to the first piece, found here, because - and I may or may not be wrong with this - but in my opinion, it does answer most of those questions. This is meant to be more a collection of linked short stories than one chapter after another, mainly because I'm working myself into the idea of writing very slowly. I don't write much, if ever, so the idea of writing a huge piece is a little intimidating. =)

To answer your questions a little more clinically:

Emily has never been normal, and never lived a normal life. She's sort of got a screw missing.

She's fallen head over heels in love with David, who is essentially perfect (in her opinion), but has now been told that David is a figment of her imagination - never existed, never will. A part of her is struggling to rationally accept that, while another is trying desperately to cling to what she had, even if it isn't "real".

Because this is written in first person, I wanted the whole thing to read like a monologue, or, as someone has mentioned before, a diary entry. Hence, everything you read is tainted with Emily's opinion.

Sleep is weak, in Emily's opinion, because she just wants to be normal and be accepted. When Emily sleeps, she allows herself to dream of David, her own creation. In her quest to be normal, she rejects sleep as weak so that she won't remember, or think of David.

When she compares David with Matt, the reader hopefully (though, this is not true in Emily's case) realises that everything in her life revolves around David, and that this has coloured her view of others.

As for relationships: the dream about David in the beginning is sort of a tool to acknowledge that she's torn in two. We know she's enjoying the dream, but we also know she refuses to go back there, so much so that she runs her body down. It's the struggle between the concious and subconcious.

Also, the holiday wasn't free. Her parents paid for it - ditto her meetings with the doctor.

The attachment is that David is her first love, which sounds "whatever" but it's a big concept for girls. The first love is the one you always remember, especially if it comes in your twenties. Especially if it's an essentially plain girl who was teased and bullied all of her life for being "not normal", and a perfect, mysterious guy.

Though, you picked up on the doctor. Yes, she is irresponsible. Sending her on a holiday would be the same as giving her pills and telling her to get out - it's the easy ticket.

Also, in my opinion, it's not a superficial idea that it's focusing on, though that does come into play. Yes, she is attracted by the perfect physical specimen (because, who isn't?) and yes, she's disparaging of how average Matt is, but that doesn't mean that she's superficial.

So, that's pretty much all the answers I can give you, and anyone else who reads this.

Other than that, try not to take it for everything that it is. In English this year, we learnt about "unspoken" stories, where nothing means what it actually says it means. In part, I tried to use that to make this interesting, so that people could put their own spin on things.

If that didn't work, then I apologise, but I'm not the kind of person who sits there and tells you every little thing. I'm not Tolkien.

Cheers.

=)

Hey again cherylkate. I would like to first point out that I did also read the first part when I was doing the critique so that I knew what I was talking about. However, thank you for your response and explanations. It actually gives me more to work with.

Emily has never been normal, and never lived a normal life. She's sort of got a screw missing.

So why haven't you shown us this? What evidence is there that her life isn't "normal"? In fact, what is considered to be a "normal" life? I'm assuming by that, you mean a lack of friendships and parental support? Talk more about how the narrator's relationship with her parents and the interactions (or lack of interaction) she has with her peers. Make it convincing to us that she's troubled.

She's fallen head over heels in love with David, who is essentially perfect (in her opinion), but has now been told that David is a figment of her imagination - never existed, never will. A part of her is struggling to rationally accept that, while another is trying desperately to cling to what she had, even if it isn't "real".

You still haven't fully convinced me here. I get it that the narrator has fallen head over heels with David because he's the first person that actually cares about him, but what does he do to swing the narrator that way? Give more details here.

You might want to show more of the conflict that the narrator faces in terms of whether to keep or ditch David (her figment). Consider the following factors:

-Social
-Family
-Work
-Economical
-Academic

E.g: What does her family think of her having these dreams? There are many possible factors that could influence the narrator to want to get rid of David. Just simply saying that the narrator wants to come back to grips with reality isn't enough. There has to be some conflicts that she wants resolved in wanting to come to grips with reality. Right now, you haven't shown us that. Seriously, not sleeping just to avoid David? If I was in the narrator's shoes, I would much rather be sleeping just to get laid since there doesn't seem to be any consequences if the narrator does sleep. Hence, you have to show those consequences.

Considering that this is written in first person, I'm rather disappointed. With first person, you are given more flexibility around the "show don't tell rule" and a greater number of opportunities to explore how the narrator is thinking or feeling. Yet, you are not willing to take advantage of this? Why make the reader guess?

In fact, what's the point of writing something only to make the reader assume aspects of your narrative? Heck, why don't we just all write out only one sentence for our novels and leave the reader to guess the rest? Why would published authors spend so much time, effort and words when we can simply assume what's going to happen. As an author, you should be helping the audience to search for meanings in life through your works, not to make them assume and leave them in the dark.

Even in those "unspoken" stories, there has to be some groundwork laid or else what's the point of even reading them?

I really do think you have a very interesting concept here, but you must, must explain and elaborate. I cannot stress this fact further. As you are dealing with a concept that many are unfamiliar with, explanation is vital in determining the success of this piece. If this piece was more down to earth, say based on teenage relationships, then you wouldn't need to explain everything. But with this, you must.

Good luck.

Andy.

P.S:

Also, in my opinion, it's not a superficial idea that it's focusing on, though that does come into play. Yes, she is attracted by the perfect physical specimen (because, who isn't?) and yes, she's disparaging of how average Matt is, but that doesn't mean that she's superficial.

I'm not saying the narrator is superficial (read my words more carefully). I'm saying that your ideas are superficial at the moment because you've talked more about the physical attraction aspect of a relationship of this nature rather than viewing the premise from a wider perspective. Hence, you need to justify and explain.