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Taken Down

Oh, my god.
Wow. Just...wow.
I was literally falling asleep before I started reading this, but you managed to completely capture my attention.
I think the most attention-grabbing thing about this piece was that it was written in a way that made me think of an RPG.
It was original, and had that taste of in-your-face bitter reality that we can all learn from and appreciate.
It could just be because I'm tired, but I didn't see and grammatical errors. None.
I hate to say this (I mean, I really hate to say this), but I thought this was flawless. Absolutely, honestly flawless.
It's 10:30 at night, and I've gotta get some sleep, and I would say I'm going to review later, but I didn't catch anything I needed to review.
My awesome critique: I loved it.

You'll definitely need to ask an instructor or someone else to look over this, because this review is way too sugar-coated. However, I mean what I say one hundred percent.

Kudos!


*anti-pop

To be honest my lower jaw just dropped in surprise... I haven't read such a good piece for a while. (Meaning at the "real life" form).
Amazing descriptions, feelings, character`s act, actions. The single thing I should do now is *bow*.

The only thing I must say is that you use a lot of "you" here. Try somehow to link the sentences (not make a big sentence, but to stop saying the "you").

In the last part where the character is in the bathroom it`s quite a great feeling. I need to give you a little tip tho : When you write such paragraphs that are meant to hit the reader and make them imagine exactly what you wanted, and you add a little psychology there, you say about the physical pain but try saying something about the inside pain. (i don't know if this sentence is correctly written lol)

The room starts spinning and you steady yourself against the teak table in your kitchen. Regaining balance, you force your feet to walk to your bathroom mirror. Here, under the haze, you look at your red bloodshot eyes, the lifeless holes of your pupils. You pry open the mirror cupboard and your fingers find the box where you left that golden piece of heaven and hell. It glints in your vision, beautiful. You slip it on your finger in one movement, as though you gulped down a shot. The cool metal hurts, struggling to come off your skin. With that one action, the pieces of your bandaged, taped-up heart explode and you fold into yourself, trying to stem the bleeding. Pinpricks of pain shoot through your core. You stare up at the bathroom light through your blurry vision and, for the first time, you understand what it means to be alive.

You could add something like :

Example: You feel that bitter taste of alcohol on your tongue or is the bitter taste of defeat, of life? The pressure on your chest, the burning on your neck, the actual pain piercing your head almost bring you at the edge of insanity. You think and every thought hurts. What`s left of your lucidity leaves you agony. You stare up at the bathroom light through your blurry vision and, for the first time, you understand what means to be alive.

Hope it helps. Luck!

-Akayl

Anti-pop and Fellow: Thank you so much! *blushes* I'm so glad you liked it! I wrote it for my creative writing class a while ago, so my teacher has looked at it, but I never thought it was that good! Thank you! *hugs*. I really appreciate the critiques.

Anti-pop: I'll start working on your piece right away
Fellow: If you ever want me to critique something of yours, just leave a message for me in my critique booth:
topic31408-15.html

This. Was. Fabulous.

I always feel slightly guilty giving glowing reviews, because I know most people prefer constructive criticism. But honestly, I found next to nothing wrong with this. The second person POV was a little jarring, but it worked - because this is a jarring piece.

One thing I did notice was this sentence:

You wait for her to look away in repulsion and disappointment, but she sits down, her mouth curving into a sympathetic grimace.

Personally I think "repulsion" should be "revulsion." Also, why does he feel like she would judge him? She's doing the same thing he is: drinking in a bar.

Just an observation.

But anyway, this was awesome. Congratulations. Gold star for you. :)

~Sunny

Lyrical Sunshine: Thank you so much! I'll definitley look into that sentence and do some reconstruction on it! I appreciate all your kind words and I'm glad you enjoyed it !

Those small bands of gold stare you in the face wherever you go. I really like this as an opener, I have very controversial opinions when it comes to words but I do like it a lot : It’s hard to keep your eyes off the little loops that adorn people’s fingers. The treachery they represent sends chills up your spine. Still, you can’t help searching for them, looking at each person’s left hand for the ring. You don’t understand why they bother you, the material representation of another’s fidelity. Maybe it’s because they stand for lies, false security. I really, really like this as a first paragraph. It's very effective, moreover it is interesting and intrigues me to read on. I love the philosophy behind rings being false security.


You sit down on a stool at the local bar, gazing around the dusty room, trying to find comfort in another’s solitude. Your eyes are drawn to a man sitting about five seats down from you at the end of the counter. It’s something in the way he stoops over. His decimated form is your victory. You smile as he passes his hand through his wispy, gray hair, the ball and chain of his life glinting around his finger’s swollen flesh. Your eyes wander over to him every few minutes. The glass in front of him is still full, so you decide he’s been absentmindedly picking it up every few seconds, but not drinking any. You wonder what’s stopping him.


The buzz of the TV is background noise to the chinking of glasses. The Mets are playing LA. You shake your head; you don’t have any faith in that “other” New York team. Not since you’ve moved out of that apartment at the center of Queens, down on 108th Street. Shabby little place. You don’t know how you were ever happy there.


The bartender stops in front of you. “What can I get you?”


“Gin and tonic,” you reply. He nods, reaching under the bar. You’re probably not the first of your kind he’s seen around here. You’re just like any other working stiff out there, half-dead from staring at a computer screen all day. You rub your hands across the splintery wood of the counter, smiling at how well worn it is. This place was probably crazy during Prohibition. And the Depression, you add silently.

He places the tumbler in front of you. It’s not your first time here and he knows this won’t be your last glass, so he waits to give you the bill. Whoever said that bartenders were like therapists was wrong. The alcohol’s the real treatment. They just administer the momentary relief; the numbing properties of the drink lasting as long as that Advil you took last night. By the next morning, your pain will be back stronger than ever.


Turning to your neighbor, you guess his story. Married to some witch who won’t take him seriously, you think. Probably has an affair or two going on to take away the sharp pain of his failure. You shake your head. At least you’re not that stupid. You were above that kind of thing, which, in today’s world, is something to be proud of.


The bartender returns and the annoyance of his presence takes away the happy solitude of your surroundings. It’s something about the way his eyebrows are raised at you. “Are you judging me?” you ask.


“Nope, just giving you more,” he replies without missing a beat. He knows what he’s talking about. Doesn’t mess around. You like that.


“Are you new?” you ask. He shakes his head. You trace the edges of your glass with your fingers. You’ve been coming here ever since it happened, which was about, what, three years ago? How could you not know him? His brown eyes and thinning hair look all too familiar, but at the same time, foreign. “I’ve never seen you before,” you decide.


He smiles. “We all tend to look alike after a while.”


“So do we,” you reply. He laughs.


“Waiting for someone?” he asks.


You shake your head. “I just like to drink.” You glance up at the TV screen in front of you, “And I like to watch the Mets lose. Used to make my wife Somehow I think instead of saying my wife you should say the wife. I don't know, it just seems to work better in this context. so pissed when they got crushed,” you smile.


Movement catches your eye and you see that your neighbor has noticed you. “Evening,” he says. “What’s the score? I can’t see it from over there.”


“Five, one, Mets,” you say.


He nods, his eyes blank, and looks back down at his glass. He lets out a chuckle, and you stare over at him. “Sorry, it’s just, I can’t believe I’m sitting here today of all days.”


“I’m pretty sure it’s Friday,” you say, your eyes going right to his ring. It’s wrapped so tightly around his skin that the gold is nearly embedded in his finger. You gulp for air, loosening your tie.


“No, it’s not that. My stepson’s getting married today. Didn’t even invite me to the wedding. Left my name off the invitation completely,” he shakes his head, tracing his beer glass with his fingertips.


You reach across the counter and pick up one of the peanuts from the customer complementary dish, taking the time to crack the nut, and chew it slowly. “I’m sorry,” you finally say. You take another sip, waiting for him to go on.


“It’s all right. I accepted the fact that he hates me a while ago,” he let out another laugh. “This one time, I told him I was going to take him to a baseball game. I begged my boss to let me out of work early, I bought these great tickets, and then when I went to pick him up for school, he wasn’t there. I was so damn scared that something happened. Ruth would have never forgiven me. I went into the principal’s office and asked if he knew where Jim was. Told me that his dad dropped by early to take him to the same baseball game.”


“Bastard,” you say, glancing up at the TV. Now the Mets are up by seven.


“Who, the kid or the dad?” he asks.


You scratch your chin, the stubble that has sprouted from your skin rough against your hand. “The kid,” you decide.


He shakes his head. “No, I would never blame that boy for anything. Divorce really hurt him,” he takes a sip of his beer, staring back at you, curious. “You got kids?”


Your heart drums fast against your chest and you loosen your tie a little more. You take a deep breath, the stale bar air slowly filling your lungs. “No,” you reply. “Don’t have enough patience for them.”


“Everyone’s different. Married?” he replies.


On the TV, a bat cracks against a baseball, the connection ringing loudly in your ears. You turn your face back to the screen just in time to see a Mets’ player in a white uniform running around the bases. “They’re playing well today,” you say.


He looks over at your hand and you feel your thumb rub the empty spot on your fourth finger. He waits for you to answer his question and you try to ignore him, looking up at the TV screen. Your mouth opens and before you can stop yourself, you hear yourself whisper those three crushing words.


“She left me,” you say. His eyes droop sympathetically and your stomach churns. Very effective line.


“I’m sorry,” he says.


“I guess we’re even then,” you reply. You turn back to the game. He looks down at his watch and lets out a low whistle. Reaching into his pocket, he takes out a wallet and places a crumpled twenty-dollar bill on the bar top.


“It was nice meeting you. I’d better leave,” he stands up. You nod. He hesitates, looking over at the bartender. “Don’t spend too much time here, all right?” he says and you smile, the muscles in your jaw hurting. Your comrade moves toward the exit, the door slamming shut after him.


The bartender gives you a new drink and you can hear your heartbeat pounding in your ears as he places the bottle back under the counter. The hairs on the back of your neck stand up and you try to look away. That golden object haunts you. It’s on his finger too. If you could move, you would, but you can’t remember which way the door is. Your thumb goes back to your finger and your anger makes you gag.


The door swings open, light trickling in and shocking your eyes. A woman walks up to the counter, dressed in a prim business suit. You hear her order a Cosmo. She glances over at you. You wait for her to look away in revulsion and disappointment, but she sits down, her mouth curving into a sympathetic grimace.


“Bad day?” she asks, her brown hair hanging limp in front of her face. You nod, cautious. You cement your mouth together, pressing your lips into a thin line. You look at her hand and see she isn’t wearing one. Your shoulders relax and you shift in your chair.


“Bad days make days like this even more special,” she says. You grind your teeth against one another. You were wrong about her; she wouldn’t understand your pain. “Got promoted today,” she says, her eyes sparkling. She takes a sip and looks back over at you.

“Congrats. I’ll drink to that,” you reply. Funny, you think. You’ve been drinking to a lot of things lately. Hahah this line was hilarious


“Thanks,” she smiles and traces the edges of her black purse with her fingertips.


“What’s your job?” you ask.


“I was a personal assistant to this editor at one of the magazines in NYC. It’s only about a 20 minute drive from my house, over in King's County. Anyway, my boss bumped me up to have a small advice column. You got to start somewhere,” she sighs and closes her eyes.


“Good luck with that,” you say and she tilts her head, studying you.


“What about you?” she asks. “What are you here for?”


“Just unwinding,” you choke out, the truth burning in your throat like bile. The backs of your eyes sting and you look down at your glass.


She stares at you, her eyes narrow, and sits up a little straighter. “You don’t have to tell me. It’s fine.” She pauses before continuing. “Just make sure you’re here because you want to be.”


“What do you mean?”


“Most people don’t come to bars because they want to get drunk. They come to bars to get away from something and this god-forsaken place is their only option for escape. Which is a bit pathetic if you ask me,” she takes another sip of the pink liquid, then stops, her hand pausing in mid-air. Her words singe your skin and you take a large gulp of your gin and tonic. You look back over at her and she blinks, staring around at the empty bar, and then glancing down at her watch. “Oh my god,” she says. “What am I doing here?”


What is she talking about? She stands up, her hands shaking as she drops a few bills on the counter. The money is so straight the bills look like they just popped out of an ATM. “Thanks,” she mutters and with that, she stands up and walks out the door.


Thanks? you ask. Thanks for what? The bartender and his gold ring returns, and the snake inside you hisses. The woman’s ending question rings through your head. What was she doing here? you ask. What are you doing here? You squeeze your eyes shut, racking your brain for a reason. The bar really isn’t anything special, is it? You force your eyes open, making yourself stare at the object on the bartender’s finger. Be indifferent, you tell yourself, but your throat burns with a thirst you didn’t know you had.


No matter how many places you’ve moved, you can feel her presence everywhere. She lives in the simple bands of gold you never really took note of before it happened. You look away from the ring, coming face to face with the reality of your surroundings. The dinginess of the bar, the dim light the sun casts from the windows, reflecting off the old bottles of liquor that line the walls sends your mind reeling.


You stare into the short glass, seeing the vague outline of understanding at the bottom. It’s not the bartender’s fault that he has everything in the world. That he sees things for what they are. You stand up, swaying under the influence of the lights around you. You push open the door and step out into the sunset. I loved that paragraph.


The cars buzz past you, on their way to warm homes filled with laughing children and stoic housewives. You ignore it all, letting your feet take you home. You fumble with the lock and you walk into your sad apartment in Brooklyn. Dodger territory, you think. You walk past the drawer where you left the postcard she mailed to you from Cabo. There had been a picture of a white sandy beach on the front of the square piece of cardboard. She hadn’t bothered to scrawl anything except her name on the back. You had gotten it around Christmas last year. Great present, you think.


The room starts spinning and you steady yourself against the teak table in your kitchen. Regaining balance, you force your feet to walk to your bathroom mirror. Here, under the haze, you look at your red bloodshot eyes, the lifeless holes of your pupils. You pry open the mirror cupboard and your fingers find the box where you left that golden piece of heaven and hell. It glints in your vision, beautiful. You slip it on your finger in one movement, as though you gulped down a shot. The cool metal hurts, struggling to come off your skin. With that one action, the pieces of your bandaged, taped-up heart explode and you fold into yourself, trying to stem the bleeding. Pinpricks of pain shoot through your core. You stare up at the bathroom light through your blurry vision and, for the first time, you understand what it means to be alive. Wow! Now that paragraph really was amazing. Fantastic way to end it too.



I really liked this. It was refreshing to read something in 2nd person. Anyway, here we go:

Narrative voice.
It was very interesting. I loved how you wrote in second person instead of first or third.

Description and imagery.
Was excellent. I felt that you put in just enough information without putting too much. My favourite part was the last line:

Pinpricks of pain shoot through your core. You stare up at the bathroom light through your blurry vision and, for the first time, you understand what it means to be alive

That line is simply amazing. An excellent end to the story.


Dialogue.
It was realistic and well done. I could see the conversations because they really were what we'd expect real people to say. This contributes a lot to your character development. So well done

Characterization.
Hmm... It was good. The MC was well developed, but it's always harder to develop characters in second person. The man has an interesting way of thinking too. The way he thinks of marriages and such. I applaud you for that. It is very well done.

Grammar.
Impeccable. Extremely well done, in fact, I don't think I noticed a mistake in the whole thing, although I'm not normally one to critique on grammar.

Overall.
I liked it. It was refreshing and different. Keep writing it. My favourite thing has to be the descriptions and imagery. You seem to have mastered them perfectly. You don't put too much in but you put enough in to make it interesting. Sorry I couldn't have been of much help, but I do hope that I've been of some help.

-Kirsten xxx

The promised critique!

Before I begin, I'd just like to point out one line that I had a problem with…

“Everyone’s different. Married?” he replies.

If you read it out loud, it feels a little weird. Just going from the 'everyone's different' to 'married?' so fast – it needs a break or something in between.

Now on to the real critique.

you need a motive

I'm really not sure why the man got up and left. I mean, I know it's because what the woman said, but it seems like he had the perfect opportunity to listen to her, waited for it to pass, and then left. It was a bit weird, so his departure took me for surprise. Try smoothing that over a bit?

you need some closure

The last paragraph confused me a bit. Is the reason he feels alive because he realizes that his wife – and the ring – only bring pain, and so he can move on? I thought that was it, but the second to last sentence almost sounds like he's dying, which confused me. Decide exactly what you want to say there and try making it a bit more clear.

look at the time!

This one confused me a lot after the second person did it. You had them both look at their watches and leave, even making the woman say something to make him think about this – 'why am I here?' It's obviously meaningful, but I didn't really catch why it was.

details, m'dear – I need details

One thing that could make this piece even better would be details. What about the other people in the bar – are their booths? Is the room dark? Is it daytime out – snowing, perhaps? Is there smoke in the air? Especially since it's second person, drag us all the way into the scene.

Other than that, I really enjoyed this piece. Second person is tricky, but in short stories like this I think it can be pulled off.

PM me for anything!

~JFW1415

Thank you both! I'll definitley look into your comments and edit my story! Cheers!