Brian's Eyes

It was Brian’s eyes that Abby liked most. They were dark brown in color, chocolate brown, she liked to think; a rich, creamy chocolate brown. Whenever his gaze feel on Abby, it made her feel warm, special, like she was bathing in a midsummer’s sun.
His smile came next. The tilted, playful grin on his face; that’s what Abby loved about him. She loved his laugh, his smile, his eyes. She loved everything about him. Being in his presence was like being wrapped in a comforting hug, and Abby never wanted to let go.
“Hey,” Brian began. He slid into the seat beside Abby and nudged her with his elbow. A fluttery feeling rushed through Abby’s arm, teased her shoulder, and danced on her spine.
“Hey,” Abby replied, grinning. She made careful to tilt her head at an angle. She read somewhere in a teen magazine that the opposite gender was attracted to those kinds of gestures. “Where were you?” Abby continued as she swiped her bangs away from her eyes. She read that in the magazine as well.
“The dentist,” Brian replied. He began to unload his supplies from his backpack. “Just a yearly check up.”
Suddenly there was the sharp rap of a pencil on chalkboard and Abby reluctantly faced the head of the classroom to find Mrs. Meyer glaring at her mercilessly.
“Mr. Fleming,” she began sternly, a menacing glare planted on her face. Her eyes and crooked nose were like a hawk’s. “Just because you arrived late to class, it does not give you the right to interrupt.” She rapped her pencil against the board with victorious triumph.
“Sorry,” Brian gathered, fidgeting awkwardly in his chair. “I’ll stop.” Satisfied, Mrs. Meyer nodded and proceeded in writing the evening’s homework on the chalkboard.
“That was close,” Brian whispered, leaning towards Abby. She caught the brief aroma of his after-shave and savored it like she would a Starbuck’s cappuccino.
“Well,” she toyed. “You did come in pretty late.” Brian grinned sheepishly.
“Hey,” he jested. “Watch it.”
The bell rang.
“I guess it’s lunch now,” Abby conjectured, gathering her belongings and stuffing them into the bottom of her backpack. “Do you want to sit together?” she added with hopeful candor.
“Sure,” Brian said as he pushed his chair under the desk. Abby noticed that he was wearing two different socks. One was gray, the other white. “I’ll be right there.” Finally, Abby thought complacently. Finally I get my time to be with Brian. Beaming, she traipsed out of the classroom. But her moment of happiness disappeared in the blink of an eye when she found herself crashing into the tallest girl she had ever seen.
“What on earth do you think you’re doing!?” an emphatic gasp came from above her. Abby looked up.
Melanie. She should’ve known.
“Oh, u-uh, sorry, I didn’t mean to,” Abby stammered. She kept her eyes fixated on the tops of her scuffed Chucks. Melanie Baxter was the tallest girl in the entire sophomore class. Besides that, she was also the most popular. Her gorgeous hazel eyes melted the hearts of many, and her sky-high bronzed legs left every boy at Montgomery High drooling for more. She was flat out perfect. At least, in Abby’s opinion. She was smart. She was dazzling. She was everything every guy ever dreamed of. Except for one thing.
She was Brian’s girlfriend.
“Sorry, I really didn’t mean to,” Abby continued.
Melanie rolled her eyes and flipped her golden tendrils over one shoulder.
“It’s ok,” she said bluntly. Students streamed into the halls of Montgomery High as lunch began. Abby hesitated, unsure if she should walk away.
“Hey Abby!” She whipped around to see Brian Fleming walking directly towards her. That fluttery feeling came rushing back to Abby’s stomach like a lake churning above it’s waterfall. “Hey, so I was thinking,” he continued, panting slightly. Abby looked up at him attentively. Their eyes met, and Abby filled to the brim with excitement. “Maybe we could sit-”
But he could no longer finish his sentence, for a tall, lean girl sporting a striped BCBG tote grabbed him by the arm.
“Brian,” Melanie began flatly. She weaved her delicate fingers through Brian’s. “Let’s go eat lunch. Unless…” she paused, thinking. “Unless you have to study? In that case, go somewhere else.”
Brian cleared his throat, then glanced at Abby tentatively.
“Oh,” he said meekly. He looked at the floor. “Yeah. I forgot.” Abby shuffled her feet uneasily. “Sorry Abby,” he apologized, avoiding eye contact. “I guess I forgot that Melanie and I were having lunch together.”
Abby’s heart fell. Brian was everything she had ever wanted, and today she had finally been given the chance to be with him; alone. Until Melanie came along.
She held back tears and swallowed, unsure of what to say.
“Oh that’s ok,” she finally blurted. She stared at the cold, trodden tiles on the hall floor. “In that case…I’ll be fine.” She gave Brian a weak smile.
“Let’s go,” Melanie whined. She reminded Abby of a petulant toddler; complaining and unsatisfied. “I have to re-do my nails!”
And with that, they were gone. Abby watched as Melanie turned on a designer kitten heel and marched down the hall. Like a puppy following it’s master, Brian trailed along behind her with his burly hands stuffed deeply into his pockets.
Abby sat quietly in the hall beside a door. There wasn’t a single human being in sight, for they had all disappeared to the school cafeteria.
She was alone. As she fished a brown paper sack out from the bottom of her backpack, Abby thought.
She was used to things like that. Being alone, that is. Ever since she had begun her years at Montgomery High School, Abby felt isolated, abandoned. But when Brian came along, everything began to feel alright. Being with Brian made Abby feel happy, content. She would do anything to be with him, but as long as Melanie was concerned, that dream would never come true.
But Abby could live with that. She had for the past sixteen years. Even if she could never really, truly, be with Brian, his friendship was all that mattered to her. Walking with him to class, whispering to him in Chemistry, laughing with him after school; these moments were all preciously preserved in Abby’s memory. She was alive, she was happy, and her friendship with Brian only made her feel freer.
She got up, brushed the bread crumbs off her lap, and opened the door.

I really like how you described melanie. It's a really good bit of writing.

Her gorgeous hazel eyes melted the hearts of many, and her sky-high bronzed legs left every boy at Montgomery High drooling for more.

This is really cute, are you going to add more to this or leave it as it is?
xxx

So, a critique.

Well, to comment on the piece in general, quality of writing aside, this is quite clichéd. The love triangle between the cute guy who happens to be with the head cheerleader, and the pretty outsider who loves him more than anything else in the world: your piece is only slightly outside the formula and it's not distanced enough from the same generic teen romance we've read a million times. I think you're still subconsciously repeating the romance you've read somewhere else - I've done it, written 20000 words of a novel only to discover I'd been literally reiterating a book I'd read a few years before and almost forgotten I owned. Having said all that, I think you take a very clichéd plotline and make it offbeat enough to read, but perhaps it's simply that I feel like I've read a similar story before.
Equally, your characters are sometimes a bit two dimensional. We don't know anything about Melanie other than her basically being a jerk, albeit a 'perfect' one; Brian is the stereotypical guy all the girls are crushing on. Since we don't know much about Abby either, I didn't feel anything for her at the end and when Melanie caught her with Brian, I could only side with Melanie. She's Brian's girlfriend, isn't she? We need to feel so strongly for Abby that we support her in her attempts to take Brian away from Melanie, because otherwise it just seems like she's the one in the wrong. The parts I did like in this area were the little quirky moments where Abby would mention something she'd noticed about Brian. They were particular and unique.

Whenever his gaze feel on Abby

fell?

The tilted, playful grin on his face; that’s what Abby loved about him. She loved his laugh, his smile, his eyes. She loved everything about him.

This sounds very repetitive. I get the idea; you don't have to mention it so many times. If you do, then make it different. In essence you're just repeating yourself here.

A fluttery feeling rushed through Abby’s arm, teased her shoulder, and danced on her spine.

I liked that sentence. That's what I mean by making it your own.

She made careful to tilt her head at an angle

"Made careful" reads weirdly. I like the idea behind this sentence, but it doesn't flow.

As a general point to add that I've just remembered reading back through this, you seem to have a bit of an obsession with speech tags. Not everything has to have a "he said, she said" after it, and certainly not everything has to have an adverb with those speech tags too. Since almost every spoken sentence has a speech tag after it in this piece, you could probably afford to glean a few off, especially when you start using words like "conjectured" in an attempt to find a tag. Also, I think you use "Brian gathered" at one point. Can somebody gather in speech? It just read oddly.

“Just because you arrived late to class, it does not give you the right to interrupt.”

Again, this reads a little oddly. "Arriving late to class does not give you the right to interrupt." Does that flow better, do you think?

victorious triumph.

Aren't victory and triumph essentially the same thing?

Abby noticed that he was wearing two different socks. One was gray, the other white.

That's one of those quirky interruptions I mentioned. They're just interjected at perfect moments, which I think is your writing at it's best in this piece.

She was everything every guy ever dreamed of. Except for one thing.
She was Brian’s girlfriend.

This reads as if her being Brian's girlfriend meant that guys were less attracted to her, which I suppose, could be true, but I don't think was your intended effect.
You spend a whole paragraph prior to this quote describing how perfect Melanie is. If you can change that, do. You even mention that she's perfect: nobody is in real life, and nobody should be in your story. If her one flaw is that she's mean, then okay; it's clear that she's superficial too, so why does Abby claim that, in her opinion, Melanie is perfect?

“It’s ok,” she said bluntly.

"It's okay" or "It's OK", I think.

She weaved her delicate fingers through Brian’s.

Again, really nice imagery.

his burly hands

I think 'burly' is the wrong word here. He has well-built hands?

By the time you get to the ending and you start telling us that she's an outcast, you lost me a little. Your writing is so good in places where your style gets going and you tell us these little details that make your characters, your characters, that it seems such a waste to choose a plotline that has been done so often before, it's become a cliché. You do write it well, but I think you could take your writing further in a more original environment, since you obviously have the skills to do it.

I will point out that this isn't really my type of story, so this crit is probably quite harsh. But hopefully I've helped you, because that's the goal at the end of the day.

I really liked your writing style. However, I agree with Jetpack that this plot is really cliched, and that we need to feel more attached to your characters. I'm not exactly sure how. But this piece didn't hold my attention that well only because it wasn't an origional story. But, again, you have great style of writing.

Something I noticed was you wrote:

Ever since she had begun her years at Montgomery High School, Abby felt isolated, abandoned. But when Brian came along, everything began to feel alright.

And then in the next paragraph you wrote:

But Abby could live with that. She had for the past sixteen years.

If she's new to the school, how could she have wanted to date Brian for sixteen years?


This was well written, but try to do something more origional. Good job, though.

Allrighty, this was good but it could be better.

First off, the cliche portion was way up there. Everything from the girl on the outside looking in to the sweet, jock-like guy who is with the hottest girl but secretly is falling for the pretty outsider. Way too cliche to even begin.

But at the same time, some parts were really good, like Brian and Abby's banter in the beginning or her monologue at the end. Those two parts made up for the love-triangle that has been thoroughly overdone.

Just tweak it up, give us something to be interested in. Give us some flare! By this, I can tell you have a talent. Spice this up and you'll be fine

Hey there,

I liked the story! The description of Brian actually reminds me of my dad (whose name ironically enough is Brian )

I really liked the amount of detail you have, and the description (is that the same thing? oh well )

I only saw one thing that wasn't right.

Whenever his gaze feel on Abby,

fell I believe

Keep up the awesome work! - Irish

the only other thing i see is:

"Finally I get my time to be with Brian."
You changed the point of view lol

I think its very cute I like your description and how you made Abby alone. Very good story and I hope to see more!