Running for you

My arms are pumping, lungs burning. I cant get enough oxygen. It doesn't matter, I push myself harder blotting out all evidence of pain from my mind and body. The finish line is in sight. I push myself harder still, make myself run faster. I'm nearly there. I can here the cheers coming from the crowd, but there not for me, there for him. He's right behind me now, I can hear him panting. He can not win, I wont let him. I search deep inside me for a final burst of energy. I find it. My body lurches forward, my legs carrying me faster than ever before. I throw myself over the finish line and collapse in a heap on the cold hard ground, my ears are ringing, lungs burning, begging for air. My mouth is open wide sucking in great gulps of fresh spring air. An official hands me a place card. I came first. The crowd lets out a small sigh. They wanted Jake to win.

I peel myself off the ground and put my track suit on and move over to an empty bench. A girl sits down next to me, I think she's in my class "nice race Pippin" she says, I nod and mumble something before standing up and moving off to an unpopulated patch of grass. I don't want to talk to anyone, I want to be alone, I need to be.

Start of prize giving is announced over the loud speaker and I go to stand with the other recipients . My name is called, I walk up the steps to the stage, the steps I have walked so many times before, and accept my trophy for first place.

At the end of the day I watch as all the families get into their cars and drive off, parents giving into plea's for McDonald's. When everyone has left I swing my leg over my bike and ride home in the thin drizzle and fog, the cold breaking through the layers of my windbreaker .

The house is in darkness but I know dads home, it's been like this since mum left, always dark, never light. I unlock the front door and walk silently towards my room. A floor board creaks. "That you Pippin?" comes my dads voice, his words slurred

"yeah dad, its me" I call back. Sighing I change direction and walk towards the lounge. My father is slumped in his chair watching the rugby , a bottle of JD on the side table.

"Hey son, how'd your race go eh? Poor your old man a drink will ya"

I picked up the bottle of whisky and poured a glass for him then another for myself

"it was fine. I won"

"that's my boy, how 'bout your brother aye, did he give you a run for ya money?"

"Jake came second" my voice was tight.

Dad smiled "both my boys winning today, say did Jakey come back with you?"

I sighed, "no dad he went home with mum and Derek"

Dads face fell "oh" was all he said before draining his glass and turning back to face the TV. I was dismissed. Yanking my pack from the floor I stormed out of the room taking the bottle of Whisky with me. In my room I slammed the door shut and threw the trophy hard into the wall. Crying I fell back onto my bed and raised the bottle to my lips, its contents burning my its way down my throat, leaving a bitter taste in my mouth. No matter how hard I tried I was never good enough. I picked my pen knife up off the bed side table and drew a long red line up the inside of my arm next to the others, a stab of pain shot up my arm before settling to a persistent burning buts its alright its a good pain. I reached for the whisky and took another long swig, leaving a bloody hand print where i had gripped it. I smiled, another race another cut. One day it will all be over

Hmm...I like the storyline so far. It seems like it could develop into something interesting. Althought I do have a few comments.

Now, a few grammar mistakes here and there I understand, but this was almost overflowing with them. Did you reread this before posting? Make sure you're capitalizing, adding correct puncutation, and using the right word. Many times you used 'there' instead of 'they're'. Catch yourself when you make these mistakes. It'll help you become a better writer.

Anyways, it was pretty good but needs improvement which I'm positive you're capable of doing. Keep writing!
PM if you need any advice!

~mybrokenreality

Hi there! Esther landing in for a review.

This was quite good, really. Here are my comments:

You need to proof read this.

Before you post something, be sure to run it through a word check. You would have caught a lot of the grammatical issues this way. Microsoft word in my opinion has the best spell check, but the Wordpad application that is pre installed in your computer (Probably) has one too. Your comma use is also kind of random. You place them here or there just because you want too. Don't do that. There are some good articles on YWS about comma use.

Good dialogue can make a story, and bad dialogue can destroy it. Right now, the grammar of your dialogue is hard to understand. While the lines themselves are good, they are hard to read. Here is a good article about dialogue punctuation.

topic41705.html

oh, and this one!

topic44898.htm

Crank up the emotion

I like your story a lot. It's interesting and emotional. My tip for your story would be to make the relationship between the two brothers more appearent. We get that Jake is the favorite. Make us feel Pippin's pain. Don't just tell us he went to his room and cut himself. Let us know how he feels to be rejected. Right now, you are just telling us what he does. We want to know what he thinks, too.

Finally, make the dad character more believable.

It's hard for the reader to believe that a drunk, life wasting father like him would even pick a favorite kid. I would think he would just sit around all day. Believability is a must for a short story like this. Work on him.

OVERALL: Very good work. I liked this a lot. The only real thing you have to work on is your grammar skills. They really detract from the story at the moment. You don't even have to be a pro at grammar, so long as you run it through a spell check, which I think you failed to do. But over all, great job. Very emotional and very real, for the most part. Keep writing.

Hello there! I'm Christina and I'll be reviewing your work this fine Monday.

Good Things:

First off, I really like your title. It creates questions and interest, and it made me click on this.

I also enjoyed the first paragraph, as it's very descriptive and you are creative with your word choice. Opening paragraphs are pretty important, in my opinion, and you have done this well.

Things That You Could Work On:

I search deep inside me for a final burst of energy. I find it.

I feel like the second sentence could be fit into the first one. It just seems kind of choppy.

A girl sits down next to me, I think she's in my class "nice race Pippin" she says, I nod and mumble something before standing up and moving off to an unpopulated patch of grass.

I suppose the girl's words should be on the next line and indented and capitalized and all those things. Also, from this point until his father is talking to him, I thought that this was a girl. It's a bit over-due to tell the reader his gender at the end of the first part. We also never know his age.

I know the end is supposed to be emotional, but I think you should go a different way about executing it. I feel kind of like I'm watching this character from a distance, and I'm not full intrigued by him. One thing you might want to try to improve on is putting a little more of Pippin's thoughts and emotions into this first part.

I agree with the others in the sense that this does need to be proofread. But that can always be fixed.

Overall:

I like this idea, with the races. It's unique, and I can safely say that I've never read a story about it before. While you are vague with information that should be a bit more apparent, you do give us a general idea of the situation. With a little work this could be very good.

Happy writing!