Warning: This work has been rated 18+ for violence and mature content.
“Doofus!” Jack ruffled his boyfriend’s pink hair, grinning widely. His boyfriend, Mark, had actually cooked them dinner for once, even though they normally had some form of takeout. “You didn’t have to do this!”
“Yeah, well, I like to cook meals so that you don’t just eat plain fast food!” Mark chuckled. The meal in question was pasta with alfredo sauce, with pork and a salad.
“So do you!” Jack countered. Mark put a hand to his chest in mock-hurt.
“I do not! I sometimes cook myself food when you go out for the night with your friends!” Mark chuckled. “By the way, I’m going to my mother’s place for a few days on the 24th.”
“Such a momma's’ man, going to see her every month!” Jack poked fun at him.
“Yeah? Well, she is by herself, and I don’t like to see her alone for very long.” Mark sighed.
“I was just joking with you, I know you care about her. The 24th? That is in…” Jack mentally counted the days, but Mark beat him to it.
“Five days.”
“I always notice how fidgety you get in the days leading up to it, why don’t you just go early, surprise her? You see me so much I don’t know why you don’t want to get rid of me.” Jack giggled.
“I do like spending time with you!” Mark defended quickly, “I just want to be great when I arrive, so I overthink it a bit.” He mumbles. They had finished their dinner, and Jack took the plates and put them in the apartment’s dishwasher.
“Come to bed you big doof!” Jack laughed, and dragged his boyfriend to bed.
Five days later, Mark was packing and checking, and packing again. Eventually he was satisfied, and took the one suitcase. He was about to head out the door, when Jack grabbed the hood of the hoodie Mark was wearing and span him around.
“Forgetting something?” Jack tilted his head and pouted slightly. Mark chuckled at his boyfriend’s childishness, and pecked him on the cheek, and then the lips.
“See you in a few days, Lovely!” Mark smiled, and Jack pulled him in for a longer kiss.
“See you in a few days!” Jack said, breaking the kiss, then spinning Mark back around and shoving him out the door, “Now don’t keep yer ma waiting!”
A few hours later, Jack was flipping through channels on the TV. There. Was. Nothing. On. He had also recently finished his most recent game, and there was nothing to do. He was too awake to go to bed, and it was only 7:00, way too early. Jack decided to go for a walk.
As Jack was walking by the local park, he saw a familiar hoodie, but shrugged as it was a cold night, and he was probably just missing Mark. The hood was over the top of the person’s head, so he couldn’t see their hair. But suddenly, with a large gust of wind, that wasn’t the case anymore.
Jack gasped as the familiar pink fluff of hair was revealed, “Mark?” He called out, and then the person, who by this point Jack confirmed as Mark ran. Jack chased after him.
Mark cut through the park and into the dense trees in the surrounding area. Jack kept calling out Mark’s name, trying to get him to stop. Finally, fatigue hit Jack, and he had to slow down and stop.
Why? Why was Mark here and not at his mother’s? Jack had met her before during the holidays, the woman had looked him over in an almost intimidating manner, before accepting him and opening up. But the thing is, Mark’s mom was three towns over, it made no sense.
The thought hit Jack like a brick, could Mark be.. cheating.. on him? Tears welled up in Jack’s eyes involuntarily. It would explain a lot, the restlessness beforehand, the calmness after the fact. They didn’t really have sex often, Jack didn’t think Mark wanted to. All Mark had to do was ask.
Jack snapped to attention when he heard a beastial growl, he had momentarily forgotton he was in the woods. Jack started walking back towards where he came, and on reaching his first clearing, the source of the growl leaped onto him, knocking him to the ground. It was a massive wolfish thing. Jack looked it in the eye for a second, the cold pits of the golden yellow eyes staring back at him, caused him to look away and whimper, he closed his eyes, waiting for the beast’s next move.
All of a sudden, the weight of the beast lifted, Jack opened his eyes to see a second beast had jumped onto the first, and was growling at it ferociously.
Jack scrambled up, eyes trained on the beasts, and he gasped as he saw how humanoid they were. Then, Jack’s breath caught in his chest, there was a pink fluff on the top of the second beast’s head. Just like Mark’s hair. The best in question, turned to look at Jack, and the eyes told him everything, this was Mark.
With adrenaline pumping through his system again, Jack took off running, away from the two beasts, which one of them was apparently his boyfriend, away from the woods, and didn’t stop running until he was back at his apartment.
Jack closed the door to his apartment, sliding down the wood, he was choking on his breath, trying to catch it again. Three words ran through his head, over and over, like fish.
That was Mark. That was Mark. That was Mark. That was Mark…
A few days later, when Jack had calmed down, he waited by the door for Mark to come home. He was originally terrified of the bea- that form his boyfriend took, but now was curious. It was the day that Mark was supposed to come home, and Jack had cooked them dinner for once. Eventually, Jack got tired of standing and waiting, so he went to the couch in front of the TV, and laid down. Eventually, Jack fell asleep.
When Jack awoke, sun was beaming down on his face, he sat up, and looked over to the table. The dishes were right where he had left them, Mark didn’t come home last night. Jack called Mark’s phone maybe five times that day alone, 15 more during the week afterwards. But there still was no sign of Mark.
After the first week, someone finally did pick up the phone. “Hello?” Jack had never heard this man before.
“Yes, hello? I am looking for Mark Fischbach?” Jack asked hopefully.
“Sorry kid, I just got my new cellphone yesterday, they gave me this number, I think your Mark changed his number without telling you.” Jack deflated with those words.
“Sorry for bothering you.” Jack said, dejectedly, and hung up. Jack felt sick to his stomach, Mark didn’t want to talk to him. Mark probably didn’t want Jack in his life anymore.
Jack cried himself to sleep that night.
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
Possible AI signals:
Original Text:
Are you sure you want to delete this comment? This cannot be undone.
Mark this comment as a review? Points will be awarded to the poster.
Your comment was posted, but it wasn’t long enough to count as a review. Reviews need about four complete sentences (at least 250 characters). Try writing another review that explains your thoughts in more detail — the author will appreciate it, and you’ll earn points for it.
125,005 Literary Works • 672,805 Reviews
Howdy, I thought I'd take a look at this. I'm going to make some comments as I read through and then try to give you my overall thoughts at the end.
The repetition of boyfriend in the first two sentences puts me on edge. It feels redundant and I'm a really big fan of smooth flowing, efficient stories. I think you could easily say 'Jack ruffled Mark's pink hair, grinning widely; his boyfriend had actually cooked them dinner for once, even though they normally had some form of takeout.'Specifics
1.
2. This could be phrased as an action rather than a 'telling' statement. Like: 'Mark speared the pasta on his fork with a piece of pork and a slither of salad.' It's not a big change but it puts the focus on the characters and helps start creating that connection between them and the reader.
3. You've used chuckled as a dialogue tag twice in quick succession. Sometimes said is actually better because we skim over it and it doesn't break us out of the story. More unusual tags like chuckled draw attention, especially when repeated. Also, when there are only two speakers you only need the tags for the first line or two of dialogue. After that, if they're not adding anything to the character development then drop them.
4.
5. Try to avoid this. It might look cool in a book which uses a lot of vernacular or modern text speech/ style but it feels very internet/ teenage here.
6.
Overall
It's too early to comment much but I think it's a fun start and gets quickly to the action. I'd like to see a little more description, especially on things like smell or touch. The woods scene felt very rushed and I couldn't get a strong feel for Jack's fear. Describing more would help build some atmosphere there.
I also can't distinguish the boys very much yet and it's early so that's not too worrying but try to give us some more dialogue and help us work out a few of their personality quirks. Is one more physically affectionate than another? Is Mark more serious than Jack? There are only vague hints at the moment.
Best of luck with this!
~Heather
This is Atsmai here for a review!
I don't see why this has been so passed up, because I like this, but here are some ways to help improve the story.
At the beginning, the dialogue feels forced, try to make it smooth like when you did this sentence:
That sentence is smooth and realistic, I could actually see someone doing this. The characters feel mostly real and I'm kind of crushed when Mark left Jack. I forgot the title and then was like, "What is this?!?!?! Werewolves!?!??!"
Overall: Parts of the dialogue are forced, I like the characters, the world isn't established much yet, but it may not need to be, and the plot is going in not a messy line.