Warning: This work has been rated 18+ for language.
Let’s get this started. We have a long day ahead of us and I don’t want to get sidetracked or anything. I’ll edit later. I know this is going to be shit but let’s just get this over with. It’s Wednesday and I’m out waking to J.’s café for coffee. I have a computer with me on which I am working on a nonfiction book. They are returning I tell you. Nonfiction’s back. It’s going to be part memoir part essay collection part lists of my favorite stuff. Hopefully, it’ll get finished. I really hope it does.
J. had just opened up. Morning is beautiful and in this story it’s going to be autumn all the time.This story is going to have a lot of talk about Jennifer who we are probably not going to be seeing much except for in flashbacks. She was my wife. Was. I don’t keep in touch with her. I think I should call her up sometime and ask her how she is for friend’s sake. I know she wouldn’t mind. I hope she wouldn’t mind.
I wanted her to leave. It’s not like she wasn’t going to. We pretended it was mutual. I still wake up early on Wednesdays, and make breakfast for her, thinking how tired she usually gets after Yoga, and how maybe she’ll smile at me when she comes home and sees me at least trying to make things work. Trying. Then I remember there is no Jennifer; I doubt she even does Yoga anymore. She can’t keep her head into something for long. She’s restless. To tell the truth, we’re all restless. But she’s a hell lot restless than any other person I’ve ever met. I’ve known her since middle school. She’s known me since senior year in high school.
J. likes me because I show up every day and let him have the papers when I’m done reading them. He is the only sane guy in this city. He is the only guy I would talk about my problems. Hell, I don’t even know his last name, or, his first, but I trust him enough to say things I’ve never said to anybody else. I don’t know how old he is. Maybe 50. Maybe 65. I can’t really tell. He has long hair, grey hair. He once told me he doesn’t have a dick. I don’t know whether he was joking or not. Probably wasn’t.
He brings
me coffee. I love him. He wants to tell me something.
“A couple of guys came looking for you, kinda weird looking.”
“Oh. Did they say why?”
“Nah. They asked if I knew your address or something. I said I didn’t. Which is
true. Why don’t you tell me where you live?”
“I live somewhere very near, J.”
“But exactly where?”
“I don’t like telling people that.”
He makes a face, leaves me with my coffee. I wonder who wanted to see me. I
don’t really know many people. I’m not the kind of guy who’d have people he
doesn’t know look for him. It’s weird. Jennifer was like me. In a sense,
Jennifer was me. She was a girl version of me. What I’d be like if I had a
vagina.
When I read the stories, I always root for the wife. Never for the mistress. I hate the mistress. I don’t want the wife to leave. I don’t want her to give up, lose faith. There’s still time. They can patch things up. Jennifer agreed with me. She used to love the wife. Especially, the bitchy wife. That’s one of the things I like about her. One of the many things.
I finish my coffee and read the op-eds. When I start glossing over the International news, two men come up to me. They tie me, throw me inside a minivan, and take me away.
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125,020 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Hey, Feelingz! Welcome to YWS, hope you like it here!
Let's dive into this. In the first paragraph, you have a few nitpicks from me. "J.'s cafe" looks a little weird to me, mostly because of the period after J. Would it work with just "J's cafe"? Because the period kind of distracts the reader, like it did to me. Also, the sentences in this are pretty simple, which isn't always a good thing. Sometimes the sentences are so simple they sound a bit strange together, and you don't want to do that. So, you could create some compound sentences (sentences made up of two but connected somehow) or use semicolons. And a bit of irrelevance shows up near the middle. "They are returning, I tell you" and "Nonfiction's back" gets the reader sidetracked, which you said you would not do in the beginning, so yeah. If you decide to keep it, though, put a comma after "returning".
"It’s Wednesday and I’m out waking to J.’s café for coffee. I have a computer with me on which I am working on a nonfiction book. They are returning I tell you. Nonfiction’s back. It’s going to be part memoir part essay collection part lists of my favorite stuff. Hopefully, it’ll get finished. I really hope it does."
In the last few sentences, it's kind of like, this happened. That happened. We're done. You didn't use much description, and you could possibly put some more thoughts in there. I have questions left unanswered, such as "Did the character fight at all?" I mean, surely he would have kicked or punched or something. Nobody would sit there as some strangers tie you up. I also need more dialogue in his work, because nobody talks except for J and the main character. Dialogue makes it more interesting, but don't use too much. That could be bad. The whole piece, is, in fact, a bit flat-out, and you overall need to use some more vivid verbs, amazing adjectives, knockout nouns (I have to admit, that sucked). More...verve, I guess. But I'm not saying this is bad. Just a few fix-ups will get this work up and going!
-wisegirl22
Hello!
I enjoyed the near bluntness of the MC, and how... random, I suppose, the thoughts and dialogue seemed. It was like normal conversation and thoughts. Writers often have to spray out the average thoughts of characters, hanging them out to dry so the random, unneeded things get cut from the script. This makes stories easier to follow--and somewhat more appropriate, if past experience tells me anything--but also takes away from the human-ness of characters, and a lot of relationship development within characters as well. You found a type of balance between the tow, edging more towards realistic thought, and it was fun to read! 
Abrupt, shocking, and completely unexpected, but interesting.
Good luck!
First of all, welcome to the site. I hope you stick around and enjoy your stay
Second of all: This title! xD I really didn't know what to expect with a title like that--it's very good, and is what encouraged me to check this piece out--so this took me doubly off-guard. I have never, ever seen a first chapter written like this; I know it's first person, but it's like the narrator is aware that this is a book, and that he's writing it, and a few other things I can't quite pinpoint. I'm not sure if I like it, but I'm not sure if a actually dislike it either. Its a strange feeling, and might take some getting used to.
It was pretty short, too... Which is good if you want to get reviews fast, I suppose. I was actually expecting a long one--if I see something I want to read, I try not to scroll through to see how long it is. I did it once, and got discouraged from reading it. I came back later, and the story was awesome; I could have read it sooner, so now... yeah--so this surprised me as well. Not in a bad way!
Now, you did say this is a draft--or your MC did...? A little confused here--so I won't go into the sentence structure too much. I will warn you that, for most of the chapter, you are doing something my old Creative Writing teacher called 'telling', not 'showing'. I couldn't hold a mental image of your characters, the location, or even the weather for more than a few seconds simply because it wasn't there. I highly suggest adding some telltale descriptive details that help readers out when trying to form images. It really does help!
Also... nice ending
Keep writing! Sorry for the long review xD I hope you polish this up someday... it could really make an interesting story