Published May 30, 2010
Ka-dumb. Ka-dumb.
“Jennifer?”
She was staring idly at the menu, fingers catching in her knotty hair. “Hm?” She didn’t look up.
Ka-dumb. Ka-dumb. Ka-dumb.
“Jennifer Whitison…” He cleared his throat. “Ahem. Jennifer Whitison…” His voice drifted off.
“Yes?” She said, unsmiling, finger spinning around the spaghetti and calamari dishes now.
Ka-dum. Ka-dum. Ka-dumdum.
“…Well, uh…uh…” I have to find a special way to say this. Not the straight out proposal. Something like… “How do you feel about rings?”
“Wha-?” She looked up, definitely confused.
And that is definitely, not it. Gah! No, no, no, no, no! I swear, this proposal sounded much better in my head. “I mean, uh, golden rings!” WRONG! The buzzer sounds. What am I doing? I must sound so dumb! Maybe I’m not meant to make proposals. Maybe I’m not good enough for her.
He looked hopeful, though his cheeks were ablaze. And what, what exactly was he doing with his spoon? He was scratching the spoon against a pimple on his forefinger. Now that was not what you do while proposing to a beautiful girl like Jennifer Marge Whitison.
Babumbum, babumbum. Babumbum, babumbum.
“Um, they’re nice,” she replied slowly, half-focused on the menu, half-focused on explaining. She yawned. “but I think copper rings are nicer. Celeste, you know, has a copper ring. It’s gorgeous. She got it at Mara-Lee’s Bargain Market…”
He didn’t hear the rest. His mind was whirling about like clothes in a dryer. He was starting to reach the frantic point. She’s not getting it. Head in hands, he slowly dragged his hands down from his face. God, Jonathan made it sound so easy!
“Harry, are you tired?” Her eyebrows scrunched up, concerned. “Do you need some Tylenol for your headache? I brought you some...” She started digging through her pocketbook, tossing things aside.
“Oh no, no, I’m fine,” He replied quickly, shaking his head vigorously. I wish. Maybe I should just hold this off…for later…
No!
“Um, er, I got that wrong.” Ka-thumpitythumpitythumpitythumpity…
“You got what wrong?” She was still digging through her pocket book. She’s not listening. She set the Tylenol aside, and took out a hand mirror and examined herself in it, making a ‘hmph’ sound, face fixed in an unimpressed frown.
He reddened awkwardly. “I mean, do you like rings with, uh, you know, rocks on them? Diamonds? I mean…”
Ka-thump.
“YES!”
He almost jumped. Eyes widened. Before he could stop talking, there she was, standing beside him, arms wrapped around him, face buried in his shoulder. She had dropped the hand mirror on the table. “YES! Oh Harry, I never thought…” She looked up at him, eyes shining with tears, face bright, and of course, smiling. And he smiled right back. I am most definitely the luckiest man on Earth. Without a doubt.
When the moment was finally over, he reached in his pocket for forgotten ring.
“Wait a moment.” Grinning, he asked, “Is it okay if this ring is gold? I mean, I can, well, uh, get you a copper one, but…”
“It is okay if the ring is gold.” She smiled.
And he slipped the golden ring on her finger.
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139,496 Literary Works • 672,587 Reviews
Oh yeah... and you did.
Sorry I never thanked you guys for your reviews. ^^
@ Yuri: When I said that her fingers were spinning around calamari dishes, etc., I meant that she was deciding which dish to pick on her menu. Hehe.
@ Skins: I said that the ring was forgotten since the couple were so into the moment that they...forgot about the ring!
I hope that makes sense...maybe not. Thanks again!
Hey Kaedee.
Sorry I'm a bit late, I've been busy lately.
Anyways, you know the drill!
You don't really need this comma here. Plus, I don't really like sentences that start with and. You should just get rid of the and so it starts with 'That'.
I understand why you change POV's here, showing his thoughts, right? My only issue is that I don't really like whole paragraphs of thoughts. To be honest though, it's more of a personal thing. You don't necessarily need to change it.
I agree with yuri on this, you should keep the heartbeat noise the same!
This is phrased kind of awkwardly. You should change it to something like He put his head in his hands before slowly dragging them back down from his face. That's just a suggestion though.
My only critique about this paragraph is the fact that there an awful lot of commas in it. Maybe you should cut them down a bit? Simply so that the flow of this becomes a bit nicer.
I'm kind of confused, how is the ring forgotten?
Awww! I really liked this ending!
Overall
I thought that this was a nice, sweet piece of writing.
My main critique is actually the same as yuri's. Although you are describing your characters actions very well, you aren't really describing their emotions as much as I'd like. I understand that you are trying to reveal their emotions through their actions and through the heart beat thing, but I would like you to sometimes use emotive descriptions as well. You need to make sure that you dont' fall into the trap of show and tell though if you do this. For example, don't write:-
Write something like:-
The people around them were calm and relaxed, so different to the heart that beat ferociously inside of him.
Sorry that was a bad example, but you get the idea? Basically, I just think that you need to describe your characters emotions a bit more. I would especially like you to reveal Jennifer's emotions a bit more. You don't actually do it too badly for your MC.
My only other small critique is about the heartbeat thing. My problem with it is the fact that you change the sound of the heartbeat quite often. The effect of the heartbeat is actually very good, especially the way you vary the speed of it. You just need to make sure that it creates the same sound. Otherwise, it kind of sounds like something else is making the noise at different times. It isn't a serious problem, I just think that it would be more effective if you kept the noise of the heartbeat the same. Especially because you use the noise of the heartbeat quite often throughout this, I think that it's quite important. My only other comment on the heartbeat was the fact that I wasn't sure what it was supposed to be at first. By the time I was a quarter way through this, I figured it out though. Maybe you should make it clearer that you are describing the noise of a heartbeat?
Negatives aside, I really did like this. All that you need to do is to take into account what us reviewers have said and edit this up a bit. If you do that, I really do think that you could have a great piece of writing here.
Keep writing!
xoxo Rhian
Hello there, Kaedee!
Here to you-know-it.
Overall:
First off, I couldn't feel any connection bet. the MC, Jennifer and I, the reader. You should placed emotions throughout your story so in that way, we could totally feel that there's something special going on bet. Jennifer and your MC. Also I was confused a bit at first to the why your MC's proposing. Is it because he wanted to marry her or for a steady relationship? Remember: show don't tell. Also, you switched your point of views in the plot, so it made me slightly misunderstood it. Should you want to write the perspective thoughts or instincts of the guy, you have to italicize it, whatever he was saying without those dialogue punctuations or quote marks. You also lack descriptions when it comes to emotion. How did your characters feel? You only described their physical expressions. You need to portray or describe to us the place, the smell, the people around them because they're in a restaurant, right? Lastly, there were some awkward moments and why the heck would he constantly say her name wholly? like: Ahem. Jennifer Whitison? You didn't have to say it in that way just to get her attention. This sounded funny and it was too proper for him to call her that when he can just simply call her using her first name only.
Aside from those things, I find your MC cute and funny. I thought this was really good!
Keep writing!
Peace out!
_yuti_