"So, ready for school, kid?" Greg asked.
"Oh, I suppose so." Father had finally enrolled me in a high school. I had been placed in all of the most advanced classes, despite being only a sophomore. Father also insisted on tutoring me at home after school. I didn't see how he planned to accomplish this, considering how busy he was trying to restore the family fortune without owning an actual business. Even Mother was out of the house the majority of the time, and I had no idea where she went.
"Good. I know I'm gonna miss your help around the shop."
"I think I'll miss being here." I had been working for Greg during the day for the past month, helping him keep up the business for a little extra money. Mother and Father didn't know about it, since I only worked while they were gone. I didn't think they would really approve of my working with someone of Greg's... social standing.
Oddly enough, I enjoyed working around the shop. Greg took pride in his business, even though the building was falling to pieces and half the time the shoplifters got to him before the actual customers. I wasn't very good at cleaning or maintaining the building, and most of the time I was too frightened to talk to anyone, so usually I just stocked the shelves, and did trivial tasks. I wasn't much use really, and Greg would probably be better off without me in his way, but I think he liked having company just as much as I enjoyed being at the shop.
I had learned a lot about the town in the last month; which people to avoid (though I generally dodged around all of them), where to go to buy household supplies, how to get around, things like that. Greg had taught me some cooking recipes and tips for cleaning as well, but I wasn't much good with either. Mother and Father were out of the house so often that I ended up trying, and failing, to keep track of it myself when I wasn't at Greg's shop.
"Ya' made any friends yet, kid?" Greg began stacking pasta sauce as we talked.
"Er, not really."
"None?"
"None." In truth I was to afraid to approach anyone in the neighborhood. All the people my age looked like battle-hardened warriors, with scars and black eyes. At least that's what they looked like when they were glaring at me from across the street.
"Well, ya' better get crackin', then. All the good ones'll be gone by the time ya' get around to it."
"Er, heh." I had actually planned to hide from everyone the whole year and try to keep my head down.
Greg seemed to realize what I was thinking. "Listen, kid, you're gonna get real lonely real fast if ya' don't find somebody to hang with. The kids 'round here aren't so bad once ya' get to know 'em."
"Aside from the thieves?" I had been keeping track of how many shoplifters had gotten away in the past month. The current count was twenty six, and the total cost of their loot was a hundred thirty nine dollars and fifty seven cents. Greg didn't know I was keeping count.
"Yeah, everyone but them. So no one. Ya' have to make friends with 'em anyway though."
I paused in my shelf-sorting. Greg was serious about this. I really didn't want to talk to people any more than was necessary, but Greg had helped me out a lot so far, and I felt like I should take his advice.
"Just promise me you'll give it a shot, 'kay, kid?"
"Alright. I'll try."
"Good. Grand. Starting in the middle of the year pry' won't help much, but whatever, right? Ya' needed to be out o' here five minutes ago. I'll finish this, you get on home."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah, get on home. You've got a big day tomorrow."
- - - - -
As it turned out, public schools in the poorer districts are vastly different from the private schools I used to attend. I knew that, but I wasn't really prepared for it.
The halls were dimly lit and cramped with people and book bags. Everyone was talking too loudly, their voices clamoring over each other, and the building had the worse acoustics I'd ever heard, amplifying the noise, making it sound even worse. People clustered in groups in front of the lockers, blabbering to each other excitedly and generally getting in the way. I ran into at least twenty different people trying to find my own locker.
Said locker was painted a chipping fire-engine red, was much too small for my bag, and had various swear words etched into the door. It didn't close properly, either, and I didn't trust any of these other students, so I dragged all of my belongings with me between classes. The books I wouldn't need yet, the school-provided dinosaur of a laptop, the phone I wasn't supposed to have on my person, all of it came with me.
The teachers weren't quite what I was accustomed to. To me they all seemed sub-par. Either they had absolutely no control over their classes, or they demanded absolute silence the entire lesson. All of the material in the syllabuses, I had already covered at my previous school.
The students weren't exactly helping. They all seemed like idiots from my seat in the back of each classroom, fooling around, shoving each other, generally being unproductive. None of them seemed to be listening to a word of the lectures. Didn't they realize this was supposed to be a school building? During most of the classes I read through a fiction book Greg had loaned me.
The only class I actually enjoyed was history, last period.
I took up a seat in the very back, as I had been doing all day, with no one around me. The teacher up front was younger than most, with a pink miniskirt, a low v-neck, and an absurd amount of makeup. At first I thought she was a student, but she stood up at the front desk, shuffling through papers.
A couple of seconds after the bell rang, a dark-haired, grinning boy burst through the door, loose papers swirling behind him in a flurry of documents. The teacher, if that's what she was, didn't even glance at him. The boy hustled to the back of the room, right toward me. For a second I thought I might be in his seat, but he threw himself behind the desk next to me, his bag spilling paperwork across the floor. The whole time he didn't stop grinning.
The teacher started talking. She spoke in a slow drawl, in a roundabout manner that made me wonder if she was saying anything at all or just talking senselessly. The class talked over her, muttering to each other, but she didn't seem to mind. I tried to focus for a while, but couldn't see the point of the lesson. I already knew all this anyway, so I pulled my mathematics homework out of my bag and got to work. The teacher neither noticed nor cared.
"Hey." The boy next to me leaned over and spoke to me.
"Uh... hi."
"I ain't seen you 'round here before. Who are ya'?"
"Chris." I didn't want to talk to anyone more than necessary. A short answer seemed like the way to go.
"Right, right, Chris. I'm Iggy." The grin hadn't left his face.
- - - - -
The bell jingled as I pushed the door open. I knew I should get on my homework soon, but I wanted to see Greg first. He sat behind the counter, and when I walked in he hurriedly shut a laptop. Greg was good at disguising his emotions, but I could tell he was stressed about something.
"Oh. How was school, kid?"
"Is something wrong?"
"Nah, it's nothing."
"Er, alright," I cast about for a new topic. "School was alright."
"Make any friends?"
"Not yet."
"Are ya' workin' on it?" He handed me a bunch of tissue boxes and we drifted down an aisle to stack them.
"Um... not yet."
"Well get on it! If ya' won't make friends o' your own, I'll have to make 'em for ya'!"
"How would that work exactly?"
"I dunno. I'd work somethin' out."
"I'm sure you would."
We worked in silence for a moment.
"How're your parents?"
"They're alright. I think the pressure is getting to Mother a little, but we're holding up."
"Good. Good." He nodded.
"Are you sure you're alright?"
"Yeah, yeah don' worry 'bout me, kid."
I turned back to my work, but I kept glancing at Greg out of the corner of my eye. The silence was awkward now. I tried to think of something to say, but Greg beat me to it.
"Have any homework?"
"A little. It shouldn't take too long, though."
"Ya' can do it here if ya' want. Go ahead an' take a break, kid."
"Um, thanks."
The homework took me all of ten minutes. My artificial number logic made calculus all too easy. I already knew all this.
Greg sent me home almost as soon as I was done. I didn't know what was wrong with him. What was I supposed to do? Invite him over for tea? Mother and Father would never approve of that. I knew, at least, that I'd never be able to help him if I didn't know what the problem was.
Alright, step one of the new plan was to figure out what I was trying to solve.
Points:
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Canary word: Present
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Hello again! Since I reviewed the first chapter, I thought I'd come back to the next and see what you have here ^^ I'm excited to read more! Once again, I am on my phone, so please excuse any massive typos that creep up.
Okay, so this chapter picks up a full month after the first one, which I find kind of strange in the sense that we skip a lot. A lot that I feel would fit in great and work as a good build up for whatever will happen later. First off, the family still has to be adapting to their new "home sweet home" and quite frankly, I want to see that. There's a lot to do to make a place livable, and from what we saw last chapter, there wasn't much. What did the rest of he house look like, did they even have beds that night? What kind of stuff were they able to bring with them? How are they going accomdate their future meals? Considering the first one didn't go fantastically. It just seems so skimmed over and that's a pretty important topic I feel. I wish you went into more detail before skipping to the high school side of things.
Also, one thing I feel is really lacking is technology. Really :/ This is fifty years after they find a way to alter someone's brain so that they can be given new and improved characteristics. That's no easy feat. And while I agree with Mea about how 2017 would be far too early a date, I also agree there is not enough of a sci-fi aspect as of now. I mean, the high school is quite literally the same as modern day and this is, again, fifty years after that technology is developed. There is bound to just be more, even in the poorer neighborhoods.
Speaking of that technology, we learned last chapter that Chris was "inserted with" or "was bought" extra charisma and confidence -- there was even a part about him being frightened by he walked with his head held high and in confident steps. Now it's mentioned that he's normally too scared to talk to other people. It doesn't really add up to me. I can understand having this bigger, better attributes with the promise that later on he's not quite so perfect, but he doesn't even seem surprised his new attributes aren't helping.
(Then later on he's perfectly fine talking to Iggy and then he has that impression that he's better than everyone else. <.< Consistency.)
Quick thing ~ I found this really confusing when I first read it, so I wish there was some kind of pause or dialogue tag to force the reader to stop after the first line for even just a second. Because it goes from sarcastic to literal really fast and I found it confusing.
Speaking of tags and stuff being around the dialogue, there is really a lot of summarizing done here. That's also not just in the first part. So, around the dialogue we're given a lot more of a run down of what happened in the past couple months rather than the faces of the characters, what they're doing, how they're acting around one another, etc. There's too much focus on the past and filling us in -- another reason why I feel you should go back and add some more adapting before this -- and so we don't get the character development as much.
My exact notes for this line: "Really scattered images. What?" Why specifically book bags? What does dimly lit have to do with crowded? Considering the next couple of lines in this paragraph, how do they all relate back to one another?
There really needs to be more of a focus in this description, that slowly spreads out from one center point rather than trying to cover everything happening at once. And I can see that sort of forming here, but it's not really going super well. Not to mention, the second sentence is really, really lengthy and wordy and should probably be cut up or shortened. Just work on focusing these descriptions more is the jist of this paragraph xD
Okay. One huge this that I felt was missing through out this was the details. I really like those, and while it's totally okay to summarize unimportant things and skip to the more plot oriented, I felt this was really too summarized in the sense that we weren't experiencing this with the narrator, which is what first person really is. It's a look inside the head and experience of the character first hand. So maybe when he first got into the school, instead of just saying, "The school was crowded." give us more of an experience like, "As I waded through the sea of bodies, there was a roar of voices swallowing me" or something like that. You could probably do better than my on the spot thinking ~ but the point is it's too brushed off throughout most of this chapter. Give us some pieces at least.
I don't really understand why Chris enjoyed history so much? He meets Iggy, yaaaay. I don't really see the "point" per say, because we are given his name and some hints. Yes I like the foreshadowing that Iggy is important, but in the narration we are told specifically that Chris enjoyed history. I can't really see why ._.
So, I'm wondering who you're going to pull sci-fi back into this because I honesty hope this isn't just entirely high school drama the entire time, but I'll have to wait and see ^^ Keep on writing ~
Wolfe
Hey there! I'm here to kick this out of the Green Room for you.
So, I went back and read your first chapter before reading this, and I'm conflicted. I'm appreciated the premise for the story, and overall your writing is quite good, but right now there are just a lot of little things that are bothering me. In particular.
1. Firstly, and most importantly, to be perfectly blunt, I don't like the main character. Chris is good as a character - he's personality and voice shine through very clearly - but he's far too stuck up for me to like him. His reaction to his school I feel should be more one of shock and dismay, not annoyance and arrogance. Shouldn't he at least feel a little bit sorry for these kids?
However, this isn't always a bad thing - if the character is interesting enough, the reader will often keep reading even if he's unlikable. This is where the other problem comes in: Not only does your character think he's better than everybody else, he actually is, because of the genetic manipulation.
This is a really big problem, to be honest. I know it kind of has in-world justification, but it seems to just be here to show why Chris is So Much Better than all these other kids. That combination drives him over the edge to be a Gary-Stue (an overly-perfect character), which will generally annoy people. Now, it's not too late - it may very well be that he's going to get humbled really really fast, and he'll soon see how much of a jerk he is. But for the time being, it's a bit of a problem.
2. Believability. There are several points about the premise of this story that are inherently flawed. However, they can probably be remedied somewhat easily.
a. "Surgery" will not make you smarter or any of the other attributes describe here. It's not a matter of technology - our body just doesn't work like that. It would have to be genetic manipulation happening before you were born, and in fact that's what I assumed until I read a little more closely.
b. 2017 is not a realistic date for discovering this sort of thing. Yes, science is moving fast, but not that fast. We've only just started experimenting with it, and we have no idea what a lot of genes do.
c. This is my biggest problem. Supposedly, it's 2067, but the high school looks and feels exactly like your average poorer high school from today. That's simply not possible - culture changes too much in 50 years.
So what are the fixes? Unless there's some sort of all-important plot reason to keep them in, I'd remove the sci-fi aspect entirely. Make it present day, make Chris a normal rich kid whose family's fallen on hard times, and you'd be good. It depends on the type of story you're trying to tell - the story of a rich kid turned "normal", or a story in which sci-fi elements are essential.
Anyway, your writing is actually pretty good otherwise - dialogue and descriptions are great. Good luck with this, if you're still continuing it.
I liked this chapter too!
Chris' view on school is very true now, even though his story takes place in the distant future. I think it's funny that he actually believes that kids will pay attention in class. Hate to break it to you Chris, but that's not how the world works.
Greg is such an awesome character. He's giving Chris great advice, and I think he's Chris' first friend. To add to it, even though Chris says that he sucks at doing a lot of the jobs at the store, Greg lets him stay. You go Greg!
*gestures to Iggy* And then there's this guy. From the way he was grinning like an idiot-and I meant that in a loving, endearing way-and the way he introduced himself to Chris, he's probably going to be Chris' first friend that is his age.
Just wondering, has Chris ever had friends before? And is Chris short for Christopher?
Keep up the great work (which I know you will) and good luck on your writing endeavors!
I'm pretty sure that even in the distant future, kids will not pay attention in class. Chris's parents paid for pricey private schools, though, so he stays focused.
Greg is my favorite so far, so I'm glad you like him, too. He was supposed to be just an awesome guy.
And yes, Iggy is important.
Chris hasn't really had friends, just companions. His parent kept him very work-and-future-oriented, so he didn't have much time to screw around or befriend anyone. Chris is not short for Christopher. I considered it, since his upper-class parents may have wanted something more sophisticated than "Chris," but names can change a whole lot in a short amount of time. Short names are popular in the future!
Thanks for the review, and good luck to you as well!