z

Young Writers Society


E - Everyone

Josephine and Peppurrcorn

by NaomiPeppurrcorn


Josephine

16-year-old teenager who enjoys reading, piano and food. She is intelligent and reliable, but can also be very pessimistic and a bit moody.

Peppurrcorn

cat??? Probably? nobody knows, but he is cute and makes strange noises, so we love and accept him.

Chapter One

CRAVE NURISHMENT!

Saturday, 9:37am

The sunlight shone through the blinds of the room and made it just bright enough to recognize the furniture in it- a small wooden table and chair, closet which just contained enough space to hold clothes for one very modest collection of apparel, a piano with the sheet music of “let it be- the Beatles” on its music stand, and a bed on which a young woman and a small animal were still sleeping.

The silence lingering in the air was broken by a low grumble. As if on command, the woman opened her eyes and groaned. “ahhh…hungry”

But she knew that there was probably nothing in the fridge, since she had forgotten to buy groceries the day before.

Her name was Josephine. With a sigh she turned her head to the right and saw her friend Peppurcorn laying next to her on a small pillow. It was so quiet in Josephines bedroom that she could hear Peppurcorn breathe softly. He looked fairly peaceful and innocent – almost adorable - when he slept, but Josephine would never dare to say that to him, as it would upset him very much to not be seen as anything other than dangerous and admirable for his talent of seeming, like he does not care about anything at all.

Peppurcorn was an unusual creature and nobody really knew what exactly he was, but although nobody understood it, they simply accepted it.

“Pepp?”, Josephine said in a soft tone, enough to wake but not to startle him. “I am really, really, really hungry. We have to get something to eat or I will be in a bad mood all day.” Peppurcorn rolled over on his pillow and was now facing the wall with his back turned to Josephine. He let out a quiet growl. He did not want to get up. But Josephine, who has dealt with this little thing for many years now, knows how to get him to roll out of bed. Energized by her desire to fulfil her quest to buy something to eat, she jumped out of bed and hastily moved towards the window to open the blinds.

The sunlight illuminated the earlier darkened room. Peppurcorn squealed and acted as if the light smacked him in the face. “Good morning, Pepp!”, Josephine exclaimed and smirked a bit. Peppurcorn looked at her angrily; he would have loved to nap for another hour or ten. Josephine opened her closet and picked out the clothes she would wear. “Supposedly it is going to be really warm today… I think a dress would be ok?”

She looked at Peppurcorn but did not wait for a response, since she knew he would not care enough to give her one. She put on a purple apron-dress and a black and white striped shirt underneath. While rolling up her sleeves, Josephine viewed herself from different angles in the mirror on the inside of her closet door.



Her eyebrows furrowed, and a look of dissatisfaction appeared on her

face. “Do you think it makes me look chubby?”, she asked. But

again, it might as well have been a rhetorical question, considering

Peppercorn has already drifted off into a light slumber again.

Josephine sighed in defeat. “You know what? No. This looks perfect

and I love it.” She brushed through her hair and sprayed a bit of

Flower-Scented Dry-Shampoo for Brown Hair” into it to

make her natural fluffy curls even fluffier. Then she put it up in a

ponytail and straightened her bangs.



She looked at her reflection

with her completed look. “Positivity. Positivity. POSITIVITY!”,

she chanted with determination. Peppurcorn, awakened by her outburst of positive energy, made a sound that somehow resembled the Windows Vista start-up- sound to show his support to Josephine. God knows she needed it.


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User avatar
99 Reviews


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Reviews: 99

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Thu May 02, 2019 5:16 am
Tawsif wrote a review...



NaomiPeppurrcorn,

This is a decent start for the novel. I loved it. Let's get to the review now.

'But she knew that there was probably nothing in the fridge, since she had forgotten to buy groceries the day before.'

I like this part. You presented the forgetfulness of the character nicely.

The scene where Josephine looks at her reflection on the mirror was nicely-written.

I like the way you relate to the Windows Vista start-up- sound in the story. I wonder what kind of an animal can produce that sort of a sound, but it's okay considering 'nobody knows what or who Peppurrcorn is'.

The tags in the story say you're writing a realistic piece. Then perhaps you can mention what kind of animal Peppurrcorn is, or whether he is an earthly animal or not. Otherwise, it will become a fantasy, not a realistic piece.

Overall, good job with the story. Keep writing.




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Sun Apr 28, 2019 12:41 pm
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4revgreen wrote a review...



Hey, Che here for a review!

This is my first review of review day so congrats :-) First I'll just quote anywhere I think improvements could be made :-)

The sunlight shone through the blinds of the room and made it just
bright enough to recognize the furniture in it- a small wooden table
and chair, closet which just contained enough space to hold clothes
for one very modest collection of apparel, a piano with the sheet
music of “let it be- the Beatles” on its music stand, and a bed
on which a young woman and a small animal were still sleeping.


Okay, woah, this is a long sentence! I really recommend going back and cutting it up into smaller ones so it's easier for the reader to digest the information!

Josephines bedroom

It should be Josephine's as the bedroom belongs to her

He looked fairly peaceful and innocent – almost
adorable - when he slept, but Josephine would never dare to say that
to him, as it would upset him very much to not be seen as anything
other than dangerous and admirable for his talent of seeming, like he
does not care about anything at all.

Again, this is a pretty long sentence!

Actually, I think that's all I spotted! I really enjoyed this short story; it was sweet, had a little bit of humour and overall just written very well. You really got across Josephine's personality well, which is a really good thing as otherwise it could get boring. It was not boring! Which is obviously good :-)

Keep writing!

Regards, Che :-)






Thank you for your review!
Sometimes my sentences can get really long and i don't even notice, so thank you for pointing that out.
I will improve that in the future :)



4revgreen says...


ahh no problem! I tend to have the same problem with long sentences myself :-)



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Sun Apr 28, 2019 7:23 am
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Toboldlygo wrote a review...



Hiloa loa! Toboldlygo here for a review!

So, before I even read it, I had to laugh at your description of Peppurrcorn. Very cute! Since you labeled it fanfiction, I think it was a great choice to introduce your characters in the way you did. Normally I don't think it's necessary for something that isn't a play, but I think it was helpful because it was fanfiction.

I'm going to be nit-picky first of all because it's 0313 my time reading this and I'm in that kind of mood right now. ;)

In this sentence here: "The silence lingering in the air was broken by a low grumble. As if on
command, the woman opened her eyes and groaned. 'ahhh…hungry,'" I'm not super fond of the punctuation going on (yeah, I meant it when I said I was in a nit-picky mood). Specifically, there needs to be a comma, not a period, after groaned and before the quotation marks. After the word hungry, there should be a period.

There are also some spacing/formatting peculiarities that I think would be great to see fixed. (I struggle with formatting on this site so I totally am not judging). There's just a ton of space between some lines and it makes it hard to read.

The overall story is fun and engaging. Your characters a great and have fantastic personality. Well done!

Toboldlygo






thank you very much for your review! :)

Don't worry about being nit-picky. The more critic I get, the more I can improve!
I honestly thought there would be more mistakes in this story, because English is not my first language.
Thank you for your help :)




If a story is in you, it has to come out.
— William Faulkner