Questions

by Othersider

Published January 30, 2014

12+

In The End

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God. It's like she could only speak in questions. I once counted how many questions she asked over dinner. 74 questions over a span of 10 minutes. That's like 1 question every 10 seconds.

"Could you pass the butter?"

"Who cooked this?"

"Wonderful stew, isn't it?"

It was like her favorite alphabet was the question mark. What I hated most when she asked a question was when she asked one she didn't need to have ask a question to answer.

"What time is it?" she asks.

"Why don't just look at the watch on wrist?" I reply.

She shot me a look from those cold blue eyes. She loved to ask but never answer. You might think its might be alright, but it's not. Imagine living with her everyday. Being woken up to "Dave, are you awake yet??!!" being bellowed right next to your face. Having to answer every single question or else being subjected to a barrage of cold looks or having to stick through her 'moods' where everybody in the house would fall at her feet. I didn't know how she could have been my sister. I was sure I didn't have any of her genes.

I had just came back from a long day at school. My back was still hurting from the load of stuff in my red Adidas bag. Before I even enter the house, it began.

"Is that Dave?"

"How did you come back?"

"How was school?"

You might think she was caring and loving but it was torture for me. And then, something just snapped. The events that followed weren't that important for this story but I'll tell you the last question she ever asked me:

"Dave, why do you have Dads' gun?"

Comments & reviews · 4
User avatar
indieeloise
Review
indieeloise wrote a review Review · Jan 31, 2014

Shock effect is always a fun tool to use in writing, especially shorts like this. However, the unexpected was a bit too sudden. I'd suggest developing the character of the narrator a little more. We know all about his sister - or at least how she is viewed in Dave's POV - but give the readers a little more information about Dave since he's the one doing the action.

Also,

What I hated most when she asked a question was when she asked one she didn't need to have ask a question to answer.


Not quite sure where you're going with this.

It was like her favorite alphabet was the question mark.


Pretty sure punctuation isn't included in the alphabet!

Being woken up to "Dave, are you awake yet??!!" being bellowed right next to your face.


Fragment; consider revising: "Imagine waking up to a zoomed-in image of your sister's face as she bellows, "Dave, are you awake yet?" or something similar. Expand on your sarcasm! Builds character.

I had just came back from a long day at school.


Grammatically, this should be "I had just *come* back …"

Also, the sister's question
"How did you come back?"

is worded awkwardly. Maybe something more clear, like "How was your ride home?" etc.

The events that followed weren't that important for this story …


On the contrary! Rising action that leads into the pivotal point/climax IS important! Don't be lazy :) Elaborate! Describe!

- Indie

User avatar
CorianderLee
Review
CorianderLee wrote a review Review · Jan 31, 2014

Ohmygoodness!
Really really good!
I might do the same as Dave if my sister only talked in questions.
So the only grammar and spelling problems I can find were already pointed out.

Now on to the story writing! This was quite interest.
The only thing that I think needs work is the last paragraph. "the events that followed weren't that important for this story but I'll tell you the last question she ever asked me:...."
Now, in my opinion the events that followed are quite important, but if you don't want to elaborate I would pick a stronger sentence. I like how it builds up and your last sentence is a powerful ending, but saying that the following events aren't important make it sound like you're trying to just end the story or you don't feel like elaborating.

Yes, I see that you wrote this at night really quick. Now we have edited it and you can go back and change it up.

Can't wait to see more :)
-Cori

User avatar
WallFlower
Review
WallFlower wrote a review Review · Jan 30, 2014

Oh my goodness!!

Wow. That was... unexpected.

To me, it seems a little extreme that Dave would kill her because of an overabundance of questions. Demands? Maybe. Questions? I don't know. But it's your work so all my opinions are just that, opinions.

It was like her favorite alphabet was the question mark. What I hated most when she asked a question was when she asked one she didn't need to have ask a question to answer.


First, in the former sentence, the word "letter" would be a better fit than alphabet, since the alphabet is a whole system of letters and symbols. Secondly, the latter sentence needs to be reworked a little, especially near the end. It's seems like two sentences got mashed together to form a complex run-on.

Hope my review helps :)

Hey thanks a lot for your review.. If you see the previous reply for the last review , you can see why this has a dark turn and why there are quite a few mistakes. It's just a trial run so yeah. thanks a lot!

User avatar
lostthought
Review
lostthought wrote a review Review · Jan 30, 2014

..... Hi, I am here to review, your, ah, piece.

Of you have done this in real life, I will avoid you wherever you go. Well, I only have two problems

Shouldn't ~"Why don't just look at the watch on wrist?"~ be
*Why don't you just look at the watch on your wrist"*

I am unsure about this on but it seems to me that ~"Dave, why do you have Dads' gun?"~ be
*"Dave, why do you have Dad's gun?"

It seems to me that this person is a bit harsh. We don't need to know what happens next once you bring out the gun, literally!

Well, welcome to YWS! Keep writing!

~lost

Thanks for the review.. sorry I kinda wrote this in the middle of the night. actually, my friend told me about his sister who was like this and i just wanted to see how people would react if he actually did something like this... thanks a lot though!



Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.
— Lyndon B. Johnson