Author's note: Sorry about the underlines. This was originally a spelling assignment, and the pesky underlines refuse to leave! Enjoy. :) When no adults are around and boredom is hardening over your brain like one of those cheap chocolate syrups that form an impenetrable wall between you and your ice cream, you tend to do stupid things. When you have a friend around, even stupider things are done. Being home alone is generally awesome, as you can put candy bars in the toaster and toast and spaghetti in the blender. But, after about four hours, just about everything seems dull. “Uugghhh… the boredom is going on and on and on and on and on…” That’s my best friend, Markus Matrone. He was staying at my house because his mom, an attorney, was working in a place 'unsuitable' for those under fifteen. We were planning to have a water balloon fight of EPIC proportions, complete with snowball cannons and slingshots. Of course, we didn’t plan for a giant hailstorm ravaging the Bay area, and being stuck inside for the whole day due to the fact my little brother has three birthday parties in a row.
For a while it was fun, and we played a game where Markus tried to impersonate animals, and I would hear them in the other room, manipulating our old houses’ tendency to reverberate loud noises. It was pretty funny at first, until he ran out of animals and began impersonating people from our school. We then played Monopoly until I became a millionaire, despite going to jail several times. (“I smell embezzlement!” Markus had declared jokingly.) Now, every board game in the house had been played, and our TV dish was out due to the monster storm relentlessly battering everything in sight. Markus could be quite despondent when bored, though he was usually overly dramatic about the smallest of things.
I could tell he usually overreacted to be funny, but now he was literally entreating Fate to give us something to do. Finally, he turned to me and said, “Kendra , can’t there be something we can do? I have abhorred boredom for as long as I can remember, and now we’re in the belly of the beast!” Belly… I suddenly had an idea. “Maybe we can find something fun in the kitchen cabinets.” Markus’ haunted expression immediately melted into a broad grin.
We searched fast, impelled by a profound desire to find something, anything, to do. Finally, something caught my eye, and I soon had a pack of Mega Puff Jumbo marshmallows in my hands. I immediately had a vision of the tastiest thing from here to Newfoundland. S’mores. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I said with a grin. Markus responded indicating the fireplace, and some old newspapers. We didn’t even need to discuss a plan.
I tried to stay steady as I struck the match, but my tremulous fingers betrayed me. When I finally got it, I tossed into our makeshift fire fuel and watched as the blue flames ignited. Wait, blue? The fames were an unmistakable shade of indigo, but Markus stuck his marshmallow-embedded stick into it without a second thought. I followed suit, knowing this was anything but sage. I got my marshmallow flaming, just the way I like it, and assumed the blueness of it all was just some sciencey thing I wouldn’t get. But, when I bit into my delicious treat, something was amiss. In fact, everything was. It tasted awful! Markus and I probably drank a gallon of water each trying to get rid of the taste. I used the almighty Internet to look it up, and it turns out ink burns really oddly. We cleaned it up to look like nothing happened, and then figured we could use the rest of the marshmallows in a cake, but that’s a story for another stormy day.
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139,050 Literary Works • 672,402 Reviews
Yaaaaaaay! Marshmallows!
Hi there!
I'm here to review another one of your awesome work!
And may I have to say, it truly is awesome! You, my friend have a lovely sense of humor that is so refreshing to read.
I saw the title and just knew this was going to be amazing.
And it was.
Okay, on to the nitpicks.
I can't really tell what is wrong but comparing it with the rest of the story, it seems a little...off. Unpolished.
Yah, you know what.
I felt you could have written it like,
There was a bit of a problem with the tense at the beginning, but it seemed fine towards the end.
That's all nitpicking.
Now,onto the story:
Like I said before, it was so amazing! I loved reading every single word of it. I loved how they did so much indoors because, honestly, I would have LOST it. And I was snorting when it came to the last. Who would've thought about ink? Genius.
Well, that's it for my review. You're really talented.
Keep writing!
I will get right to fixing those errors.
Thank you so much for reviewing!
Hello! I'm Flash and I intend on reviewing this piece.
For starters, the style is very lovely. I noticed that it says that you are eleven, which is amazing! I wish I wrote like this when I was your age, haha! There are people my age that couldn't write like this.
Now, onto the nitpicks. There are only three huge paragraphs. I would suggest splitting them up into more paragraphs. Remember, begin a new one when a new idea/topic is created.
"Maybe we can find something fun in the kitchen cabinets," Markus's haunted expression... See the comma there instead of the period? Always use commas unless it's an exclamatory or intteroggative sentence. Also, add an "s" even though Markus's name already ends with an "s." But then again, everybody has their own personal opinion about that issue.
Speaking of dialogue, always make a new paragraph when each character speaks.
In the name "Kendra" I noticed the last three letters italicized. I would fix that, even though it is just a little mistake.
Well, that's pretty much all I've got! The biggest issue is the paragraphs, and if that's fixed the story will flow better. It's a cute story that is enjoyable to read. Oh, and good use of vocabulary, too! Sometimes people try to add advanced vocab in a story that isn't too descriptive and it just seems out of place. I absolutely did not see these words as out of place for the rest of the story has a nice description.
Keep writing, and Happy Holidays!
~Flash
Thanks for the feedback! Sometimes I do forget to start a new paragraph, and Microsoft Word is not a great critic.
I'll try to proofread a bit more before publishing, and Happy Holidays to you too!
This was great! Just by the title and description I could tell this would be fun. The plot is funny and interesting, as well. I just have to ask--did this really happen to you? haha
Overall, I really liked it. And to prove I'll be the first to like and review! The only thing that I saw that could use correcting was the dialogue. Try and start a new line when a new person is speaking. There wasn't much dialogue in this, so it wasn't that noticeable, but if you are ever writing something longer or with more dialogue I could see how it would become tedious to read. Beside that, though, it was great!
Thanks for that! I will try it in the future, it does make things easier to read. As for your question, no, this never happened to me, but a friend's cousin told us she had done it with her little sister, with the same outcome in the story.
You're welcome! Happy Holidays!