Warning: This work has been rated 16+.
I needed to impress her. I really did. I guess all of us needed to ever since we saw her with her queenly aloof demeanor, her unassailable beauty and her pristine untouchableness that shouted “Special!” Hands off!"
Not that she dressed differently mind you; she wore the same mandatory short, green-plaided school-dress topped by the starched white blouse that all the other girls wore. But on her it was not just a dress, it was banner announcing the triumph of womanhood over girlhood. She’d obviously matured far before all others and her full breasts bore witness as did her shapely buttocks and curvaceous white thighs. “The epitome of womanhood!” we all joked with adolescent nervous laughter while knowing full-well we would give our lives for just a glimmer of hope, a touch, or just glance that would tell us that she knew we were alive.
For a full week since her arrival at our school, on it went. She’d sway as she walked past and we’d swoon in the distance following as she went. She’d toss her thick golden, wavy hair in the afternoon recess sunlight and we’d feel blessed and would sniff the breezes hoping to intercept the aroma of her perfume. Yes, I along with all others needed to impress her. Despite my morbid fear of heights, despite the terror that I felt at the sight of the narrow ledge and the jagged rocks far, far below that promised oblivion for the slightest false step. I needed to.
All others had chickened-out and I was just about to do the same. But then she glanced at me and seemed to sneer in contempt as I began walking away. I don’t know how, but as if some trance, I suddenly found myself bragging that I could do it. That it was cinch. That I would prove who was the man! Found myself cautiously inching my way along that narrow ledge as all the others chanted. “Go Joey! Go!”
I heard their voices grow dimmer as the ledge leading to the cave grew narrower and my sneakers began to slip. Heard their confident chanting turn to screams and panicked shouts as I began falling as if in slow motion towards the jagged rocks below. But not before I caught a glimpse of the girl’s horrified face and her gaping mouth which revealed her rotting green-stained teeth.
Last edited by Radrook on Wed Nov 01, 2017 1:48 am, edited 1 time in total.
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139,487 Literary Works • 672,577 Reviews
Oooh, I love this to bits and pieces.
I love how you bring across the idea. Your writing is crisp and that is what drives a short story in my opinion. I like the minimum word count and I like the message that you drove home with the final line.
Attraction can be fatal indeed. Metaphorically, I think it would mean that we could any day be ensnared by a beautiful person who is just not right for us.
I won't nitpick, as the others have already done so. Plus, I have a feeling that I'm biased when it comes to your writing.
Good job. Cheers!
Thanks for the review and encouraging words. I fixed the spacing between paragraphs. Had to cut and paste it to my word pad in order for the adjustments in the spacing between paragraphs to take. True about outward appearances. The sad part is that when he is falling he sees that her teeth aren't that grand. LOL!
Hi, Radrook! Pan here for a quick review. First: small comments!
Good opening. Hooks me right in. I'm instantly thinking about the 'who' and the 'why' and I want to know more.
Watch out for overlong sentences because you're quite prone to them. This one could easily be broken down to something like:
I guess all of us needed to, ever since we saw her queenly, aloof demeanor, her unassailable beauty, her pristine untouchableness. Everything about her shouted "Special! Hands off!"
That's just an example, so disregard it if you wish. Just make sure you break it down somehow. The 'Special! Hands off!' bit is really good, though, so make sure you keep that.
This is another one of those overlong sentences. I'll leave it to you to toy around with this one and find a more comfortable length.
You need a comma after 'distance'. Most of the time you need commas before 'ing' clauses.
'Chickened out' doesn't need to be hyphenated.
I'd stick an 'I' before 'found'.
This is quite a subjective point, but I think this last image would pack more punch if you got rid of 'stained'. It doesn't really add much to the image, so it's just dead weight in my opinion. Completely up to you, though.
Okie-dokie, that's it for small comments. Now I'll get onto what I liked and what I think needs work.
What I liked
1) The twist! I wasn't expecting that at all. When I sat down to read, I was a bit like 'here we go again, your typical tale about a boy trying to impress a super hot girl' but you twisted the idea into something completely different and took me pleasantly by surprise. She's almost like a land-based siren, luring helpless boys to their deaths. I love how Joe realises only as he's falling to his death that she isn't what she seems. It's excellently morbid.
2) Considering how short the piece is, I think you captured the boys' complete intoxication with her very well. I like how they're all besotted with her but trying to play it cool at the same time - it's realistic teenage boy behaviour.
3) You're good at keeping the pace up and maintaining intrigue. There was never a point where the story dragged and I wanted you to get on with it, which means you held my attention all the way through. If anything, I think you could stand to slow the pace down just slightly, but I'll talk more about that in a minute.
Things to work on
1) As said in the nitpicks section, you need to make sure your sentences don't get convoluted. If you don't already, make sure you read your work aloud, because that will help you spot moments where you need to break sentences down. You also need to pay attention to commas, as you have a habit of missing them out between consecutive adjectives. Example:
As Jenthura pointed out, you've missed out a comma between 'thick' and 'golden'. I can see why you've made an error like this, because not all consecutive adjectives need to be separated by commas. In a phrase like 'soft blue wool', for example, commas would be ungrammatical. So how do you figure out if you need commas or not?
An easy test is to switch the order of adjectives around in the phrase. Take these examples:
She'd toss her thick, wavy, golden hair.
She’d toss her wavy, thick, golden hair.
Here, I've swapped the original adjective order around, but you can see that it still makes sense and sounds fine. However, if I had:
blue soft wool
That's weird, right? It just doesn't sound good.
So the rule (in general) is: if you can change the order of the adjectives around and it still sounds okay, you need a comma between them. If you mess with the order and it doesn't sound right, you most likely don't need a comma between them.
I've explained it pretty haphazardly here, so I'd encourage you to look at this great resource for a more thorough comma-or-not-to-comma guide.
2) I want a bit more information on how Joe, the girl and all the other boys actually ended up on the edge of a cliff, because it seems to just come out of nowhere. I do like that the story is short, but you could definitely tease it out for a little longer to give us a better sense of the plot progression and Joe's personality. Part of me thinks it would be great if there was a more gradual build up to the reveal at the end, actually. If you gave us a Joe who was desperate to impress the girl and had him doing increasingly drastic things to get her attention, you could really create suspense, making us wonder how far he was willing to go to curry favour. If his final endeavour was to walk to the edge of a cliff and accidentally slip, you could pull the rug out from under the reader even more than you already do, because the reveal of the girl's true nature would reframe everything Joe had done throughout the story and turn it on her. I'm just spitballing here, obviously, but it's something to think about.
3) I'm not sure how convincingly the narrative sounds like a teenage boy. I'm not wanting to stereotype teenage boys, of course, but they're rarely so lyrical, and I can't picture a group of young lads saying 'the epitome of womanhood'. The rewrite you replied to Jenthura would definitely be better and more realistic.
I'll call the review here so I don't end up going on forever. I really did enjoy this, and once you've ironed out the grammatical mishaps and tweaked the tone I think it'll be a crackling little piece. Maybe just add a line or paragraph to give us some indication of how they ended up on the cliff. We don't need a blow-by-blow account, but it would be good if that transition was easier.
Keep writing!
~Pan
Yes, I have had criticism on another website about the vocabulary not fitting the boy who is talking and wrote a revision. Here is the revised version to make the boy sound more like a teenage boy.
needed to make a big impression on her. I really did. I guess all of us guys needed to ever since we saw her with her stuck-up ways that shouted: %u201CI%u2019m special so hands off!" Not that she dressed differently, mind you. She wore the same short, green-plaided school-dress topped by the starched, white blouse that all the other girls had to wear. But on her they weren%u2019t just clothing, on her they were banners showing she was a woman and not just a girl. She had grown up way sooner than all others, that%u2019s for sure, and her big tities, nice ass and plump white thighs were all the proof we needed.
%u201CMan! Now that%u2019s what I call a real woman!%u201D we all joked nervously while knowing that we would have given our lives for just the slightest hope of a touch of a her soft hand, or just glance that would tell us that she knew we were alive.
For a whole week since she came to our school she%u2019d sway as she walked past and we'd follow. She%u2019d toss her thick, golden, wavy hair in the sunlight and we%u2019d sniff the breezes like dogs hoping to get a sniff of her sweet sweat mixed with perfume.
Yeah, I along with all the other fellows really needed to get her attention. Even though I had this big fear of heights, was terrified whenever I looked at the narrow ledge and the jagged rocks way down below that looked like they were waiting for a slightest mistake, still I just needed to get her to notice me.
All the other guys had chickened-out in trying to reach the cave where the ledge led. I was just about to do the same. But when she glanced at me and sneered as I started walking away, I don%u2019t know how, but I suddenly found myself bragging that I could do it. That it was cinch. That I would prove who was the man! A little while later I was inching my way along that narrow ledge with my heart in my mouth as all the girls and guys were saying. %u201CGo Joey! Go!%u201D
I heard their voices getting dimmer as the ledge leading to the cave grew more narrow and my new sneakers began to slip. I heard their chanting turn to screams and into panicked shouts as I started falling like in slow motion towards the jagged rocks below. But not before I saw the girl%u2019s scared face and her wide-opened mouth showing me her rotting, green-stained teeth.
I agree with a need for a transition into the cliff scene. I did briefly consider it but had trouble fitting it in so I left it out and concentrated on making him sound more like a teenager. But will fit it in in my next revision where I apply all of the advice you offered. Thanks for the great review.
Dude. Nice.
I like this a lot. You killed it with that goddamn last line. It's absolutely absurd and I love it.
It reads clean, the idea comes across well, and I can begin to identify with the main character just a little bit before the end. Maybe he needs a little more personality. As is, he fits the cookie-cutter, young male that wants to impress a girl. On the other hand, it is a short story, and you might not want to detract from the idea you're presenting here.
You could condense this to:
"I needed to impress her. I really did. All of us needed after seeing her queenly aloof demeanor, her unassailable beauty and her pristine untouchableness that shouted “Special!” Hands off!
plaid, green school dress
topped with
Missing a comma:
..."thick, golden, wavy hair..."
Maybe instead of using three adjectives:
"She'd toss her thick head of golden curls..."
Eh, just a thought. That one's your personal decision.
I got nothing else though. You did good.
Keep writing.
Thanks for the feedback Will apply the changes you mention. Good advice! I also wrote a version which has him speaking more like an adolescent. Tell me which one you like better. Here it is:
I needed to make a big impression on her. I really did. I guess all of us guys needed to ever since we saw her with her stuck-up ways that shouted: %u201CI%u2019m special so hands off!" Not that she dressed differently, mind you. She wore the same short, green-plaided school-dress topped by the starched, white blouse that all the other girls had to wear. But on her they weren%u2019t just clothing, on her they were banners showing she was a woman and not just a girl. She had grown up way sooner than all others, that%u2019s for sure, and her big tities, nice ass and plump white thighs were all the proof we needed.
%u201CMan! Now that%u2019s what I call a real woman!%u201D we all joked nervously while knowing that we would have given our lives for just the slightest hope of a touch of a her soft hand, or just glance that would tell us that she knew we were alive.
For a whole week since she came to our school she%u2019d sway as she walked past and we'd follow. She%u2019d toss her thick, golden, wavy hair in the sunlight and we%u2019d sniff the breezes like dogs hoping to get a sniff of her sweet sweat mixed with perfume.
Yeah, I along with all the other fellows really needed to get her attention. Even though I had this big fear of heights, was terrified whenever I looked at the narrow ledge and the jagged rocks way down below that looked like they were waiting for a slightest mistake, still I just needed to get her to notice me.
All the other guys had chickened-out in trying to reach the cave where the ledge led. I was just about to do the same. But when she glanced at me and sneered as I started walking away, I don%u2019t know how, but I suddenly found myself bragging that I could do it. That it was cinch. That I would prove who was the man! A little while later I was inching my way along that narrow ledge with my heart in my mouth as all the girls and guys were saying. %u201CGo Joey! Go!%u201D
I heard their voices getting dimmer as the ledge leading to the cave grew more narrow and my new sneakers began to slip. I heard their chanting turn to screams and into panicked shouts as I started falling like in slow motion towards the jagged rocks below. But not before I saw the girl%u2019s scared face and her wide-opened mouth showing me her rotting, green-stained teeth.