Published June 17, 2008
Lyrics at the beginning of each section are from 'Bowl of Oranges' by Bright Eyes. Translation of the French is at the end.
___
I came upon a doctor who appeared in quite poor health,
and I said, “There’s nothing that I can do for you
you can’t do for yourself.”
___
Margot sat sprawled in a train station crowd, her back to a pillar and her feet extended, waiting for someone’s shiny shoes to catch them and fall with nothing but bare palms braced for impact. She put the Venus in Venus fly trap. Her crooked teeth hid behind painted lips, and the rip in her skin was covered in brown ringlets and the gaudy pearl noose that dangled from her neck.
There was a man between her fingers—a doll made of sackcloth and ashes, its face painted with ink. It was a form of ill-fated voodoo; ill wishes for boredom and wrongdoers. That crude face only barely resembled Dr. Neuhaus, but it was the thought that counted. She'd drizzled black over it with a shaking hand. He’d broken open her head and stitched it back together--searching for something that had never existed--and left behind a puzzle-map of skin and thread.
Her train pulled into the station. There was always that morbid moment as she was facing it head-on—what if she was on the tracks, and not against the pillar? What if she was to hold still? What would that last breath feel like?
Would it ever come?
The train halted, screeching like the bats that hid up in the rafters. Margot slipped the doll in her purse and waited, eyes cast on the concrete as people brushed past her. When only a coughing businessman was left, she brushed the dust from her skirt and stepped onto the train, the air inside stuffy with breath and fabricated heat. She rolled a strand of hair between her fingers as she passed by compartments with open doors, and their occupants gazed vacantly out at her.
The door to compartment forty-six was closed. She pushed it open with her shoulder and there was a mouse-shriek of terror—she would have blamed the hinges if a boy was not sitting there, with one hand pressed to his heart and the other fanning himself with the dinner menu. “My God,” he breathed. “I’m so sorry, it’s just…”
She stepped awkwardly into the compartment, setting her things on the seat across from him and clearing someone else’s newspaper out of the way to make space for herself. “It’s just what?”
“…I thought I was alone—you know how that is—and. And.” He looked at her, searching for something, though she wasn’t sure quite what. “Well, you don’t know who I am, so I suppose it doesn’t matter.”
She looked at her feet. “I don’t.”
He smiled weakly and set down the menu. “Do you like the window open, uhm…”
“Margot Rosenfeld. And you can open it if you like.” As he tugged at the blind string, his fingers shook—they were slender and pale, much like the rest of him. From his suit to his gray eyes, he appeared drowsy and washed out--but for his hair, which was thick and black. It was an unsettling contrast. “And what’s your name?”
“Oh.” He looked at her, with the corners of his mouth twitching. His eyelashes were like spider legs. “Miles…Miles Sinclair.” Margot offered her hand. His was frail and cold. “Where are you going—with your ticket, I mean? To where?”
“Elsewhere.”
“Me…me too.”
The train began to pull forward, and the people on the station platform began to shift, freeze-frames of life in all its ubiquity. The newspaper headlines held by men in benches blurred into one heartbreak and, when the train broke free of the station doors, the sun was too bright to make out the city below.
Miles was shaking. Margot reached inside her purse and popped open the tin that held all of her medication. She held a cream-colored tablet over to him.
“What is it?”
She smiled. “It’s not legal in the city.”
He gulped it down gratefully. “I’ve had too much of that today, you know, but it can’t do anything bad for me—can’t it? The doctors say it can, but they’re all liars. All of them.” He frowned. “Aren’t they?”
Inside her bag, she crushed the doll’s head with her fingernails, homicide hidden by leather. “They are.”
“Do you…do you go to school here? In the city?”
“I don’t go to school.”
“Oh…I’m so sorry—I thought you were my age, I’m sorry.”
She laughed. “I should be in school, but I’ve been sick. So I learn from books and things. It’s more interesting, anyhow.”
“You’ve been sick?” He gulped. “Er, I don’t mean to be prying or anything, Miss Margot, but I worry for sick people—I really do, I’m not a gossip or…or anything like that. I haven’t got anybody to gossip to.”
She flicked her hair and smiled in the way that made people visibly relax. Miles simply twitched. “Insomnia,” she said. “I don’t sleep. And when I do, I don’t dream.”
“That’s awful,” he said, looking at his feet.
“It’s not so bad. I get more things done, anyhow.”
“Like what?”
“I taught myself French.” Margot didn’t mention the pile of twisted canvas in her closet—the skeletons of people she despised, stuck with needles and bobby pins like little arrows in fallen deer.
“Je ne sais que un peu Français.” His accent was beautiful, flawless—the sort of French that the movie star couples who whispered it in each other’s ears wished they could hear. “J'ai apris en l'école, mais…mais je ne suis pas en la course maintenant.”
“Pourquoi?”
“The teacher…I…I don’t like him very much.” Miles’ shoulders sagged. “At least…at least not anymore.”
“What happened?”
“Things…things got odd.”
His eyelids began to flutter and came to a rest shut. The purple rings around them stretched as his face relaxed and he fell asleep, chest slowly pushing his tie out from behind his vest.
Margot counted to twenty before she bent forward and dipped her fingers into his pocket. His wallet was thick and fat and had small slips of paper falling from it—train tickets. They all left the city but eventually looped around on themselves and came back. Some were purchased immediately after they arrived at their destination; others were spaced several days in between.
Once, he’d made it to the coast. He’d come back five days later.
The tickets fell like thick snowflakes onto the floor as she thumbed through pictures of people she didn’t know and notes from people she’d never met and membership cards for clubs she’d never been invited to.
Just as her fingernails stumbled upon the promising green of dollar bills, the compartment door opened.
___
"I don't speak much French." His accent was beautiful, flawless—the sort of French that the movie star couples who whispered it in each other’s ears wished they could hear. "I learned it in school, but...but I'm not in that class anymore."
"Why?"
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139,593 Literary Works • 672,612 Reviews
Ooooo. I like it. I mean, well. At first i somehow thought she was disfigured...you know? Is she? Ah, I want to know more. If my questions aren't answered I'll tell you.
you know how much, ah, j'adore (eeeergh) your stories. I think they're some of the best I've every read, but, that is nothing new. I've thought that since tenth grade when your writing still resembled green day lyrics (ohmystars)...I still contend that Desmond needs to get up off of Jane's floor, but since thats as far as you've written it, he's gonna remain stagnant, and worried about Bryant locking him out of the house (teehee), and his mother who doesn't love him.
I forgot how emo that piece was.
pooo...this is a crap review. I love this story, though. I can't tell you that enough. Especially I love the super intents (like a ten person tent) ending. Obscure yet clinically correct.
oh, you know what I mean.
you are such a good writer. sometimes these things are so natural.
Hello,
the rip in her skin was covered in brown ringlets and the gaudy pearl noose that dangled from her neck.- I didn't quite understand the first part of this, though the second is clearly a necklace.
"There was always that morbid moment as she was facing it head-on"- exactly! I think what I like best about this piece is that although much of it seems abstract and bizarre, parts of it are undeniably real.
I know just a smidgen of French so I could get the gist of this, but I'm not sure those who don't speak it would. Oh, I see that you have a key at the bottom, it might be more clear if you marked it as such but that's up to you.
I really enjoyed this piece and I think the atmosphere is very well developed, miser able and a bit frantic like an insomniac's world might be. Your description was excellent. Write on!
The (Side Characters) contest has finally ended, and here is your critique!
Anyways, I think I'll explain how I am scoring this before I read further than the title. I have made a set of guidelines:
Following the rules: /50
The side character story: /20
The side character: /20
The main character(s): /20
Originality/Theme/Style: /10
Dialogue: /20
Personal opinion: /5
Technical details: /5
And you will get an overall score (then turned to a percentage) based on that. I will post the scores you got, and explain why for each category. That way you'll know what to improve on.
However, these scores will not be publicly visible. You may discuss them if you wish, but I am putting a password on them. I will PM you with the password, and you will all get different ones.
That way, only first through third place will be announced. For forth through seventh, you will know that you were one of them, but you won't know which one. I figured that would be a bit kinder.
Also, I prefer to put my overall and nit-picks in an attachment, so that is also there. I can only attach one file, so it has a password, too. I would just PM you the scores, but I know that many people will accidentally delete the PM and then not be able to get to the critique, and I don't want that. Saying that, PM me if you need me to tell you the password again. I will save all of them, and it's easier that way than saving the overalls and getting mixed up in that.
Warning Number One: I am planning on doing a very thorough critique, as this is a contest prize. Meaning a comment on every tiny little thing. (And the scores are all low.)
Warning Number Two: I am not going to read through all of your previous comments, so don't yell at me if I repeat things.
(To everyone else: Yes, I write this same thing for all my critiques in this contest. But I swear the attachments have a real, detailed critique. I just wanted to put something here so I'd get points for the hard work, but I hate converting stuff from Word to here, especially since I'll be so thorough as this is a contest prize. I hope that's okay?)
Best of luck!
~JFW1415
(Make sure to PM me for anything at all, and check out The Side Characters Contest Page for more information on the winners.)
Ello Sam
I was looking for something interesting to read and I have found it. Margot seems like the dark character that everyone loves to love vice versa. She seems like she's troubled but yet she seems totally normal. I loved this writing it was something odd but yet it was spontaneous. Your descriptions were very unique. My favorite part was the beginning:
I can almost picture Margot as if I am sitting in that same train station looking right at her. Beautiful. All in all, I thought this was great. I'll keep reading.
Angel,
Sam,
Zomgoodness! I love your writing more than anyone else’s on the site! It’s so much fun to read an always has something extraordinary in it. Always. No matter what you read, it’s always going to be fun and heartwarming. How come you’re so friggin’ awesome?
Okay. Enough with the compliments.
(Again, I’ll try to be funny, but I’m not in the giddy mood I was in yesterday) I love this story to death. It’s so real and so believable that we just instantly fall in love with the characters. I think that’s what you are best at, Sam. Characterization. It must come naturally to you. God, I believe, picked out some of the best writers in Heaven and decided, “Hey, I’m gonna give you an extra whiff of characterization, and for you, and profound gift of description…” ect. It goes on and on, and he gives us all a gift. He gave you characterization, and because of that, you are superawesomeamazingiloveyousauce.
One of your characters, though, needs a bit more attention. This is just the first piece, so I’m sure that you’ll go into so much more detail, but just from this first piece alone, I feel that Miles need a bit more work. I refuse to comment any more because I need to read the rest of the pieces. So, unless I see something wrong, these critiques are pretty much just gonna be praise, until the last one, where I’ll really tear you down.
Zomgoodnessritemorelykenow.
-Jared
As many people before me have said, i haven't found anything wrong with this piece. It was down right brilliant, although i found it somewhat too dead-ish for my taste
. Kepp it up, it was great!
I am going to apologize ahead of time for such a small review but I do have a reason:
I found absolutely nothing to correct
No grammatical errors or spelling typos. Nothing. Nada. So, I have nothing really to comment on, at least to quote. But I suppose I could give you a overview of your story, since I enjoyed it immensely!
Characters
Beautiful. Absolutely attention-grabbing. Miles was wonderful and Margot even better. You made them so live like, so REAL. Which is the whole point of literature.
Plot
There wasn't much there yet, because it was a little short. But I think this Margot is a theif and Miles a drug-adict...Maybe?? Those are my assumptions.
Well, that's all I got. I did apologize ahead of time!
Wonderful work!
One to part two!
*glee* Cal! You rock! I've never studied French in-depth, but none of the languages I do know work quite as well here. ^_~ I shall consult a Frenchie and try again.
Sam,
I don't know if I have ever told you this but this is another stunning example that reminds me of the fact that your writing makes me want to write and, more than that, write well.
About this piece, it is beautiful, in a very sort of precious way. As if twisted it would shatter into pieces not quite knowledgeable of the entire picture it had made previously. Am I making any sense? I hope so. You can breathe in the sadness with each line, and something in Margot, (love the name), reminds me of a young Regan. But perhaps it is the rifling through pockets that makes me draw conclusions.
I like how you have approached the story, writing-wise. It makes me wonder, and that is lovely for the gray cells in the brain.
Beyond that, you probably should now that, maintenant, at least how my French friend Marlene says is actually more like right now rather than anymore. Plus, I don't think ne pas is the right negative and I know I haven't spoken or studied french in awhile, but I think I've figured out how it would be: mais je ne suis [...] plus. Which brings me to the first part of the frenchy-french. Je ne sais que un peu Français. = I don't know that much french. And, francais shouldn't be capitilized. Unless, you written it like this on purpose. The verb apprendre (to learn) which you have written apris, needs an extra p; it should be J'ai appris. Picky, aren't I?
Ta,
Cal.
i love this story, or part of story... i know everyone's said this already but the way you create mood is EXCELLENT, and i especially feel the mood of this story because its the kind of mood i attempt to create in a lot of the things i write....
it came off, to me, as sort of surreal, mysterious, and obviously dark. very intriguing " 'Where are you going?' 'Elsewhere.' ". i also love the title, very fitting and certainly grabbing. not too much i can think of that you can improve upon... cant wait to read that next installment! keep it up.
Ah! You guys are so amazing. ^_^ I've fixed the things that you pointed out, and I'm glad the atmosphere worked.
Luke -- Gorey FTW. I love the Gashlycrumb Tinies [though I've completely forgotten how to spell it.]
Part two is up! I can still PM those who are interested.
I can only agree with the reviews above, like those by Ohio and Penguin. The mood in this piece is established quickly and strongly, giving the reader a mysterious, creepy feeling as soon as they read the title.
Your characters are presented well, but I'd love to know more about them. Since this is only the first part (I'm assuming xD) you've set it up well for a second part and I really hope you go more into your characters, especially Margot.
All in all, good job on this piece! I'm looking forward for the next part!
Missa
This is a very good piece of writing. I didn't find any mistakes and such excapt for just one part that kind of disrupted the flow:
I feel like that is too specific and worded kind of weird. Maybe you could just get rid everything past the hyphen thing? Just a suggestion. Anywhoo, that's wall I found, so I'll just jump into the good stuff. Your writing style is lovely. Very sophisticated and mysterious. I love the mood, as the others do--it's very eerie and leaves you with a lot of questions. Which makes me wonder... is this a stand-alone or is there more to this story? I would really like to know a bit more about Miles. Are there more to these little trips he takes? Was he once maybe more calm or something, and then some incident occured and left him scarred and jumpy for life? Anyway, beautiful! Ten gold stars for you!
Holly
P.S. I love the names, by the way. Very romantic, and like your writing, sophisticated. Sinclair! How mysterious!
"As he tugged at the blind string, his fingers shook—they were slender and pale, much like the rest of him. From his suit to his gray eyes, he appeared drowsy and washed out--but for his hair, which was thick and black. It was an unsettling contrast."
I wish I could put sentences together like that. Well done.
Have I ever told you that I like you, Sam? No? Well, its true. I do.
The idea, as put forth by others, that the creation of mood is essentially more important than the strength of the writing in question, is absured, in my mind. Or that, the mood can forgive bad writing.
Not that such is the case here, I was merely making a point.
I think this was well written, with only a few errors. However, I feel as if some cohesion and stability is traded for pretty words and sentence structure. I struggle to put into words exactly what I mean... tis frustrating. You write, at least in this piece, much like the Imp. In fact, I've noticed a similarity between yours, Imps, Suz, and DD's writing styles; I dub thee a coven!
But that's unrelated.
Much like the Imp, the writing is beautiful in places, but some of the meaning is lost... I must consider this more....Not sure how helpful that is to you :p
But um, anyway. It was pretty.
Ohio is right about this. It is the mood you have captured so well, and it is the mood that id so difficult to critique, for every piece should just have mood, but some never do. This, rather, has an over abundance of the perfect mood, bah to you. ^^
I like Margot. She is a voodoo doll herself, broken with her stiches and theivery and drugs and malevolence. It's fantastic how you've coloured her already with no glaring characterisation (that is the art of good writing, when people can wonder if there is characterisation even though they know the characters well all ready).
Elsewhere was a brilliant use. It's the essense of the else - I'm not sure if you'll understand what I think I mean by that. xD. Nice.
Your triumph, however, comes in your start. You present Margot, the Venus in Venus fly trap, and I feel in love. You were intriguing and enchanting all at once with your destructive doll. Most well done.
Evidently, I found nothing to fault in this. I may read it again (and again, as I've ready read it thrice) and see what I can find. Although I hope the next is as perfect, if only for my uninterrupted enjoyment.
Lovely work.
*Hearts* Le Penguin.
He said, "oh yes you can, just hold my hand.
I think that that would help."
So I sat with him a while, and I asked him how he felt.
Sorry, had to do that.
Anyway, I'm not sure if you're familiar with the works of Edward Gorey, but something in this piece was very Gorey-ey (ugh). The train, the voodoo, the medication, the boy, the French, I don't know. The point is, that while any of us could go through and point out things that need improving (not that there is a lot), you create mood like very few people can. And this is good, because you can't critique mood like you can everything else.
The title was lovely, too. Especially because of what it does for the mood.
I hope I can catch the next installment. Thanks for the read.
I like this. I'm afraid I can't give much in the way of a critique, but that's because this piece was so good. The one thing I will say is it was very short. I'm assuming more is coming because you said it was the first part, but I think you went too fast.
I want to know more about these characters, and you don't say a whole lot. Right now they seem to be very interesting, but not fully developed. I'm sure they'll be come more developed as the story goes on, but right now you've left me staring at the screen thinking, 'Is that it?'
And I was wondering, Elsewhere? Is that a place or something, because I've never heard of it. And it was drugs the two were talking about, right?
I like your writing and I'm sure this will turn out to be really good. Could you PM me when you put the next part up, do you think?
Good job and good luck with the next bit!