Young Writers Society

Aha! Now we're in familiar territory. At 258 words, this is solidly microfiction, which is my new pet hobby while waiting to get my novel MS back. In this realm, EVERY SINGLE WORD matters. Like, imagine you'll have to manually pick up each word and put it on a shelf or pack it in a bag or wrap it in wrapping paper, or whatever menial task you want to imagine. EVERY. SINGLE. WORD.

Soooo, since this is nice and short, I'm going to go sentence by sentence for a change.

First of all, I really don't like the "them/they." This is just me. It's not common enough usage in everyday language to feel as personal as a he/she. This character has suffered a loss, and they KNOW what gender the person was. Maybe it was someone who went by they/them, but I guess in my possibly limited and biased worldview, it just plain makes it harder for me to connect with the character and their loss. I'm going to arbitrarily pick a pronoun to use, but if you prefer they/them, don't let me stop you.

From here, I'm going to rewrite line by line. Not because I think this is how YOU should write it, but that this is how *I* would write it, and you can hopefully find the technique differences and sift out the taste differences. I'll try to use your words as much as possible.

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I rest my cheek on the cool pillow. The soft down sinks under my head as I try to fall asleep to the Sandman's lullaby. I lay staring up at the spinning ceiling fan, and all I can think is...

This bed is so cold...

Here, I've intentionally trimmed out words to focus on the most salient descriptors. I've managed to reduce the total number of sentences, which speeds the pace, and I've tried to use word choice to manipulate where the most focus/emphasis goes--cool pillow, soft down, Sandman's lullaby, and spinning ceiling fan.

The space beside me is empty. There should be a body there. Not just any body. Her.

This bed is so cold...

I've dramatically reduced this paragraph's size. The most important thing, to me, is that "her" encapsulates EVERYTHING said by: "A person. Someone that I cared for. Someone I still care for. And yet...they aren't there." In "Her" I *feel* that same longing. All those things are implied, inferred, evoked. And as for the last sentence, it goes without saying. BETTER left unsaid.

I can almost smell faint traces of her almond shampoo. Feel the depression in the bed, the warmth of her breath. Lying so peacefully that I dare not move. But with each passing day, the memories fade a little further.

This bed is so cold...

Now here, you'll notice, while I did reduce wordcount, I wasn't as aggressive with it. I allowed myself to add words if I needed to (even though I didn't end up doing that, haha). I wanted to make this really real and personal and visceral and vivid. So I went for very SPECIFIC memories. Therein lies power, if you ask me.

I run a hand over the empty sheets, their chill caressing my skin. A tear falls from my eye to the pillow below. It joins the many that have come before it.

This bed is so cold...

I deleted a lot of extra "fluff" from this paragraph. You also misused the semicolon.

Where did it go wrong? What could I have done? Now she's gone. And this place is so lonely.

This bed is so cold...

For this one, I stuck with the more unique and emotion-driven of the rhetorical questions. 4 is too many. I didn't necessarily *decide* I was going to keep two, but that's what felt best. Also, those lines are the hugely important part of the whole piece, because this is what tells us what happens. The way I've written it, based off what you wrote, suggests a breakup. If she DIED, I might dooo.... "Could we have caught it sooner? Could we have done more?" or something like that.

It might help to read your whole version, then my whole version, without my commentary, and compare what you like and dislike of the changes.

Hello.

I normally do not advocate a thesaurus, but you would most certainly benefit from broadening your vocabulary. The word "cold" shows up seven times total, and in fairly close proximity at that. With how sparse this piece is, and how few words you have in general, allocating about 3% of your wordcount to a single word (over 3% if you add in "chill" and "cool") is distracting.

Which leads me to the general point this work is extremely repetitive. In the fourth paragraph you repeat the same turns of phrases on top of each other for what I assume is emphasis, but it simply falls flat because there's so much other repetition. Whenever you start to use the same technique over and over again, it loses meaning. Paragraph 1 has "head" repeated in two sentences". Paragraph 2 spends five sentences expanding upon who the body was. Paragraph five is nothing but questions.

My guess is this was an attempt at a generic storyline everyone could insert themselves into, but the result is something so generic that it's forgettable. Personal details, ironically, are what make a work impersonal— they give readers a little piece to latch onto and more easily adapt to their own lives.

Overall, cut out the repetition, get to the point faster, make this more detailed, and focus on a personal connection to the reader. The story will be stronger as something where the characters are characterized, instead of simply being vessels to tell the plot.

Hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions or comments.

~Rosey

Hey there!
So I'm just here for a quick review. This "short" reads more like a poem because of the consistent formatting with the two lines and then the repetition with the bed is so cold. Also, I think this line is repetitive too much, it takes away the meaning of the words. I think this is really good as far as concept and imagery but there are definitely some things you could do to work this out.

XOXO,
Grav

Heya, here for a review~

Grammatical Errors:

"The cool feeling caressing my neck and head as I try to fall asleep to the Sandman's lullaby."
~ This is an incomplete sentence.

"I look to the space beside me It wasn't always like this. There used to be a body there. Not just any body. A person. Someone that I cared for. Someone I still care for. And yet...they aren't there."
~ Just a missed space after the ellipsis (...) and a missed period after "It". Also, I noticed that you say one person, though then you proceed to reference the person as multiple people later on.

"Lying so peacefully that I dare not move or risk waking them."
~ Waking whom? The smell? Or is the narrator speaking in terms that they are there metaphorically, or is it waking the presence of them?

"I run a hand over the empty sheets; a chill caressing my skin with their cold embrace. A tear falling from my eye to the pillow skin by their cold embrace. A tear falling from my eye to the pillow beneath my head. It joins the many that have come before it"
~ I'd avoid using the same comparison in such close proximity to one another. It can create bad repetition. Also, another missed period.