Published February 3, 2009
Part of the brief for this piece was that I had to keep the words below 300. It's called microfiction, apparently. Anyway, I'm still not sure - for obvious reasons it's far less descriptive than what I usually write.
If anyone has any tips on how to improve this (without adding more words!) I'd be grateful
Regifting
Their favourite song was on the radio though, at the sound of the first chords, she had turned it down so far that the words were barely alive. When her brother had played it, when they had jammed with he on guitar and she on piano, they had played it in F. The piano needed a tune, and his solos ground for too long. Each note was still a gift.
She glanced towards the bookshelf. A stack of Christmas presents already lay beside her. She had wrapped them as her mind wandered and there wasn’t a crease wrong. The tags were in a calligrapher’s hand. Even by the tired glow her lamp, they sparkled.
She had spent hours not thinking of the only gift she had to give.
The bottle of aftershave sat beside her, its label faded because Ben had left it on a windowsill the year before. Since he had won it at the school fair, they had passed it to each other more times than she could count without laughing. It would appear under alternate trees, wrapped as proudly as anything. Taking it down set her heart throbbing.
The glass was cold. Her fingertips wiped dust from the gold stopper. Ben, over the years, had had the nerve to use the scent.
She sobbed at the song. Ben had always faltered on that shift from the B flat. She couldn’t sing in any other key.
She cut a square of paper.
There were some things that twenty years of tradition couldn’t survive. This wasn’t one of them. It was her year to pass it on, so she would wrap the bottle as elegantly as she could. The last thing she did before midnight would be to drive to the cemetery and leave the parcel at his grave.
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140,890 Literary Works • 673,704 Reviews
Hi guys.
Thanks for these comments - exceptionally helpful. Bravo!
Most of the things you found are either typos (how is that possible when I edited this down from being 540words??) or flaws in my logic.
I feel another draft coming on...
Anyway, it does suck to have a word limit but every once in a while, you learn something. For me, its been helpful as I tend to veer into melodrama. Frequently. Also, I've found an avenue which might see some of my writing published if I can stick to stringent word limits. PM me if you want in on it.
All the best
Um, wow. Powerful.
Very few nit-picks here:
"Though" should be broken away from the first part of the sentence. The way it is now, I had to read this over a couple of times to understand it. Try:
Their favourite song was on the radio. Though at the sound of the first chords, she had turned it down so far that the words were barely alive.
(Corrections for above: Put a period after "radio" and deleted the comma after "though")
I don't really understand this line. I would if the bottle was on the bookshelf, but not if it's right beside her.
Other then that, amazing job.
I can't say anything more without choking up.
If you have any questions, PM me.
~Rosey
Wow- that was great.
It was so sad and I really can't think of anything much to change, the only thing that I would do differnetly would be to replace
with words were barely audible as to me it dosen't seem to fit quite right- but thats just my prefernece.
Also, I know that you can't add in words but if you had one to spare then an of after lamp in
would make more sense.
It amazed me that such a short piece of writing could tell a story in a way that is well written and has such emotion to it!
A sad, bittersweet piece of 'microfiction', mtempleton
Isn't it annoying when they give you a word limit? Completely stifles creativity. Still, for what it was, you worked it well. It didn't come across choppy, like you were trying to get as much in with as few words as possible. Kudos for that.
The first sentence needs altering:
As you can see, the 'though' is in the first part of the sentence, before the comma, so it gives the impression that you are saying 'though' about the song being on, and not about her turning down the volume. Ach, it's hard to explain, but d'you see what I mean? I'm also a bit put off by this part: "the words were barely alive". I see what you're getting at, but 'alive' doesn't work, for me at least.
Something about this sentence glows with profundity!
Maybe I'm being pedantic, but could you swap that 'anything' for, well, anything? A subtle simile would do brilliantly.
*Claps* A superb ending. Didn't fall into the clutches of melodrama, was subtle and telling.
Gold star.