Plastered to my face, the smile greets friends and teachers as my feet carry me from one class to another. People compliment me on my hair, on my clothes. I thank them with the smile, as real as the makeup of a clown. I stride down the hallway, class after class, waiting for a moment to myself. Lunch finally arrives, the long awaited messiah. I storm into the bathroom, allowing the façade to crumble. The weight of everything in my life crashes down on my shoulders, an anvil of terror and frustration. Tears erase my makeup in hideous streaks as I pull my knees to my chest, staring at the graffiti on the bathroom wall, written as dark as the thoughts in my head. The shrill bell cries out, and I shakily rise to my feet, a climb seemingly steeper than Everest. I towel the tears off my face, and reapply the smile along with my powder.
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140,764 Literary Works • 673,687 Reviews
Hello, and welcome to YWS!
This story, although short, really packs a punch! I have a couple of suggestions, however, that might make it even more powerful. I feel as though if you were to add line breaks (as well as maybe delete some words) so that it looks like poetry, that a poem would be a better vehicle for this idea. The paragraph makes it look clumpy and detracts from the overall purpose, I think, and it's too short anyway for it to be an actually story, since nothing is actually happening.
For example, this:
really speaks like poetry to me! It's really a beautiful line.
This bit confused me a little. I'm having a hard time understanding what the "powder" is that the speaker is referring to. Is it literal makeup? Or are you going back to the idea of relating it to the makeup of a clown? If the latter, I would definitely want you to elaborate on that. I think the idea of comparing a fake smile to something so concrete as a clown is really amazing and would tie in the "circus" theme you were going for.
Overall, nice concept that although is slightly overused, the way you related that abstract thought of "putting on a mask" to the concrete image of a clown at a circus was really great! Nice work, and keep writing!
-Snazzy
Hello wafflewolf7!
Welcome to YWS!
I'm a rookie here myself, just to let you know.
Your story is dramatic and sad, yet so realistic. As the title suggests, your story is about masks we all use. Just like a circus clown, we apply masks to look different. We use mask to hide our inner emotions, fearing to be judged by others for our emotions, or we want to fit in, prove that we are happy. Yet while alone, we take off the mask, only to hate ourselves and to be scared of our insecurities.
Your story is something many teens go thru in school. We all want to fit in with our peers, so we pretend to look cool, happy, like there is no problem with our lives. As we act like this, we further hide our problems. There might be problems with our relationships with our parents or guardians, our hatred for how we look and many more. By hiding them, with no answer and solution or encouragement from other, we begin to be depressed.
Your story is an encouragement, that we shouldn't let stress overwhelm us, that we should be more open about the things that trouble us. By being true to ourselves, we can live a happier life.
Hope you will continue to write similar interesting content like this one. Good luck with further writing.
Sincerely, rkm.
Thank you very much for the warm welcome and support! This one was just kind of a brain vomit, but I thought it was important enough to post. I'm really glad that you think so too!