The Picture

[cyclonus]

We had our projects, so we had to carry a lot of stuff to school. It was the English literature project, and we had to write summaries of two plays by William Shakespeare. I’d got a lot of cool photos to make up for with my ugly handwriting. Among them were two of the best, and I intended to use them in the starting pages of the project. One was a large picture of Shakespeare, page size, and another was a collage of A Midsummer Night’s Dream . Needless to say, as God tests man in the most unlikely of situations, when I had removed my file from the bag, those two pictures were left in the picture thin and light plastic bag, that floated around without my knowledge, dropping its precious contents around.

I realized that only when it was time to paste the pictures. The supervisor in the class, fortunately, was revered everywhere and well disposed towards me, and helped me find one of the pictures, the collage of the night’s dream. The picture of Shakespeare was still missing.

Suddenly, I remembered a guy from another division looting around for a picture of Shakespeare. I had seen him run out of our class with something waving in his right hand. I told the supervisor, and she immediately took me to his class. I felt a little awkward, searching someone’s things like that, but what could I do? Twenty marks were at stake. I didn’t find it there. A thought flitted through my mind that he must have hidden it somewhere, but I held myself.

I went back to the class and to my bench, forlorn. A while later, somewhere behind me, a shrill sound said, “eh, you idiot! It’s lying here!”

No one can comprehend the amount of relief and thankfulness to god I felt at that moment. The supervisor suggested that I should go to the suspect’s class and apologize. I agreed with her.

I returned to the class, and the supervisor asked, “Did you say sorry?”

I said yes.

I returned to my bench, and asked my partner, “Where’s the picture of Shakespeare? Give it here; I’ll keep it safely somewhere.”

The guy just stared at me. I had lost the thing again.

This incident was put to light, and the whole class guffawed their lives out, no one caring about my feelings. I also put up a light front, pretending that I’ll find it again. But in my head, a hurricane raged. On top of it, the supervisor said that I had taken the picture with me when I had gone to apologize to the suspect, and it must have fallen somewhere in the corridor. I couldn’t remember clearly, but she was reliable enough.
She made us all say a prayer (out of fun) for the picture, that may it be found. I resumed writing, trying to convince myself that bygones were bygones.

After a while, she got up and went around the class. When she reached behind me, she cried, “See, it’s here!” I turned, and surely, there it was, in her hands.

I thanked her, and the bell rang. She walked out of the class. It suddenly struck me.

“You guys set me up!” I yelled to my friends around me, who were smiling suspiciously ever since the supervisor had left.

They broke out into hearty laughs, and I just kept looking at them, smiling gently.
At length, one of them said, “We didn’t! The supervisor did!”

[cyclonus]

please someone give me some reviews. its a true story, by the way

[Cross]

Love the verbs you used, but the phrase guffawed their lives out is unfamiliar to me. I'd have most likely used 'hearts' or 'faces off' instead. But other than that, really good. :)

[cyclonus]

this is the first story i wrote. thank you.
other than that, any mistakes?

[cyclonus]

guffawed their lives out - i guess that's what being creative is, isnt it? what's the point of using phrases that people have seen elsewhere?

[Cross]

You're exactly right, if I can understand it, I might start using it as well :)

If your set on some CC, here ya go.
change the, 'I’d got a lot of cool photos to make up for with my ugly handwriting.' to get rid of the 'with.' So it'd go a little smoother, 'I’d got a lot of cool photos to make up for my ugly handwriting.' But leaving it like this would have it considered a fragment, whereas you could add a semicolon and take it into the next sentence and have it blend a bit better.

'that floated around without my knowledge, dropping its precious contents around.'
That 'floated around' could be perked up a little, perhaps, 'drifted away'? And 'scattering it's precious contents along the floor'? These are just suggestions on how I'd try to make it flow a bit more :)



"I went back to the class and to my bench, forlorn. A while later, somewhere behind me, a shrill sound said, “eh, you idiot! It’s lying here!”
Its partly a matter of preference, but I find a sentence flows a bit better with the descriptive adjective at the beginning, followed by a comma and the rest of the sentence. As well, it sounds a bit awkward. So in this case, I'd write it, "Forlorn, I went back to my bench in the classroom." Also, a person's voice can be described as such, as well, try to mix it up some instead of using 'said' all the time; so it could have been, 'somewhere behind me, a shrill voice called, "eh, you idiot! It's lying here!"'

If you want more, I'll happily nit-pick through the rest, but for now, I bid you good night. Keep up the writing, it's really good.

[hillwalker]

I’ll start with that opening sentence - I'm not sure what purpose it serves – I would kick off with ‘For our English literature project we had to…’

The sentence I’d got a lot of cool photos to make up for with my ugly handwriting. sounds awkward because it’s grammatically incorrect. You don’t need the word ‘with’.

Similarly …those two pictures were left in the picture thin and light plastic bag, that floated around without my knowledge, dropping its precious contents around is a mess. You’re trying to fit far too much into one sentence – and why ’around’ twice?

’a shrill sound said, “eh, you idiot! It’s lying here!”’ is also awkward – a sound can’t say anything – you need to rephrase this – perhaps ‘I heard a shrill sound – ‘

And this sentence is dreadful I’m afraid –

’This incident was put to light, and the whole class guffawed their lives out, no one caring about my feelings.’

The word ‘guffawed’ is a very strange choice, but even if you replace it with ‘laugh’ you can’t laugh your life out so it makes no sense (and is grammatically incorrect anyway – the class is a singular object so has one life not many lives).
And you're not being creative if the words don't make sense - the sentence is not an original use of English, it’s a shambles.

Other than that it’s quite entertaining – a little flimsy perhaps, and the fact that it actually happened matters not. But it made me smile – good stuff.

H