Untitled.

[trois_pistoles]

This story contains dark humor, but is written with good intentions.

***

I was wandering around, hunted by ennui. Out of errands to run, I was pacing around like a panther.

I felt eyes on me. She was beautiful. She wasn't even hot or cute. She was just ****ing gorgeous. She was a natural beauty. She did have eyeliner on, but all it did was make her look a little more sultry. She had Mediterranean features, an aquiline nose. Dark curly hair, blue eyes. She had her legs crossed and they were stunning. Her thighs were thick and powerfully built, although her upper body was skinny. She had a sprinter's thighs. She was wearing high leather riding boots with a skimpy cotton dress. She had profound eyes. Not bright, but deep.

Confident outfit, shy body language; the boots were sort of knocking together. Every time I made eye contact with her she looked down and blushed, or turned to the side and hid a smile. It dawned on me that I looked like ****, like a hurricane hit me. Feigning confidence, I sat down next to her. Luckily, I was amused enough to wear a genuine smile.

Small talk. The usual stuff. Short on wit, I asked plainly for her phone number. Surprisingly, she gave it to me with zero resistance.

We met at a wine bar. I don't remember whose choice it was, but neither of us really knew **** about wine. I had borrowed a sports car, a six-speed, and put together enough cash to order comfortably. She was dressed up a bit. I wanted her to think I was classy, and I guess she wanted the same. We were both pretty relieved to find out that the other was actually quite broke, so it was agreed. The next date would be simpler.

She turned out to be a year older than me, at 22. We talked about politics but I have a hard time pretending to agree with **** so that topic went south.

An awkward silence.

Brave, she rescued the conversation. She was "not exactly bisexual but umm…" had fooled around with girls before. She had had a threesome once but didn't like it. I considered that option still kind of open, although the ruling sounded final. Actually the thought began to consume me. I had never really known anybody to talk like that, especially on a first date. It made her seem exotic. She said she liked dirty talk, but wouldn't give an example.

She was the most enticing combination of forward and hard-to-get.

We saw each other a couple more times. A cafe, a dive bar, a park bench. It got harder and harder to leave. We had been loitering around a restaurant, reminding each other that we "really should go." We ended up in the car, steaming up the windows like douchebags. I lifted her dress up, and found she was sort of au natural, although neat. I could picture my friends laughing and giving me **** about it. Philistines. I didn't give a ****. I was transported instantly. I imagined we were in an old movie or an old book, that, somehow, we were in the good old days, if there ever really were any. I thought the world of her. I figured I was in love. I had to have been. Married couples can't even stand each other. We were inseparable. There was no way that two old twats giving each other singing Christmas cards on a Florida cruise felt like this.

***

Sitting here now, I am physically pained by the fact that she didn't come back with me to spend the night. My new roommate and I have just moved into a new place and it doesn't really feel like home.

"I'm going to the convenient store."
"for what?"
"cigarettes."
"they don't have any."
"of course they have cigarettes"

…

In the store, there's fruit behind the counter. There are usually cigarettes behind the counter. My blood is curdling like sour milk. They must be stored somewhere weird so as not to entice children. Someone must not have had the patience to wait in line and ask.

…

"pack of Marlboros"
"Marlboro? Cigarettes? We don't carry tobacco products."

Holy ****ing ****. They really put the fruit there to taunt smokers. Bananas. They're really telling me to smoke a banana. I am ****ing overheating. I walk outside to bum a cigarette. No one in this town smokes. I am in a Kafkan nightmare. I imagine myself walking back into the convenient store in a long overcoat, leather brimmed hat and, for some reason, goggles, carrying two pistols.

"No cigarettes?" I'd taunt them.
I am a man on the edge.

…

My roommate has some friends over. He's apparently kind of popular, and sort of a jock. He has a bizarre sense of humor. He seems to quote movies I haven't seen.

"Howdy-doody there private **** patrol" in a Southern drawl.
"oh, hey."
"All hands on dick, private." In the living room, laughter effervesces.
"Engage your **** holster." He's making mechanical macho motions. "Activate schlong sensors." An uproar.
…What the **** movie have I not seen?

I am so relieved that one of his friends smokes, the puzzling homoeroticisms evacuate my mind. She dances through my thoughts. I can't carry a conversation without leading it toward her. I can't speak highly enough of her. I am informed that I am acting like "Lieutenant *****-boy of fag company." I am warned that if I continue acting like a *****-boy I will be banished to the friend zone, unable to get out until the ****-chopper lands at my LZ. I am then treated to a long-winded jeremiad about how females are genetically programmed to have an Alpha male impregnate them, while simultaneously tricking a Beta male *****-boy to take care of them.

I try to shake it off. It is disturbingly convincing.

Another cigarette. It haunts me. A dark shadow casts over imagery of her.

I tell my roommate that he's an *******, and he swells with pride. It is explained to me that there are two types of *******s: a dick-head ******* and a ****-sucking *******. A dick-head ******* is just a proud man that others are jealous of. A ****-sucking ******* is insecure and venomous. He gives examples. He seems to have thought about this. I wonder if he's smarter than he lets on. I wonder if he was a nerd in high school. I have to admit that his cavalier attitude is enticing. I swear, though I won't let any external **** **** this up. Baggage from an old betrayal, Ranting dude-bros, that is all bull****. I decide that a '*****-boy', truly, is someone who acts in fear. I determine to go out on a limb with her. I resolve to carry a zen cup, a mental space for new experience, free from assumption.

I **** it up.

She cancels plans with me to see other friends. They're going to a bar. I am prickled by jealousy. She reports later that she blacked out, and "can't remember what happened." I am stewing. I have strange visions of her conspiring with the other genetically programmed females my roommate illuminated. I hang up on her. I know I'm not thinking clearly, but I can't get my bearings.

I see her again, and am deeply intoxicated by her presence. Everything seems fine. Nothing in particular, but everything about her strikes a perfect chord with me. We are outside, in some common area, in some town that we wound up in, lost, not really caring where we go anyway. We have one of those cliche conversations where it turns out we have so much in common. We swear we've known each other for a long time. We have been looking for each other. We declare, officially, that we are boyfriend and girlfriend. Time slips by. It's getting dark. I'm enraptured. She starts acting strange. She's looking around a lot, avoiding eye contact. She's biting her lip and wincing a little. I tell her no one is looking at us. I am assured "It's not that."

"Then what is it?"

Adrenaline. Romance evaporates.

She coughs up that she's sure I'd understand. Takes a deep breath. She starts mumbling and stammering something about "some guy she ran into." I am stunned. I am rung like a gong. I feel as Claudius, taken for a *****-boy, and then poisoned by the girl I trusted.

"I knew you were a slut. It was obvious all along. I knew not to care about *****es" I fire, interrupting.
She is crumpled up, crying, with her head cocked all the way to the side. The back of her hand is against her forehead. She looks like the damsel in distress from a bad movie. Everything is still around us. The wind is blowing eerily. She whimpers quietly. I am fuming. She looks at me and winces.

Air escapes from her throat, like steam through a valve.

A pause.

"I was sexually assaulted" She fires out, monotone, like a machine gun.

A thousand poison arrows hit me. Guilt rings through me, resonates in my fingertips. I am falling a thousand miles. I snap back. I am a coward. I fall again.

…

I loved her more than old duffers love each other. She won't return my phone calls.
I am informed that she's moving. It is not clear where.
I sit down in a chair, to die a thousand deaths.

[trois_pistoles]

Can someone say something?
Even if you don't get it, or you don't like it, can you tell me what you don't get, or what you don't like?

[hillwalker]

Something...

You want to hear more? It's humorous in a throw-away way. But two things made it less rewarding than it could have been. The linear plot ends up going nowhere despite the gut-wrenching line delivered close to the end. It became hard to figure out why you were telling us so much trivial stuff except to see how many *****s you could fit into a sentence.

I know censorship doesn't help free expression - but after a while bad language (for want of a better term) becomes boring, almost infantile. In its place it can be effective but when it's scattered through a story the way it is here we fail to see the point. Unless that was the 'humour' element.

H

[AuntShecky]

I'm afraid that I can't see anything resembling a plot or vivid characterization here. Despite the intended shock value of the girl's (her name?) statement, not much in the way of meaning. The reader almost wants to say "So what?"

Perhaps you might want to work on how to present your writing. A good place to start is practice writing elegant sentences and then moving up into paragraphs. Learn about the different types of sentence structure and vary their appearance. You'll want to give your paragraphs a sense of rhythm so that you won't have an endless string of simple, declarative sentences all beginning with the same word, "I."

The opening section of this piece is heavy on narration, more "telling" than
"showing." Unfortunately the lines of dialogue don't really reveal all that much, except a shortage of butts and the difficulty of obtaining them. Maybe this is an attempt at a metaphor referring to the ultimately unattainable lady(?) By the way, when writing lines of dialogue, begin each line with a capital letter. End the line conventionally with one ( and only one)
punctuation mark before adding the closing quotes.

Think through your images and references. For instance, why would you want to personify an abstract affectation such as ennui, which rather than actively "hunts" down its victims merely hangs around the area, like smoke clinging to a ceiling. Also, the term is "convenience" store, which may or may not be actually "convenient."

As my astute fellow LitNutter has pointed out, try to be a little less promiscuous with your use of
*****. Vulgarities, swear words, whatever term you like have their place, but depending on them too often may indicate a sparse vocabulary on the part of the writer.

Keep writing, but in the meantime read some good examples of modern and
contemporary short stories. Study the craft.

[trois_pistoles]

Something...

You want to hear more? It's humorous in a throw-away way. But two things made it less rewarding than it could have been. The linear plot ends up going nowhere despite the gut-wrenching line delivered close to the end. It became hard to figure out why you were telling us so much trivial stuff except to see how many *****s you could fit into a sentence.

I know censorship doesn't help free expression - but after a while bad language (for want of a better term) becomes boring, almost infantile. In its place it can be effective but when it's scattered through a story the way it is here we fail to see the point. Unless that was the 'humour' element.

H

OK, so I know it's not the height of fine literature. It's not intended to be. I wanted to convey what I saw as a lot of hilariously cavalier attitude in people my age, and some of the disastrous consequences. It was written at about 2 am so it might not be incredibly lucid.

The original vision for it was a young guy using arrogance to cover insecurities but being a fundamentally decent guy. The girl is supposed to be insecure also, but she acts seductively to cope with it. They are supposed to be a potentially happy couple, if they could both just trust each other. The lack of trust is supposed to bring them down.

Do you think it's worth retooling, or would you recommend moving on to one of my next ideas?

[hillwalker]

You mention the character traits of your two main players - a young man masking his insecurities and trying to fit into his peer-group by behaving loutishly and a young, traumatised woman behaving precociously as a way of coping with past abuse.

These are two avenues definitely worth exploring if you are willing to redraft the story - but you need to bring your characters to life by more than just stereotypical dialogue.

I'm guessing you found it so easy to put yourself in the shoes of the former that you decided to have a ball at the expense of your readers. It wasn't particularly entertaining or enlightening. And as for the girl - she's a paper-thin character because again you are using her to make a point rather than allowing her to inhabit the story as a real person.

If you have the patience this has potential - just try a more subtle approach. Less 'American Pie' and more 'American Beauty'.

H

[trois_pistoles]

You mention the character traits of your two main players - a young man masking his insecurities and trying to fit into his peer-group by behaving loutishly and a young, traumatised woman behaving precociously as a way of coping with past abuse.

These are two avenues definitely worth exploring if you are willing to redraft the story - but you need to bring your characters to life by more than just stereotypical dialogue.

I'm guessing you found it so easy to put yourself in the shoes of the former that you decided to have a ball at the expense of your readers.


I didn't really think it was at the expense of the readers. I thought they were supposed to be enticed by the attitudes and then warned about them later. I guess that depends on who's reading. I'm not sure how to present the male characters here without the "ball" that you describe.



It wasn't particularly entertaining or enlightening. And as for the girl - she's a paper-thin character because again you are using her to make a point rather than allowing her to inhabit the story as a real person.


I want her to inhabit the story, but there's a caveat. It's important to the storyline that the main character is ignorant of her interiority. I'm not really sure how to go about it. Do you think the story should follow her when the main character is not there? Should she speak intimately to the main character? How can the reader figure her out while the male characters remain in the dark?

[trois_pistoles]

I'm afraid that I can't see anything resembling a plot or vivid characterization here. Despite the intended shock value of the girl's (her name?) statement, not much in the way of meaning. The reader almost wants to say "So what?"


What makes you say shock value? Is it the way it's presented suddenly? It's not supposed to be a cheap trick on the reader it's supposed to give the character an epiphany.



Perhaps you might want to work on how to present your writing. A good place to start is practice writing elegant sentences and then moving up into paragraphs. Learn about the different types of sentence structure and vary their appearance. You'll want to give your paragraphs a sense of rhythm so that you won't have an endless string of simple, declarative sentences all beginning with the same word, "I."

The opening section of this piece is heavy on narration, more "telling" than
"showing." Unfortunately the lines of dialogue don't really reveal all that much, except a shortage of butts and the difficulty of obtaining them. Maybe this is an attempt at a metaphor referring to the ultimately unattainable lady(?) By the way, when writing lines of dialogue, begin each line with a capital letter. End the line conventionally with one ( and only one)
punctuation mark before adding the closing quotes.



The butts scene is supposed to develop the character. He's supposed to be kind of edgy and impatient. He's in a city where people are health-conscious and he is a smoker.




Think through your images and references. For instance, why would you want to personify an abstract affectation such as ennui, which rather than actively "hunts" down its victims merely hangs around the area, like smoke clinging to a ceiling. Also, the term is "convenience" store, which may or may not be actually "convenient."



I agree on the ennui imagery, thank you.

[hillwalker]

What I meant by 'at the expense of the reader' was the segment with his room-mates which is virtually unreadable because of all the ***s. No one is going to make the effort to read through it in search of the occasional bon mot. One presumes you had fun writing it - but it became rather lost this end of the wire.

H

[BookBeauty]

I agree with the above statements, but especially the use of profanity.

I began reading and I was caught for the first few sentences, I was engaged and ready to read. And then profanity all of a sudden.

It stopped me short and I wanna roll my eyes and walk away from a potentially good piece when I can see there's a whole lot more profanity coming.

It, quite frankly, ruins the narrative for me. I like raw pieces, but however jagged and rough it might be, they've got to come together smoothly and cohesively.