I enjoyed this a great deal. It brought tears to my eyes and made me wonder about other parts of “The Old Mans” story. Who was she? Did the children walking past remind him of his? What was significant about the necklace? I was struck by the kindness of the drug store clerk or owner too, he was a kind, gentle man. I wonder what he did with the old mans “Treasures.”
I enjoyed this little moment in a life you describe. You pulled me into her world, all of the pain she suffered living in the doldrums for two years, then the glorious moment of success. For me it all takes place in a couple seconds in her mind.
I see the after story too, the hassle with the police. While they were ineffective because he had done nothing to her, she has definitely done something to him and will have to defend her actions. I think because of the history and that he has a gun in his hand she walks away free with her head held up, looking forward now, instead of fearful over the shoulder glances.
Thank you for sharing your story with us.
Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I enjoyed your story, it was quite funny. The allusions for names you used got to me. Indamiddle was good, but Getmore 6 made me laugh. A worry that had first place in my mind for over 60 years, but at 77 has dropped several notches.
The only thing I noted that ou mighat think about is your line, “...but those shiny-sparkly things...” which goes against known data. The stars do not sparkle in the vacuum of space. The sparkle is caused by our atmosphere.
Thank you for sharing your story with us. Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I liked that a lot. I’m still laughing at their conversation. Being 77 and needing new ears (I got programmable ones) I can relate to their verbiage.
I thought the interplay was great with each in their own little worlds and refusing to accept their situation. I can relate to that too being crippled too.
Thank you for sharing your story with us. I’m still laughing at their back and forth. Very good putting that together.
Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
That is very well done and expresses the site. It’s a site about words and all of those words tell part of its story. Mostly it’s the people who maintain it and I tell them that at every opportunity.
This is a beautiful way to show it. It might be well for them to want to use it.
Thank you for sharing your work with us. Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I really enjoyed that. Thank you for sharing your story with us.
Having been in the navy from 1959 to 1963 I knew several special forces and marines that shared some stories with me. You took me on a trip back through those memories in your setup of him. I believed every word of it.
Then the introduction of his wife and daughter was handled beautifully. A very smooth transition from his very rigid and dangerous persona to the loving husband and father. The way you used her to wrap a warm blanket around him to calm the savagery he’s holding.
Your last line was very good.
Thank you again. Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I like your story, it’s a neat scene to visualize and play with in my mind. I think making the cop female adds strength to it.
Your use of dialect is good, but you drop out of it often. The first line reads too educated, “Hey, ‘scuse me lady, this’s y’urs.” or something like that. The sentence where Albie tells her what his Pops said does the same. I also don’t think this street thug would ever say “...showcased the curves of a females legs.” it would be a lot cruder than that.
Where Albie tells her he’s Frankie’s currency carrier you start the sentence in good dialect then he says “currency courier” and again that strikes me as too educated, “Money runner,” maybe and the end says, “So, here, take this delivery, okay?” Again, not street talk.
I enjoyed your story, a cute little street vignette.
Thank you for sharing your story with us.
Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I like your story. You take a very macabre scene and make it almost believable.
A couple small things, a typo where you say “...meatof...” needs a space. Also you italicize “meat”, is that your intent? I think emphasizing that word then pulls focus from your story. My opinion only.
When you use the phrase, “No. Why would I tell you anything?” Is the character reemphasizing the “No” or defining what he meant by saying it? If it’s simply restating it it’s fine, but if he’s trying to define it, which ads another level of contempt to his position with the cop, then “No, as in why would I tell *you* anything!” might play better. Italicize the “You” there to focus the contempt on the police chief. My opinion only again.
You say, “...blue eyes shooting holes..” and that threw me. My image was of the cop leaning over him with an unwavering, intense glare that would be “...boring...” holes through him, a slower, much more intense mood to draw on. Look up Auger too, a slow, ratcheting, agonizing way to cut a hole in someone.
You use an en-dash when you say, “...joy of their screams-“ and it should be an em-dash, double wide, “...their screams—“
I think your end would be stronger if you put the sentence, “I may have lied...etc” as the last sentence. You’ve built this marvelous scene to where he’s free, jumping around like spit on a hot griddle and shrieking, I don’t think he’d say “I may have...”. He’d use the words like a knife, stabbing the cop with them like, I screeched, “Surprise! I lied! He does kill!”
A very eat little story. Good work. Keep at it,
Thank you for sharing your work with us. Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I liked that a lot. You got a great deal of emotion across with very few words.
My strong assumption, from the morbid laugh, is that she just eviscerated him and wants to gloat, but his “ Lots of practice” response gets to her.
If I might make one suggestion; the last line is too strong if she’s really been effected by him. Something like, “Each word he uttered broke her heart.” It is your piece though, for me a softer end shows a much deeper understanding of his hurt. If that’s what you were after.
It is good though, and I enjoyed it.
Thank you for sharing your words with us. Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
🐸
I liked that little story. It brought back several memories of that happening in my life.
I loved the twist you used. I did not get that Buddy was a dog until the kid with sticky hands grabbed him. I also didn’t get that Lola was a dog until I reread it and caught the shoulder bump, a common thing among some dogs. I missed the “breaking in a new mailman” too until I reread it.
Good work, keep on writing.
Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I’m a navy vet, 1959 - 1963, I was in Subic Bay in the Philippines new years eve 1960.
I like your story. It tells a tale that I can live in for a while. My wife of 45 years died 4 years ago and this pulled up memories of her finding me. I have never been able to ask a girl out the first time. 2nd time, no problem, but they must ask first. When they found me they hung around, 45 years is the record for me.
One place made me stop to think. You wrote, “She made him want to be corny. He smiled, unknowingly.” I’m not sure I understand what you meant. They seem like unnecessary words. If you eliminate them her following question sets the whole thing up it reads more natural too.
Good banter between them, it reminds me of getting to know my wife. Also, I haven’t heard the word “Corny” in a very long time. Thank you for using it.
Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
Thank you for sharing those thoughts. I have 3 daughters and one of them went through the cutting. 8 grand daughters too and 3 of them did it. I was confined for a month for evaluation, by state law in California. All but 1, she’s still just 19, of them are successful business women now. My youngest daughter is 44 and my oldest grand daughter is 39.
To me, being an old white fart, it reads like a dump from a late teens female mind, much like what I saw and heard. It also puts forth the “Cleaning” concept which fits exactly into how I feel about all life. “I’m in charge of Me, no other one or no other thing in the universe gets to decide who I am.” Every preacher and politician on the planet wants control, pretty much “Everyone” actually.
Do it like this! Don’t do that! Believe this fantasy! Think like this! Stand now! Sit now! All language to take away who you are and put them in place instead. Screw them!
Thank you again. I appreciate the Cleaning thought. They want to sweep me away so they can live there.
Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I like this little story. It’s a powerful lesson in life, not just love. I particularly liked the ending, Bill is a self centered male that doesn’t deserve her or anyone else.
The only thing that made a blip in the story was the line, “What's happening, Bill?" the name, Bill, feels forced. We know it’s Bill, the first sentence tells us, and if they’re buddies like the rest of the dialog makes clear, what’s happening would sound better in my mind. The piece isn’t long enough to catch some of the other nuances.
I loved the last sentence. What a marvelous twist. Bill deserved every bit of that.
Thank you for sharing your words with us. Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I like your poem. I’ll be 77 in July and I’ve spent days, maybe months, contemplating every one of those thoughts along with a string of others I thought of. The title caught my attention and your words kept me wanting more.
The only thing that jarred me was , “And imagined all the possible worlds, That each burning gaseous light might beget.” Might Beget implies they haven’t and they’ve been working at it for 14 billion years or so. Our solar system is only 5 billion years old. “...could have...” adds a lot of past to it. Just my thoughts because it did stop me.
I think it flows smoothly. Your “...I ran ahead of time...” scene took me back 70 years to catching lightning bugs with my cousin. She and I had a lot of fun together. Thank you for prompting that memory.
Your last paragraph is beautiful. It puts words to exactly what I feel. Thank you again.
Very good.
Thank you for sharing your words with us. Stay safe and enjoy life, it’s a wonderful place to hang out.
I like your story. It’s a cute retell of the vampire legend, with a little twist. I rather like the simple ‘bash their head in’ instead of the paralyzing gaze or bite. Much simpler.
I love the ‘al fresco’ title.
Your words painted vivid images for me. I could Feel his cold standing there at the towers top. What was he expecting though? A ‘rare viewing opportunity’ doesn’t feel strong enough to draw him to the top of the tower.
Your last paragraph is wonderful. ‘The usual order’ implies habitual behavior, so this is very common and ‘Plump Yanks’ is perfect, it implies a lot of that habitual behavior was with plump yanks. Very well done.
Thank you for sharing your words with us. Stay safe and enjoy life.
I enjoyed your story. Having a dog attach to you like that is a different experience and I think you described the process well. It reads like a true story and my thoughts are you may as well give in and accept the inevitable. I didn’t once a long time ago and I still regret it.
One or to niggling things. In your 2nd line “rest” should most likely read “rests.”
The sentence where you say, “She was never good with people. Now her animals ... then, it is another story.” is difficult to not stumble over. I had to read it a couple times to really understand. Maybe something like “...Now her animals, but that’s a different story.”
I liked that. I wasn’t familiar with the form, but it evoked memories from 70 years ago at 6 standing in my grammas kitchen heated by her wood burning stove waiting for the first loaf of her incredible bread. She churned her own butter too, with a few hours of my effort pumping on that old wooden churn. It was a trip to paradise eating the first slice of that buttered bread.
She taught me how to iron with irons heated on that stove too. I could barely lift it, but she was patient and I didn’t burn myself or the clothes to often. I learned later all she let me iron were rags until I learned how to not burn them.
I loved my gramma, I still miss her 55 years later.
Your words got a firm grip on my insides and TWISTED to the point of almost sickness. My desire is to be able to do that with words. Make them cry in despair, laugh with joy, scream with a burning rage and settle back into a warm, comfortable lap, all in one sentence. Well, maybe a paragraph.
The picture you painted for your opening was so real I almost stopped reading, I don’t read those types. Then I remembered a story like that wouldn’t be published here.
What incredible twists, first the pounce in the attack, but putting his life at risk to save the girl then the girl comforting him. That lead me to think he’ll die with a change of heart, but that’s the next twist; he dies thinking he’s still going to get the little girl. He just falls asleep bleeding to death.
He’ll be remembered as a hero by the little girl and everyone else. Newspaper articles, the whole ball of wax. But all he really was, right to the last seconds, was what he was: A child molester. Even the act of pushing the little girl to safety was a selfish act, he was saving her for himself.
I still feel outraged at him and hope he’d fry in hell if there was one — about a “Fantasy” character.
That was very good and I enjoyed it. Thank you for sharing your words.
I liked that a little t. It’s a cute story from a dogs point of view. You handled the scatter-brained “Immediacy” of a dogs world well, the jumping from one thing to the next as attention moves around. I loved the “...baking is not Rachael’s strong point.” line, it’s perfect. The the immediate return to being anxious about a walk.
The cats a god though so it’s response is imperious. It probably would never eat cake anyway.
Than you for sharing your story with us. All I have is praise for the way you handled it. I write anthropomorphic stories and I’ll study what you did for technique.
I like that a lot. I’ve never considered laundry as a metaphor for life and my inner psyche, but I think it’s a good one. I be been doing my own laundry since I learned to wash using a tub and washboard and to iron with a real “Iron” that my grandma heated on a cast iron wood burning stove somewhere around 1948 or 49. “I am older than sex, just not quite as old as dirt.”
Creative Writing is a phenomenal world and the journey is essentially a lonely one living in your own mind, but we can pop up here and share the experience periodically.
That is so sad. You made me feel the pain they feel. It could be a man or a woman feeling that. I’ve felt it in some measure a few times.
There are a couple filler words you could throw away and word changes you could make that would evoke images in the readers mind that would add to the impact.
Very good. Thank you for sharing your words and thoughts with us.
Stay safe and enjoy life. It’s a wonderful place to be.
I enjoyed that a great deal. It brought back memories from 1959 when I was in that line on North Island Naval base going through boot camp and getting ready to go in and spend a couple minutes in that chamber. I didn’t hesitate and I remember it was a painful experience and was absolutely required.
The hesitation about crying is understandable, I had a similar experience with crying, but not then. Everyone who came out was crying and we couldn’t see one another anyway. I loved the confusion with flatulence. It made me laugh when I read it.
Thank you for sharing your story with us.
Stay safe and enjoy life. I find I get a lot more writing done when I’m enjoying it.
I liked that, I liked the twist at the end. The fortune teller was a good setup for the trucks brakes squeeling.
It’s difficult for me to point out grammatical errors because Australian English varies from American. In America we wouldn’t say, “...in Main Street...” it would be “...on Main Street...”
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