So, this is sort of an aside, but would anyone be interested in doing a revised icon for the Writer's Group?

I'm working on my submission right now. I'm having a tough time picking a prompt though...they are all really good! :D

I'm going to have to use fiction prompt here, but may do the non-fiction one later too as I like them both.

"When I first met her, it hit me. The sudden realisation that I loved her. There and then, even before knowing her name or anything about her, I knew that I loved her. No-one else in the room seemed to matter, and people's voices were muffled background noise to me.

She walked over to me and started to nervously speak, but I grabbed her hand before she could and simply held it. A large gruff man sidled alongside her and said something I didn't hear.

I enquired as to what he had said, and he uttered a series of coarse and curse words against me and then strolled off with her, showing his ownership, as though something this precious could be possessed like a necklace.

I gave chase, and encountered them kissing in the icy wintered parking lot. Overcome with emotions of love, anger towards the gruff man and a small andrenaline rush, I swung my fist around at the guy who seemed a lot taller close up.

He crushed my hand in his much larger one as I let out a yelp of pain. I attempted to push my head in to his chest to knock him back, and though he stumbled slightly, it didn't have much effect.

As he shoved me back he laughed to himself, and spoke some words to the woman I loved. I saw a chance to run at him, and try to disrupt his balance and took it. Mid-run, I slipped on some ice, but continued to go, sliding in to the man with both of us heading for a larger patch of ice.

On reflection, I should have realised that the patch of ice was covering a lake. We both slid on, myself being flung further down and then scrambling to get out before it gave way.

The gruff man did not seem so lucky. The woman I loved was screaming and shouting his name, though I do not recall it. She exclaimed that he was unable to swim, as his large body sank beneath the splinters of ice.

I could only watch in horror as bubbles began to float to the surface, and then couldn't move as they ceased to come up any more.

I looked at the woman I loved from the other side of the lake, and she simply shook her head through tears. She may have been the woman I loved, but I had just killed the man that she loved.

I tried to shake away the tears too, and started to flee as others piled outside and the police sirens began. I've not stopped running since."

Also, with that, I realised half-way through that I hadn't used any speech yet, so kept it going to the end.

"When I met her, it hit me" were the last dying words that my father said to me when I was just eleven, growing up in the inner suburbs of New York. My hands soaked up in the glimmering blood that travelled its way to the gutters. I never saw it coming, nor did he.

I glanced around hoping that someone would help my father from the bright white light, but only the apathetic cats, no, fat cats that sat surveying on what has just occured, just gave a slight purr and wandered off.

Loads of tears flooded my eyes as my father just kept on murmuring "It hit me". My eyes shouted pain but my mouth remained tranquil, as though I was trapped in the system. But then, in the corner of my blue glazing eyes I spotted him.

Looking at his figure...his movement...his smile, just illuminated my soul and mind, even though I was just a eleven year old girl that just needed a shoulder to cry on after the horrendous acc- I mean event that has just took place, my eyes would remain fixed upon him.

I was just stunned by what was happening, first me and my father going on a gently stroll to my father on the ground peaceful and the one just walking past me with such a enthralling pace.

All the time, my father said to me sweetly "If you see the one, you catch the one" whilst my mother sat in the corner ironing, cooking or being subservient to him and me.

My life began here. My story began here. My name is Kate Riddleston, and my dream belongs with him.

"This is my story..." I whispered softly to myself. "This is how it hit me."

Can you find the hidden message?

When he first saw her, it hit him. He should have been attracted to her. She was hot - everything a man should want. Long, tanned legs, deep chocolate brown eyes, dark, curly, thick hair spilling over her shoulders in waves. Her smile was confident, her white teeth shining beneath soft red lips. She blinked, long lashes curled. I watched her approach with her wide hips sashaying back and forth reminicient of a metronome. But he wasn't attracted to her.

Finally she stopped in front of him.

"Hey there," she purred lustily as she adjusted her blue miniskirt. "Name's Monica. Mind if I join you?"

"No, not at all," replied Andy, gesturing towards an empty seat next to him at the bar. He stared at her. She winked, leaning forward so that he could clearly see down her shirt. Which wasn't hard, considering its size.

Dammit! he thought. Nothing.

He sighed and looked into his beer. The book had told him if he looked hard enough, he'd find someone. All he needed was to find the perfect woman. Here she was - hot, willing, confident.

Maybe it just took a while.

"Mark," he called, "get me another drink, would you?" he paused for a moment, looking at Monica. "What do you like?"

"Beer is fine," she replied. She winked again as the barkeeper handed her a cold one. She lifted it to her lips, blowing lightly across the top before putting it to her lips.

She even made that look sexual.

Still nothing

-----

It hadn't taken more than a beer and a half before they were in a cab headed for his place. She was all over him, hands, lips, legs. Yet, the cabdriver was clearly having a better time than he was.

He stopped at his house.

"Alright kids, have fun," he said, leering in such a way that made Andy very uncomfortable.

It took all of his self control not to push her off of him as he fumbled for his house keys. He eventually found the right one, and opened the door.

Nothing.

It hurt him. All this and he still couldn't feel.

By now she had noticed - not that hard when all of her skill failed to get him going.

"What's wrong honey?" she asked, straddling him.

He looked up at her, unsure of how to reply. Something was wrong. Everything was wrong.

She swore something under her breath and got off of him. She replaced the miniskirt that had somehow gotten removed and pulled up her fishnet stockings.

Nothing

She turned to him and looked at him critically.

"I...I don't know," he finally responded, hanging his head. "I just... I should be turned on - I know you're attractive and hot but I just can't-"

She shushed him, putting a finger to his lips.

"I think I know what's going on, Aaron-"

"Andy,"

"Andy," she corrected, sitting next to him on the sofa. "I have a brother like that..."

"I'm not! I'm not gay!" he finally snapped. He froze.

"Oh honey," she smiled sadly. She took him into her arms and sighed.

"I can't be, I just can't," he began rambling. "I'm attracted to girls, I'm supposed to be, there isn't any way I'm not, I must be have to be need to be,"

She sat there, rocking him slowly as he continued, tears streaking down his face and soaking her shirt.

"Baby it's okay," she whispered. "It'll be alright."

"No I'm not! I... I..."

"I think you need some time to think," she murmered. She slipped him a piece of paper. "Call that number when you figure it all out, yes?"

She left.

Nothing

-----

He called the number. He told the man on the other end that Monica had told him to call. He was immediately given the location of a coffee shop and a time.

Andy sat on a table in the corner, clutching a cup of tea long gone cold. A young man, about his age, sat across from him.

"Look," he finally spoke up, "I know."

"How can you?" Andy whispered, voice cracking.

"Just trust me," he replied, putting a hand on Andy's shoulder. "You'll get through it."

Andy looked up, brown eyes meeting green.

And suddenly, he felt it.

Something

*****

YES WAY TO GO SPOTTY, TURNING IT GAY.

It wouldn't be me if I didn't though, would it? :P

Also, glad to be back writing here again. It's been a while, yes?

Non-fiction prompt: Write about your first memory of attending school.

The little girl wandered the halls like a scared mouse stuck in a maze. She had never before been in a place so big, so white or so shiny. The floor was made up of hundreds of speckled blocks which were all clean and sparkly. The girl shuffled her Mary Janes across the surface and noticed with alarm that the soles of her shoes left a black smudge on the spotless floor. She picked up her pace and hurried further down the hall, darting around people who all seemed to have at least five feet on her. Could she possibly be the shortest first grader ever? Without meaning to, she felt tears start to well up in her eyes. Then, she glanced to the right and saw an empty classroom, beckoning to her as a safe haven from the cold, sterile hallway that brimmed with strangers. With great caution, the six-year-old made her way into the brightly lit room and surveyed her new surroundings. On the walls were brightly colored pictures of flowers and plants, musical notes, and black and white posters featuring people the child didn’t recognize. At the front of the room, behind the teacher’s desk, a blackboard was covered in a swirly kind of language that the youngster quickly identified as cursive. Her older sister wrote in cursive and was always flaunting it like she knew a secret language. The girl’s heart skipped a beat. No one had told her she’d get to learn cursive in first grade!

There was a sound behind the girl and she turned to see several people walking in the door. In nervous anticipation, the little girl hurried towards the far side of the room and sat down at a desk. She placed her trapper and lunch box on the desk and busied herself arranging the crayons in her pencil box. The noises around her faded into the background as her stomach twisted itself into knots. She thought about that morning, when her mom had insisted she and her older sister pose with their backpacks for pictures. Her mom’s voice echoed in her head.

"You’re going to have a great time. First days of schools are always the best. A new teacher, a new room, new friends…there’s absolutely nothing to be afraid of."

"But Mama, what if I get lost?"

"You won’t get lost. Your sister is going to walk you to your classroom door."

Mama’s voice faded. The little girl looked back up and glanced around the colorful room. Big kids were standing in small clumps; chatting and laughing as if they’d known each other for years. She didn’t recognize a single face. Why, oh why, had she told her sister she could find her own way? It had seemed like a good idea at the time, impressing on everyone that she was a big girl and didn’t need a chaperone. Her sister had left her in the cold, giant hallway and ten minutes later here she was, stuck in a strange room without a friend in sight. Even with all other kids nearby, the girl suddenly felt nostalgic for that desolate hallway. At least in the hall, she knew she was supposed to be there. "I’m not supposed to be here," the six-year-old thought. "I’m really not supposed to be here."

"You’re really not supposed to be here."

The precocious child’s head titled upwards and she starred into the soft blue eyes of an older woman with curly blonde hair. A name tag identified her as Ms. Pierce and though she towered over the little girl, there was nothing frightening in her gentle smile. She held out her hand and the child didn’t hesitate to place her considerably smaller paw in the woman’s grasp.

"Don’t worry, sweetheart, we’ll get you to the right classroom. Now, what’s your name?"

The little girl whispered her name. Ms. Pierce led her across the length of the classroom towards the open door. It was somehow comforting to see the white hallway, which was now empty, except for a tall brunette girl holding a clipboard.

"Josie, can you please help Michelle find her classroom?"

Josie gave the little girl a cheery smile, which was more patronizing than kind, but still reassuring to a nervous six-year-old. The brunette clipboard keeper put an arm around little Michelle and led her out into the hallway. While Michelle was glad to be out of that classroom, she couldn’t help but glance backwards. Symbolically, the large wooden door slammed shut, sealing her off from Ms. Pierce’s fourth-grade class. The little girl peered up at Josie.

"I’m not going to get to learn cursive this year, am I?"

I may come back with something else, too, but I'm running out of time!

Untitled
He published his novel at 15
I wrote a lot when I was that age
She was in her first film in 3rd grade
While I'd been on the stage for years
I taught him sound production
Now he's a renowned DJ
My treatment was the same as
That movie trilogy released 10 years later
I've been playing for years but can't
Hold a candle to that newbie -
I worked on that project for years
But he took all the credit
His kids are well-behaved
He's in great shape
They never fight. Ever.
She's got 8000 fans. 8000!
His links comes up first in search
Her article's been featured for 3 days.
I feel very happy for them
And
Something
Else

Thanks for all the submissions; we now have a bit less than a week to provide feedback to the authors before the next session begins.

Non-fiction prompt: Write about your first memory of attending school - chel139
I loved it. The story itself was hilarious and the way you wrote it was really good. Your an excellent writer.

Story prompt: Write a story that begins "When I first met her, it hit me." - Spotty_Vision21
Excellent story. I loved it how you twisted it at the end and made him gay, hilarious. You had great descriptions and wrote, in my opinion, excellent. It was intriguing and I enjoyed every line.

I'll be posting my critiques through the week. I wanted to start off with my favorite submission!

Spotty_Vision's Story

It was a great story, from beginning to end. The first two lines ("When he first saw her, it hit him. He should have been attracted to her.") grabbed my attention, as all good stories should. Your descriptions of the girl were speckled with such wonderful detail that I could almost envision her and Andy. You really put us into Andy's head and the frustation that he must have felt, fighting against his own feelings and society's standards. By the end, I was so happy for him. It's a rare gift to get the reader to connect with the protagonist in such a short time, but you did it. Well done! I have no complaints. :D

Whoa. I didn't expect so many nice reviews :D thanks muchly!

My reviews:
PkmnTrainerJ
It was a really good story. The lack of dialogue didn't detract from it at all. The only complaint I have is that you could have been a little bit more descriptive. But all in all it was great!

Rockster
Great imagery. I like how it moved around the timeline and such. Now I'm curious though - hidden message?

liissaaxx
You have a good idea going there, but it does need work. For one, stretch it out - your paragraphs are long and it makes it hard to read. Make it more visual and emotional, make the reader feel what the characters are feeling. Slow it down. Bring out the information slower - keep the information hidden, coming out in smaller doses over time, not all at once - it keeps the reader hooked. It is a good idea though - you definitely have something there.

chel1395
Very good I felt like I was walking right there in your Mary-Janes :) I did the same thing - except I ended up crying in the hallway and was found by a 2nd grade teacher instead.

harold
Very good! The ending made me picture someone giving a mechanical smile with an eyetwitch. I enjoyed it.

PkmnTrainerJ:
This took me a few readings to really grow to like, but thankfully you posted early so I've had plenty of time to re-read it. On first read it seemed rather stilted, but I think I was rushing through it and not focusing on the nuances present in the work. On further re-readings, I liked the whole sound-muffled approach, that in the narrator's passion, his senses narrow. The lack of dialogue really helps that, actually. Reading it, one gets a sense of numbness, of extreme emotion absent most physical sensation. The only things he hears clearly are symptomatic of extreme distress: his own yelp of pain and the police sirens.

This all makes me very curious about the narrator and his situation when he's telling this story: presumably it's a long time later, as it feels like it's been long enough that he's forgotten details that might be important (names, in particular). Does he still love her, or was this just the inciting incident to a much larger story? The narrative stresses again and again how much larger the man is than the narrator, which makes me wonder still more about the narrator: was he a child when this happened, or is the narrator a woman? Either seems likely, since the man is, for whatever reason, clearly discounting the narrator as either a serious contender for the woman's affections or a physical threat (of course it could just be that the narrator's rather small).

I like that there are no details provided for any of the characters, and no reason or justification given for the narrator's falling instantly and completely in love with the woman: the reasons for the narrator's devotion are unimportant, as the important thing is that the narrator IS smitten. I also like that the narrator doesn't seem to realize the woman's feelings for her man until after he died.

Rockster:
It's really cool how well this presents the disjointed, frantic mental state of someone who has had a loved one die an horrible death: the jumping-round in time, the mixed verb tenses, the startling vivid details...

I like some of the juxtapositions you present in your piece. Apathetic cats, inner suburbs, eyes shouted pain...mouth remained tranquil, blue glazing eyes, the blood and the enthralling pace...these are all striking contrasts, almost conflicting images, lending a further strong sense to Kate's emotional turmoil.

It's intriguing, too, needless to say, since there's so much that is only hinted, and so could be interpreted multiple ways. The narrative flow is obscured, too, by the deliberate out-of-order chronology you present.

Assuming that the narrator is somewhat reliable, we know this:
* Kate is eleven in New York, with a father and mother.
* Kate's father has often ("all the time") admonished her: "If you see the one, you catch the one" at home
* Kate goes on a stroll with her dad.
* Something hits her dad, leaving him dying and murmuring "it hit me" near a gutter.
* While her father died, Kate noticed someone else, whose physical attributes enthrall her. At least one cat looks on, purrs, and then wanders away.

We don't really know any more than that, so we're left with a bunch of interesting questions:
- Who is the father talking about, in the first line? That is, who is the "her" that he talks about as he's dying? Presumably it's someone very important to him, but there's no other obvious female around other than Kate, and he's talking to her.
- What is "it" that hit her father? Was it the same "it" referred to later, when he repeats "it hit me"? Does that mean that "it" was responsible for his dying near the gutter, such as a runaway vehicle jumping the curb? What caused his death? Was it a weapon of an assailant, and how is "he" involved, that guy with the irresistible walk? Foul play is suggested or at least suspected by Kate's correcting herself when she was about to call the event that caused her father's death an accident: it's not an accident, it's an event.
- Is the "he" a cat?
- is the "it" that hit Kate in the last line in any way related to the "it" that hit her father?
- with which "him" does Kate's dream belong: her father, or the smiling illuminator?

Reading A: I'd like to think that the "he" is too conveniently placed at the scene of her father's death for it to be an accident; he's either an agent of the bad guys who killed her father, or is actually the mastermind of the whole plot, who for some reason needs to get Kate's affection and trust.

Reading B: Or he just happened to be there and isn't actually all that exciting to watch, but that in her heightened emotional state she gloms onto him as a comfort and a "shoulder to cry on".

Interesting turns of phrase: "as though I was trapped in the system". with Reading A, this could be a facet of the paranoia that Kate is experiencing after finding out that the man she admires most was involved in killing her father. "blue glazing eyes": this could mean that Kate's blue eyes were glazed with grief, but it also suggests that in her sorrow she is seeing everything with a blue (sadness) filter: everything appears blue because she is blue, thus her eyes glaze everything blue. "my dream belongs with him": if she's talking about her dad, it means that her dream is dead, or should be. If she's talking about the suave guy, then the dream is synonymous or at least parallel with her life and her story...which is also associated with being subservient, as modeled by her parents in the previous sentence.

It's nice how dense this is with meanings, and I enjoy trying to tease out particular interpretations from the text.

Spotty_Vision21:
Cool that you changed the prompt to be third person! I also really like the subtle narrator, watching this all happen. It's unusual to have a narrator be first person flawed {the narrator is clearly judgmental: "Sashaying (like) a metronome"} and at the same time omniscient {able to read Andy's thoughts}; I like it - it's daring and unusual. But it leaves a lot of interesting questions about the narrator: is he/she some sort of "Twilight Zone" observer, providing wry commentary? Will we see this person again in other stories?

Given this, I'm also curious what the "it" is that hit him. The fact that he wasn't attracted to her, or that he should have been attracted to her? Neither of those seem to have the same punch/intensity as the idea that it "hit" him; to me they seem like realizations, not epiphanies. Maybe there's another way to phrase it so that the thing that hits him is more strident. Or maybe what hits him is that he's not attracted to any woman, or that he's gay? That's interesting, if it's what you intended, because it leaves us wondering throughout the piece just what it was that hit him, and it also shows an interesting character trait of denial on his part - he has the epiphany at the beginning of the narrative, and then spends the rest of the piece trying to ignore that truth. Or is it that the narrator, watching Andy see Monica, is struck by the sudden realization that Andy is not attracted to her?

The humorous bits are very nice:
- the comparison of Monica to a metronome, a clockwork mechanical device, and then the dry observation: "He wasn't attracted to her."
- "It hurt him. All this and he still couldn't feel." That's a great contrast, and somewhat wry, again.

Andy's confusion is well-realized, particularly with his berating himself for not feeling anything. He chooses the most odd times to think he should be feeling something. Sure, he's upset that he feels nothing when Monica practically flashes him, or when she flirts with him while drinking a beer, but then he feels bad that he feels nothing when opening the door, when Monica is upset and starts to get dressed, and when she leaves after expressing sympathy. He's clearly emotionally crippled, if he's not only not feeling anything at those times, but also upset at himself for not feeling anything. "Dammit - I'm not excited that she's getting dressed!" It's either that, or it's more existential than that: "I found my keys. Who cares? Everything is meaningless in an uncaring universe!" Either way, he's disturbed and that comes across well. Also the "I must be have to be need to be" without any punctuation also conveys this emotional disturbance quite well.

I like the parallelism of the bar and the coffee shop. They're both places where addicts go to get their drink fixes, and they're both places people cruise to make connections, but different types look to coffee: generally more upscale and respectable folks. So Andy's made something of an heroic journey just in coming up the ladder of beverages. Not only that, but he doesn't even drink coffee in the coffee shop - he drinks tea!

I wonder whether Monica is trying to help her brother hook up, or whether she's some kind of counselor by day, because she sure was ready with that number in a hurry.

If she was giving Andy her brother's number, the phrase "I have a brother like that" struck me as weirdly remote, almost intolerant, which doesn't jive with her behavior afterward, for me. "Like that" makes it seem like she wants to separate herself from "that"; it's not close to her, but rather over there, away from her. A less distasteful way of putting it, for me, would have been something like "I have a brother who's..."

There are some weird things, for me. "Which wasn't hard, considering its size" isn't at all clear to me. Is the shirt really big and loose, so that it hangs open to provide a clear view, or is it really tiny so that he's not really looking "down" anything?

"He...looked into his beer. The book has told him if he looked hard enough..." If he looked into his beer hard enough? That's a crazy book!

There's a few "finally"s thrown around in this piece. A couple don't have much sense of coming after a long wait or any period to justify using "finally":
- "Finally she stopped in front of him" Was she walking for a looong time? Maybe it's a really big bar, and there was a lot of space between the narrator (who saw her long lashes) and Andy (to whom she sashayed)?
- " 'I'm not! I'm not gay!' he finally snapped." Who was waiting for him to snap? Maybe it's because the "it" that he realized at the beginning when he saw her was the knowledge that he was gay, and he's trying to deny it all along?

Why does Andy sit on the table in the coffee shop? It seems out of character, rather too comfortable and maybe even a little bold, when feeling emotionally vulnerable and meeting a mysterious stranger.

I'm really intrigued by the ending, because it seems to be the start of a longer piece (or it could be), since we don't know what he feels at the end. Attraction? Connection? Alarm? Happiness? The predatory assault by Monica leading to the rather convenient provision of a contact number lends a somewhat ominous tone to the nameless man clapping a hand on Andy's passive shoulder: is he somehow in cahoots with Monica? Why did Monica come on to Andy so strong in the first place? Is it a deliberate seduction? A competition? A heist? Does Monica and the man do this sort of thing often? It's very interesting.

chel1395:

I think it's great that you took your own memories and recast them as fiction rather than memoir - that's pretty bold, too. There's authorly flourishes you make that are unexpected and even surprising for someone writing about herself: likening your hand to a paw, the long period where you don't provide yourself a name and instead call yourself various generalities ("the little girl", "the six-year-old", "the precocious child" - my favorite). I find that choice particularly intriguing - being so coy about naming the protagonist - it really makes it seem less personal, telling your story from a third person omniscient perspective. I'm not sure I've seen it done this way before, and that's interesting, too. It's in keeping with the story approach, making it easier for the reader to see themselves in you when you don't provide any details (appearance, attire, name) to make her specific to a given person.

Whew - your sister left you?? You must have been very persuasive at 6!

I'm envious that you have such clear memories of your first day. I don't, though I came up with the prompt. I have a lot of vivid memories, but nothing particularly close to my first day.

I'm trying to envision a smile that is both cheery and patronizing; it's contrasts like that that keep me on my toes, like Rockster's inner suburbs.

It's a nice structure, too: you establish the character's predicament, then explain how it was supposed to go (which adds tension for the reader, wondering why it didn't happen that way), then you explain how the plan broke down, and then you resolve the problem. It's...elegant. I also like the echo of your inner voice with Ms. Pierce's first line, and the humorous bit at the end regarding your eagerness to learn cursive like your bigger sister.

I felt like the size of the kids in Ms. Pierce's class might have been stressed more. Earlier there was more emphasis, that everybody was five feet taller than you, but when you're really out of your element in the class, it's just "big kids". I also didn't think "Symbolically" was necessary - the symbolism would have been apparent without that cue, for me.

You've got a future in fictionalized memoir, I think.

Just a reminder: 2 more days to get in your responses to the writing for this session!

I'm very poor at critiques, so these will be more comments than anything.

Rockster

I like how the prompt is twisted around in to violence. I also like the narrators corrections in what has been said, as though she's scribbled out that part of the sentence, and then carried on.

Spotty_Vision21

The "nothing" parts had me wondering what was going on, but once it became clear it was great. Very descriptive as well. I liked the conclusion to the story as well.

chel1395

Great memory there chel. I recall learning cursive, and people taunting signatures at you and all that. First day of school seems scary and daunting to any child. I'll write mine down next time perhaps.

harold
I liked the disjointed style of it, and how the author seems to be surpassed at each turn and tries to pass off as being happy, but as you say feels "something else" (envy, jealousy?). The fans part reminded me of that internet meme, which I'm unsure whether was intentional, or wanted.