Lunchbreak
romance
Published on:
April 22, 9:45amWord Count:
1211Last Edited:
April 22, 10:00amWork Description
Short story, something a little bit out of the blue.
This work is archived and isn't accepting critiques or comments. Why?
Print
was wondering what he was thinking and looked at him in the way you
look at your boyfriend when you are at party surrounded by
strangers and you begin to see him in a different way and through
other people’s eyes.
- Seth?
- What?
- You should come over tonight, we’ll have a few drinks, talk things through. I think we need to.
- I think so too, he said with excitement in his eyes.
- I love you. He smiled. We seemed to be drifting apart, always, no matter where we were or what we were doing. I always pictured us on two separate clouds drifting apart while both of us held on to each other hoping to keep things together. A somewhat nightmare but with a romantic touch to it.
-And you know what?
-What?
-I’m not going anywhere. Even if I was, I wouldn’t leave you behind.
-Yes you would, he said laughing.
-I’m serious.
-I know. But you would leave me no matter what because that’s who you are and you have to leave things behind.
-Oh do I now?
-Yeah. You’ve got all these scattered dreams haunting you from the past so if you were ever to stand still and maybe even turn back to face them your future would completely vanish and you would be stuck in what seemed like a prototype of a past you escaped long ago.
-Clever.
-And I’ll always be the fool who loves you.
-You’re not a fool. Just slightly stupid.
-Exactly.
-Tell me about San Francisco.
-You’ve seen the pictures. I can’t explain places, you need to go there and see for yourself. Write me a postcard.
-Do you still keep all my postcards in that wooden box by the piano?
-It’s on the bookshelf now but yeah, I’ve kept them. Of course, they’re yours. I love reading them. Croatia, Spain, Italy, France… Your changing mood depending on the weather. It’s high class fiction. Do you still write?
-Postcards?
-In general.
-Occasionally.
-You should keep it up.
-Come on, let’s get going, I’m quite hungry.
-What do you fancy for lunch?
-No idea. Just something.
We got up and continued walking, holding hands – which now seemed the only reasonable thing left to do. Seth would glance at me while I pretended not to notice, facing the sun and it felt as if he was saying goodbye because he would squeeze my hand again and again. I was already planning what to write to him in my next postcard from San Francisco.
Rate This Work
Your honest rating will help the author improve, and you'll earn a little karma too.
Please log in to rate.Discussion
I liked the opening and found it motivated me to want to find out more. I was interested in what followed.
I would like to know why you liked it when seth spoke of different places, becasue my curiosity levels were now high.
Things will get better, he said a couple of times. Sometimes I preferred to think of him as an older brother rather than an old lover. He put his arm around me and told me to cheer up. I told him about my friend moving to San Francisco. He said America was a beautiful place worth visiting. I liked it when Seth spoke of distant places, especially America.
I did get a little bit lost during the conversation between them both and would have found it personally useful to have had the names of those speaking occasionally added to the end of some sentences. This is just my opinion as I am an impatient reader and think ahead too quickly.
I thought the topic for this story was very powerful and I liked the piece around holding you back by squezing your hand. A few more descriptive words about maybe how they were walking and the impact of the sun as you were facing it would have been useful for me.
I liked the ending because it hasn't really ended.
We got up and continued walking, holding hands – which now seemed the only reasonable thing left to do. Seth would glance at me while I pretended not to notice, facing the sun and it felt as if he was saying goodbye because he would squeeze my hand again and again. I was already planning what to write to him in my next postcard from San Francisco.
Just two issues about this story for me.
1. The introduction seems to be a bit long and a little confusing because it covers a lot of different thoughts
For example,
Tell me more about your friend. Who told you America was a beautiful place and who told you to look up flights? Seth, or the friend? Then it goes right in to the old man walking his dog; maybe make that part a new paragraph?
2. I got a little lost in the first half of the dialogue, but the second part of it I followed easier.
The last paragraph I absolutely loved!
I would like to read it again if you edit and post a 2nd draft.