TALENT OF FIXING

A description of adolescent school boys mind

                   TALENT TO FIX BUCKLES

 

       Not even a single familiar face! In the crowd he felt alone, terribly lonely, listless. It seems his classmates new everything about his being enrolled in St Francis convent school in the middle of academic year. They never tried to befriend him.

               Bad conduct certificate is a punishment for his badness in the old school. The written agreement between authorities of new school and his dad which  dad signed in his presence is precaution against his possible juvenile adventures in future. He felt as if in chains. A new kind of indifference strange to him, accentuated his loneliness.

            It was his second day in the hostel. It was a talent day. One can exhibit talents, talents of any sort. From crude inherited talents to those assimilated and acquired from life situations.

 

             Has he any talent? He asked himself. A deep feeling of inferiority hurled him into the deeper recesses of loneliness.

               This feeling of loneliness is not alien to him. While in old school he overcame it by hobnobbing, bunking classes, disregarding authority and occasional resort to drugs. All these things ensured noise in his life. In the din of these antisocial ventures he drowned his sense of being insignificant in a significant world that surrounded him. He made noise and kept on declaring that “I am here”.

 

                  But now he has only two choices. Break the chains imposed on him or surrender and find a new means, something clandestine to make noise and kill this damn solitude. Breaking the chains will end up in some juvenile court and imprisonment, thereby inviting heavier chains.

                He sat on the stone bench in the desolate corner of School Park. Thought of talents, worthiness, and all other words synonymous with socially approved norms crossed his mind. Each word left its own share of sense of unworthiness upon him as he weighed himself against them. A big zero rolled round his head like an elf . He felt that, if he continues to sail in the same stream of thoughts, he will sink into despair similar to death itself. He wanted to escape from them.

                   He loitered in the park. Then came out, stood in the middle of huge football court, lingered in the canteen for a coffee, taking care not to meet the eyes of other students, talented students.

                 Before entering into the hostel, he had to cross the lane that led to a long row of bathrooms. He sauntered towards one of the toilets. He couldn’t see anybody in the nearby bathrooms. Still he heard water flowing from the faucet of one of the toilets. He paced to his right to identify the bathroom from which the sound of water was coming..

                  Finally he saw. It was from the 32^nd toilet. No sooner he entered into it, he saw a girl standing with her back against him. She was struggling with something in her hands.

 “What’s the matter?” He asked.

She startled and turned around panting in bewilderment.

“I cant fix it..”she said

“What?”

“This one..” She showed the buckle of her braziers to him. Her sprouting breasts not full yet. Her n*****s were visible through the transparent cups of her braziers.They appeared as candid as her eyes.

“Mom said I must wear this. I began wearing it only last week. It is such a disturbance..”

               He looked at the girl. Her beseeching eyes aroused his depressed nerves. Finally, here is somebody who is in need of him. He walked towards the girl with careful reassuring steps. He must fix it.

               He has never fixed such a buckle in his life before. But he knew…he can. He did it slowly. He had to bite the buckles to make enough space for the clip to enter into the hole. In the process his hot exhaled breath blew against her bosom and she knew it.

“Is it ok now?” he asked.

“Yes” girl said with her eyes down on her bosom

“Your breasts are not full yet” he commented.

              She lifted her face and gazed at him. He felt as if she is trespassing into his loneliness as if to shatter away his stupid sense unworthiness.

             His heart jumped in exaltation as if he is the most talented boy in the school. Next day he saw her. Next week he kissed her. By the end of his school days he learned to live in love. His dad astonished at his change. Father praised his teachers and authorities.

      

 

 

                   

 

Reviews

[Griffin Hill]

First, change the font, it’s very distracting to read.

OPENING COMMENTS
I’m guessing that english may not be your first language so I’ll go easy on the grammar hammer.

INITIAL IMPRESSION:
The story beginning is listless, it does nothing to pull the reader in. If your having difficulty diving directly into the action (which is usually best) try setting a vivid scene. Give the reader something to think about, to imagine the world of your story in lieu of anything else.

SCENE:
There is not scene or setting; you need to show the reader some (not necessarily all) of the following: who, what, when, where, why. Showing these details will build your story and draw the reader in. As it is now, your text does not appeal to the readers senses.

PLOT
You have the beginnings of a plot with our protagonist struggling to overcome his perceived lack of talent and worth, but it’s fairly week. Now that’s not to say that great writing can’t overcome a weak plot...happens all the time. But to have great writing, the reader needs to be totally immersed in your written world.

PACING
The pacing, how the story unfolds is a little rushed, then again with so little plot it’s difficult to judge the pace.

DESCRIPTION
You have a few good descriptions of what’s going on in your character’s head and some of his surroundings; the park, the football court, the hostel. But we need more.
More showing, less telling. For a description of Showing vs. Telling, see my blog or send me a private message and I will send it to you. As it is now, what you have is mostly exposition and telling.

POV
You did a good job of staying in your protagonist POV.

CHARACTERS
Your character doesn’t even have a name, simply, ‘He.’ Give him a name, let us get to know him; he is too abstract. That being said, I could feel your character’s suffering, that did come across. What motivates him came across a little less; I’d develop that theme more. I could certainly identify with your character; especially earlier in my life.

Did the characters each have unique personalities? The piece was really too short to see. We begin to get a sense of his basic goodness, but one scene of helping the girl with her buckle is probably not enough to judge. Develop this theme further.

Most Compelling Character: ‘He’ why? Well, “He” is the only character developed to any degree.
Least Compelling Character: why? the girl, she’s just a prop to give him something to do; fix her buckle.

DIALOGUE
Was the dialog natural and believable? Somewhat. Try using dialogue to show us the action. Have the character’s tell us what they see and feel. You tended to tell too much or spend too much time inside the character’s head. Which really doesn’t give the reader to opportunity to understand his motives. We only know what we’re told by the author/narrator. This approach will not hold a reader very long.

Was there too much or too little dialog? Too little.
Were there any tedious monologues? Too much inside the “He” character’s head.

SPELLING / GRAMMAR
Your english grammar and vocabulary needs work. There are MANY websites to assist you with this, or ask questions here online at WC. We’re a pretty friendly lot. Don’t be afraid to ask questions.

OVERALL IMPRESSION
Strengths: Good concept.
• Favorite Passage: “Thought of talents, worthiness, and all other words synonymous with socially approved norms crossed his mind. Each word left its own share of sense of unworthiness upon him as he weighed himself against them.“
• Passage felt most present: “He loitered in the park. Then came out, stood in the middle of huge football court, lingered in the canteen for a coffee, taking care not to meet the eyes of other students, talented students.“

Weaknesses
• Least Favorite Passage: “Mom said I must wear this. I began wearing it only last week. It is such a disturbance..” To me this has no relevance to the plot or characters.

CLOSING COMMENTS
Don’t give up. Writing is hard work. There are some basics that you need to learn, but we all started somewhere.

Ask questions, and write, write, write.

[Holly O'Brien]

story was ok, needs more basis to it...maybe a better attention grabber...it definitely has potential though, with a few adjustments

[alesuriko]

First of all... the bold is completely unnecessary and distracting. You really don't need to do that with any type of writing, especially prose. Along with the size, really excessive and disruptive to the flow and aesthetics. You also have a lot of grammar problems like missing commas, sentence fragments, and improper tense. You're also rather repetitious, repeating sentences in a different way and adding something slightly different on the end to change and progress it. Usually doing that is fine, but you do it so much that it makes it a little more difficult to read. Most of your wording is also awkwardly formal, especially for an adolescent, and awkwardly worded. You also forgot to use apostrophes a few times and forgot the pluralize things sometimes.
The plot is lacking, it does nothing really to capture my attention. I found myself only reading to pick out the flaws.