Forgiveness

Another piece of Flash Fiction for my creative writing class.

“The answer should be obvious.”

“Well it isn’t. Again, why are you here?”

The truth was I didn’t know why I was there. I came on an impulse; something I had the unfortunate habit of following. It was, after all, just six months before that I had left her on her front porch crying, after letting her know, ever so nicely, that I never wanted to see her again. Yet here I was, on Annabelle’s front porch, again.

“I don’t know, Annie,” I said, sounding as small as I felt.

“Don’t call me by that, I hate when you do that. What happened to not wanting to see me again? Or did you forget?” she asked through clenched teeth.

“I didn’t forget. I just wanted to see you. I don’t know why. I guess I just felt bad about how I ended things with you,” the situation wasn’t getting any better.

“You should feel bad. You have no right being here Erik. No right at all. So why don’t you leave. I don’t want to see you ever again, and unlike you I mean it,” her anger was overflowing now.

I don’t really know what had lead me to ending it with her that night. Or even why I did it like I did. I guess I was just angry and bitter. She was the only child of an upper class family. I was the middle child of five, from a lower middle class family. I guess the class difference just got to me overtime. Other than that I can’t think of one thing that was possibly wrong with our relationship.

“I came to say that I am sorry, Annabelle. I’m sorry for the way I treated you. I was wrong. I never should have said those things to you. I was wrong for letting my insecurities get the best of me,” it was the only thing I knew to say.

“What? Did you think that by coming here to apologize it would make anything better? Please tell me that you didn’t think that, for the slightest second, I would consider forgiving you. You don’t get that privilege. Not from me. Not now. Not ever,” she was yelling now,” Erik. Leave.”

“Anna…” I started.

“Leave,” She yelled, tears now rolling down her cheeks.

What else could I do? I looked at her one last time, then turned around and headed for my car. I don’t really know what I thought I would accomplish by coming here, it was after all just on an impulse that I did. What was clear was she would never forgive me, and who could blame her? I had messed up.

“And Erik,” She said from the porch.

“Yes?”

“I meant what I said, I never want to see you again,” she said, before turning around and walking inside.

Reviews

[Katie]

Hey, a not cute one! Cool. Not to say that I dislike cute stories.

Okay lots of constructive on this one, that being said, not a lot of critisism. There is nothing severely or even moderately wrong with this peice. It's well written. Everything feels natural and it flows very well. These are just a few tips for improvement.

You are very good with dialogue, in the other two I've read more with what they are saying then the "he said, she said" part of dialogue. But this one you did a much better job with that. It flowed fairly well (aside from my one comment below) Overall its pretty good.

Lacking on description again (this may be a common theme with your writing, which is okay, its a tough thing to write) although, I don't see it as much of a problem in this story because it is so dialogue based. I think too much description in this chapter would take away from the emotions (although a little but might help) For emotional scene's body language and facial expressions are great things to describe, because they add to the emotion instead of take away from it. (if you need help with matching body language to emotions you can send me a message sometime or comment on my page, I make a habit of studying it for writing purposes :P)

You do great getting in to your character's heads with what they are thinking in this story, but you might want to go more in depth in the emotions they are feeling as well. Like how he feels about having messed up. And having her tell him to leave.

For technicals
"It was, after all, just six months before that I had left her on her front porch crying, after letting her know, ever so nicely, that I never wanted to see her again. "
There is nothing really gramatically wrong with that sentence, but as far as the story flowing I find putting two.. I will all them double comma statements...in one sentence breaks it up in a kind of awkward way. if it came down to choosing, I'd take out after all.

"just got to me overtime" over time is two words in this case not one

[emmajoy]

Mainly dialogue - maybe that was the set work and you've handled it very well in spite of a little too much padding in some parts. I like the way you explain his background - hers briefly .. explains away his way of looking at their relationship tho I feel there's more to it than meets the reader's eyes.

[KATHY SUE SILLS]

O:k just by reading this one little vstory I'm hooked on your writing, very well done!

[MuSe Ampoule]

Interesting little snippet that could easily fit into a much larger piece. What worked was the ease and structure of the dialogue...what would make it stronger would be to extend this just a little bit to give the reader a taste of what "act" it was that caused such strong emotions between the two.