Oh god, you made me cry. The ending is a punch in the gut. The whole thing is amazing.

Holli, it's a strong piece, very strong. If there's something missing - and I'm not certain there is - it may be in the turn of phrase in one or two places, a sense that the narrator is an observor only. That may make it feel a bit chilly, but chill, in this instance, is no bad thing - you're talking about youth, and youth's tendency is not so much to distance, as it is to dramatise. So the detachment here, of the narrator for the subject, is jarring, but I think in interesting ways.

A couple of mechanical notes:

"conplained" - complained. But actually, I'd lose that entire line, to preserve the continuity of thought here: "I knew her from the literary magazine, which she had joined that year, and I can’t say I liked her. Mostly I thought of her as pretentious, and a mediocre writer besides. I remember thinking, that night, that if she had told my friend this story, (add a comma there) she was a better writer than I thought."

I think the story, as told, certainly comes right down to its point: death is the irrefutable fact, and the only mystery is in how we get there.

What did you feel was missing?

(Just realised how editorial I sounded...)

edit: and damn, out the door in ten minutes for writers group. I'm hoping to see all sorts of commentary on this one when I get back.

Deb, thank you! Editorial's exactly what I need.

I was thinking I needed a better transition to the second version of the story, and from that to the conclusion. The mystery is what I mean by "better," and how on earth to write it. It's problematic.

Got it. I love the fact that you're going less for blind emotion on this one than for clarity - because I live in the headspace and heartspace that tends to define the eternal verities as things we spend our lives hunting for clarity about.

I need to be out the door in about ten minutes (writers group, and for once, I'm not hosting, so I need to go there, and it's over in the Castro) - but may I look this one over again, and let my head nibble around its edges, and ping you later? I'll try to check AIM when I get home.

Definitely. I'll be on IM.

It may be lateish. I'll check in when I get home; if you're up, we can seesaw. Meanwhile? Smoochies, bebe. It's a damned good piece of work, and any alterations, additions or subtractions are likely to be minimal and cosmetic.

Huh. I thought the repetition was deliberate: as in, awkward teenager, think again, awkward teenager. I thought it was there to smack home the "fishnet tights" line.

Do you think the repetition works?

Holli, that is an amazing story. Very powerful.

sj, I thought it worked fine. But if you had a different intent, it would probably work just as well with that - it comes down, in the end, to where the author wants to take it.

edit: and how did I miss this?

"And I guess I'll just wallow in self-pity now." (/Pissy!Munchkin) :)

Oh, you so will NOT, madam. Don't I praise your meatloaf and bake you lemon bread? Huh?

Huh. *Finally* got my damned AIM up, and Holli, I think I missed you. Let's try again in the morning or tomorrow night.

Thanks, Kristin, erika, and especially deb. It's funny that you used the word "instinctive" - I more often than not find myself being criticized for filtering things too much, thus mostly preventing myself from doing things instinctively.

Oh, and I think that the biggest advantage for me, when reading in not-my-first-language-English, in which I need to actually read, as opposed to Hebrew, in which it's a completely automatic process and if anything I have to stop myself from reading, is that I have to pay more attention in order to follow the words and their meaning, and this way I can discover things that would escape me in Hebrew. Either that, or I'm just reaching to find something good about reading slower, and therefore less.

Holli, I really liked your piece. Something I don't think anybody has mentioned before - I loved the contrast in the images that were build in my mind, of the two "backgrounds", in the lack of a better word, for each story. You being alone in a cool basement for the first one, you being with your friends and the description of your costumes, in the other. I especially liked this:

shook my head and set my antennae wobbling, and wished that I had known Peter so I could know which story to believe.

because of that contrast, the sweet costume and the death, being together in one sentence. I don't know why, but it made the point of the finality of death even stronger, for me.