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Breakfast
Copyright 2006 Dale Bridges
'Where were you last night?' asks Donna. She's not looking at me, she's reading an article in Fitness Magazine of all things. She plays with the stupid zipper on her stupid canary-yellow jumpsuit. Zip-zip-zip. Donna is a yoga instructor. Donna follows the teachings of Buddha. Donna meditates topless in the backyard.
'Out,' I say, stirring my cup of no-calorie, no-fat, no-flavor yogurt.
'Out with who?'
'People.'
'What people?'
'Pedophiles and rapists. No one you'd know.'
She looks up from the magazine with her eyes but not with her head. I smile and hold up a spoonful of yogurt. 'This stuff tastes like jizz,' I say.
'No it doesn't,' Donna says, then blushes, realizing that I've gotten her to admit she knows what jizz tastes like. She looks away and takes a sip from her bottle of distilled imported Tibetan spring water.
'I really don't think you should be wandering all over the city without proper adult supervision.'
'Who says I wasn't with an adult?'
Her left eye begins to twitch. Zip-zip-zip. 'You are fifteen years old, young lady.'
'Wow, you remembered my age. Good for you. Fab. I want some breakfast.'
She turns the page of her magazine. 'You have breakfast right there.'
'I want a real breakfast. You know, bacon, sausage, scrambled chicken embryos.'
Donna's purses her lips together until her mouth is just a white scar. 'Jack!' she yells. This comes out in two syllables, the first one high, the second one low. 'Ja-ack.'
'What?' comes a voice from the living room. My father is a lawyer. My father has fifteen Armani suits. My father pays an Italian fag named Gi-Gi two hundred dollars a week to color his hair.
'Can you please control your daughter.'
'Leslie, listen to your mother,' the voice in the living room says.
'She's not my mother,' I yell back.
'That's right, your real mother ran off with the pool boy. So listen to this one.'
'I want a real breakfast.'
There is a pause. Then the voice says to Donna, 'Let her eat what she wants.'
Donna's lips completely disappear. 'But Ja-ack,' she says without looking at me, 'we've talked about this. That food is not healthy for a teenage girl.'
'Oh, for christsake! It's just meat. She's not eating strychnine.'
Zip!
'Well, she might as well be. If you had read that Surgeon General report like I asked you to'¦'
'It's meat! Meat! People eat meat every day!'
'And people die every day! Not to mention the inhumane conditions those poor creatures are subjected to.'
'Goddamnit, Donna! You're not her mother. Just butt out.'
'That's a horrible thing to say.'
'You can't expect to change everything overnight. There has to be compensations.'
'Thank you, Mr. Prosecutor.'
'Goddamnit'¦'
Donna stands up and marches into the living room so she can talk about me behind my back. Soon they are yelling and I can hear them perfectly. It's the usual stuff. 'You always take her side.' 'How will she learn to respect me if you keep undermining my authority?' 'I want a nose job.' I check my cell phone messages and finish my yogurt.
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| Funny, with pretty good dialogue. |
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Comment by: - 2007-05-03 15:23
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| I really enjoyed the quickstep pace of this. The line about "Ja-ck" being pronounced in two syllables was an amusing touch & the banter shifts tones well between the family triangle. Well done. |
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Comment by: karjon Online- 2007-03-05 11:38
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I keep laughing at 'I want a nose job' just thrown in there with all the other complaints. Excellent. Okay, three stories, three lots of laughter and great characters. If I had time I'd read more - but I don't, so I'll have to come back another day.
Cheers
Karen |
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Comment by: Teri - 2006-10-12 13:42
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There's not one thing I would change in this except make it longer because it's one of those rare pieces of writing I did NOT want to end. This line destroyed me:
β??Thatβ??s right, your real mother ran off with the pool boy. So listen to this one.β?
Another cat is orbiting the moon right now. That is WONDERFUL writing. The whole thing is great. I really need to read more of your uploads. I've obviously been missing a lot here. T. |
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| hmm, nice characterization. Good dialogue. What I think is missing is that the way you described the scenes, is a little over specific, it stifles the story a little. Made me think more about the expression on the character's face than I wanted to and took me from the story a little. The part about Donna's smile being a white scar was great, that is just the example I used. There are other descriptions that I think are over wordy or too specific/anal. Message me if you want to know which ones. Beyond that, I think there needs to be more inner dialogue from the narrator. Her inner dialogue is great, you are amazing at characterization, the story is great, but I think there needs to be more from her, about things not happening at the moment, such as how she felt the last time Donna made her breakfast, etc. Things of that nature. I'm no great fiction writer myself, but I think I'm pretty good at giving comments/critiques. Because your story inspired me, I decided to upload an excerpt from the novel I'm working on, please comment, and good luck with this story. I really enjoyed it. |
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