Hi! I’ve just finished writing the first chapter of my sci-fi novel. After years of thinking about this idea, I’ve finally decided to put it down on paper.

I’d love to hear your feedback, especially on the opening, pacing, and character voice. Also, would you be interested in following Sunny on his adventures as he tries to serve the great UEDC (United Earth Defense Coalition)?

Thanks in advance for reading!

STARDUST

Chapter 1

Quick question: What would happen if you could extract enough energy from a rat to make the atom bomb look like a glow stick? I was trying to answer the same question and could see two possible outcomes of my endeavor: I would either revolutionize the field of bioenergetics or turn my little village into a crater. Either way, August 23, 2048, was going to be memorable.

I had barely slept the previous night; the anticipation was too much to endure. If I hadn’t promised Mom that I would get at least six hours of sleep a day, I would have stayed in my lab the whole night. As soon as the alarm went off, I jumped out of bed and walked to the balcony to breathe in some fresh air. My skin tingled as the tender morning sunlight hit it, and a sweet, loamy scent filled the heavy air. As far as the eye could see lay vast, waterlogged rice fields—a sea of aggressively growing green paddy. But then I caught the slight blue-green sheen on the water’s edge.

Algal bloom. I could have bet that the carbon-to-nitrogen ratio and the pH were both off from their optimal values.

That idiot Ramu had overdone the top-dressing fertilizer again. I honestly don’t understand why Dad insists on employing these good-for-nothing fools. I’ve told him a dozen times to buy those automated AI drones—heck, they’re heavily subsidized by the UEDC and would skyrocket our yield overnight. But no. He just keeps nagging me about “human intelligence,” “tradition,” “community,” and blah, blah, blah.

I decided not to let these trifles mess up this beautiful morning and immediately made my way toward my lab.

As I passed by the kitchen on the ground floor, I could almost taste the tangy aroma filling the air. Mom was making her signature upma, humming a tune from an old Bollywood song.

“Sunny, is that you?!” she cried just as I was trying to sneak out the front door.

Tchk! I couldn’t let her ruin this morning, so I ignored her and kept walking. The door was close—so close. Just a few steps and I would have been free, if only she hadn’t called out again.

“Sunny-beta?” Her voice was shriller this time.

“Yes, Mom, it’s me!” I shouted, letting out a heavy sigh.

“Come here, beta,” she called back.

I turned back toward the kitchen. Mom was standing right at the doorway in eager anticipation, her eyes practically glowing, wearing that big, silly smile of hers that I was so used to seeing. I entered the room but stopped a few feet short, foolishly hoping she might forget the routine today.

I was instantly proven wrong. She beelined straight for me. I braced for impact. She pulled me into a smothering hug that lasted a beat too long, then patted my head, cupped my cheeks, kissed my forehead, and popped a soaked almond into my mouth. It was a compulsory morning ritual that she had practiced every single day.

Wiping my forehead, I finally escaped the house with an almond still in my mouth. Ahh! She had managed to slip some into my pockets too.

I’d turned sixteen a few months ago and would soon be heading to the UEDC military institute. I was meant to be on the front lines, putting down rogue factions and making a name for myself, not getting coddled by Mom.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow for sure, I’d tell her to stop.

Nursing my bruised dignity and munching on the almonds all the way down the gravel path, I finally stopped in front of the heavy steel door of my lab.

The lab used to be a cattle shed filled with Dad’s favorite cows, buffaloes, and whatever else, but I’d had him clear it out and refit it just for me. I felt a tiny sting of remorse when he had to guard the animals in the open at night until the new barn was ready, but I was ecstatic the second my equipment and chemicals moved in.

The lights hummed to life as I pushed the door open, and a hologram of Chen Xin, the Savior of Humanity, flickered into view, reciting his victory speech.

I stood at attention, as I did every morning. When the recording reached its climax, I raised my hand in a salute and chimed in on the final words.

“The Earth endures because we stand guard. We are the guardians of the green. We are the UEDC.”

Hyped up by his words of unwavering devotion, I made my way to my workbench to continue my revolutionary work.

Resting on the bench was the Mona Lisa of modern civilization: a carbon energy core. This beauty could consume anything with even the slightest trace of carbon and power an entire town. Hell, if you bypassed UEDC regulations, it could light up an entire city like it was Diwali—or create a micro black hole and collapse the planet.

I had finished building my custom core last night, and of course, I was entirely responsible and careful about it. Which was why I had carefully bypassed all regulatory kill switches and boosted its output.

For my fun little experiments. I mean, for science, of course.

I switched on my recorder drone to log the day’s baseline conditions before getting to work.

It lifted off the bench, scanned the room, and chimed in its synthetic voice, “Dear Commander, scan complete.” A crisp hologram flared above it, showing the exact atmospheric and energy readings for the experiment.

God, I loved this drone. It was compact, sturdy, and customizable down to the last line of code, like everything the UEDC made. It would stay on for the whole session, logging data and every brilliant insight I shouted at it mid-experiment.

I began by dictating the day’s baseline.

“August 23, 2048. 8:47 AM. Today is Day 73 of my Somatic Carbon Resonance for Bioenergetics experiment. As of yesterday, my open-chambered resonator maintained a perfectly stable output in its equilibrium state; empirical results matched my simulations down to the decimal. Today, we proceed with observing the effect of hyper-dense carbon resonance on living systems.

“The specimen is Rattus norvegicus, the common Indian brown rat. Total mass: 457 grams. It contains precisely 43 grams of carbon actively incorporated into its biological systems. Assuming this organic carbon behaves as it would in a standard inorganic lattice, we should produce a total of 23 terajoules of energy for every single gram consumed.”

Finishing my log, I stepped up to greet our test subject of the day. The rat had been terrorizing our grain stores for ages. Again, I had told Dad to buy storage containers from UEDC Agritech, and again, he wouldn’t listen.

When I needed a live subject, these little rodents were the obvious choice. After analyzing her feeding patterns, I’d had Ramu place a trap that would temporarily paralyze the culprit. It was a simple motion-activated contraption that would enclose the bastard and blast her with my synthetic conotoxin, which targeted only the somatic motor neurons and completely spared the autonomic nervous system.

It seemed I’d overdone the toxin, because this absolute unit of a rat was still lying motionless in her cage. Good for me. I carefully opened it, and the serene expression on her face as she slowly blinked up at me, shuddering, gave me a moment of hesitation. The toxin was wearing off. Her ears began to flap slowly, and she tried to open her mouth as if to tell me how her children were waiting for their mommy to get home.

I almost felt pity for this brown furball of cuteness, but I got hold of myself. I couldn’t let those big, watery eyes and that cute, quivering nose get in the way of scientific advancement. Sacrifices are necessary for greatness, and to make sure hers wouldn’t be forgotten, I decided to give her a name: Bonnie.

Bonnie would be the pioneer of bioenergetics.

I loaded Bonnie into the transparent chamber and sealed it shut. I switched on the resonator, and the coils came to life with a deep humming sound. I watched the numbers carefully as they approached the resonance threshold. The energy emission would begin any minute now.

I grinned at Bonnie through the chamber.

“Time to find out which outcome we get.”

I am mostly looking for feedback on whether the horror and scare elements are hitting.

"If you don't open the door, they can't get in," That was the rule carved above the broken mantle in what could charitably be called a farmhouse. Dry, brittle crops surround the building, wilting in the sun's amber light. "I wonder whose trial and error it was that taught that lesson," Will it be my turn to learn soon?

My shoulder burns as I crank the old iron pump in the middle of the room, sweat coats my body. I purse my lips at the effort of achieving a few more drops before the day's end when the well ceases to produce any more water until the morning. I squint up at where you sit, silhouetted in the window by the last of the sun's light. Empty eyes staring through my attempt at humor, it stings more than I care to admit. Intermittent drops of water accompany the syncopated tapping of my heel. Time for a final pump remains. I flinch at the prospect in the face of my exhaustion.

Lifting the handle is the most difficult step. "I sense your judgement in your posture," I say as you slouch forward at my sad attempt at perseverance and conversation, straining as I lift. "So long as a drop remains so shall I," I declare. With the lever raised I place both hands upon it and allow my weight to force it down towards the Earth in a pitiable triumph undercut by the absence of the anticipated final drop of the day. Bent and sighing I peer at you sitting across the room and try to meet your head's amused tilt with a dignity that scarcely exists.

The final rays of the day drip into the room. Taking the light but leaving the heat, the horizon swallows the sun. I feel my skin begin to itch in anticipation of what comes next. The darkness is total and undeniable once present, only my memory of the space allows me to navigate it. The scuttling of too many feet scampers outside the walls shorting out my frayed nerves. While the day saps the life from your body, the night does the same to your mind in this place. A rat-tat-tat-tat-tat bounces from the direction of the door.

“Cheers,” I declare to your skeleton as I arduously lift the too light pail to my lips.

It tastes metallic, bitter, and dirty.

¡Hola a todos! Les comparto un extracto del primer capítulo de mi novela de ficción/drama psicológico. Explora las consecuencias emocionales y financieras de las decisiones impulsivas tomadas en la juventud. Me serviría mucho saber qué les transmite el tono y si el ritmo los engancha para seguir leyendo:

Se levantó y caminó hasta el ventanal, mirando las luces dormidas de la ciudad. Desde que tenía memoria, había crecido bajo la firme creencia de que Dios guiaba cada uno de sus pasos. En su hogar, una familia humilde de clase media baja donde cada plato de comida se agradecía y cada sacrificio valía la pena, le habían enseñado que las buenas acciones traían bendiciones.

¿Y las malas?

Esa era la pregunta que lo atormentaba cada noche mientras miraba el techo. ¿Seguía pagando la factura? ¿Era esta asfixia constante el vuelto de aquel pecado? La religión de su infancia no le hablaba de karma, pero a sus treinta y dos años, el concepto le pesaba en los hombros como una losa de cemento.

Pensó en ella. No en su prometida, la mujer que dormía a unos metros de distancia en la habitación principal, ajena a la tormenta financiera que los devoraba. Pensó en la primera. La mujer que, estaba seguro, Dios mismo había puesto en su camino. La que lo amó con una pureza que él no supo valorar y a la que destrozó sin piedad por perseguir un espejismo envuelto en fuego y adrenalina.

Diez años atrás, a sus veintitantos, creyó que podía engañar al sistema. Creyó que las decisiones tomadas en la oscuridad de los pasillos de una oficina no tendrían eco en la luz de su futuro. Creyó que pedir perdón en silencio borraba las huellas del daño infligido.

Qué ingenuidad tan arrogante la de los veinteañeros.

Hoy, atrapado en una jaula de oro que él mismo había construido, atado a deudas por intentar salvar a alguien cuando el que se estaba ahogando era él, entendía la lección más cruel de la adultez. El castigo divino rara vez viene en forma de rayos y truenos. A veces, Dios simplemente da un paso atrás, cruza los brazos y te deja vivir las consecuencias exactas de lo que tú mismo elegiste.

Agradezco cualquier crítica constructiva comunidad !

Hi I’m very new to this stuff don’t really write. I lowkey have a learning disability involving it so I don’t really do the regular writting so I’ve been doing I guess rap and adjacent writing and just wanted some feedback.

Man in the mirror
Sometimes it feels like I’m staring inna fractured mirror
Warped perspective like I hammered back a thousand beers
Now when I take a peek all I see’s a grown man with a thousand yard stare
We got matching scars yet he seems somehow unfamiliar

I recognize the fear though admittedly he’s better at hiding it than I was
Fear never really disappears though you’ll still flinch
at every hand that comes near you
Only thing you can do is dress up distress till your loving
family and friends can’t no longer detect it
Not so good at hiding fatigue though eye bags from sleepless nights
Hard to hide those especially in bathroom lighting
Fatigues as deep seated as deceit is my minds ripe with these diseases

Trained my whole life to make sure nobody would see em
Built up lead curtains not even Superman’s x-ray vision could peep through em
Now I’m secluded connection has never felt so illusive
I know where the gaps are but this mirror seems to shield them
Maybe that’s why this stranger is so unidentifiable
Maybe my memory is just yet again unreliable
Maybe it’s my anxiety
Maybe just another trial gods getting off too
Why is he so old feels like hardly a day away I was fleeing another ass beating during recess
Never could quite manage to get away always ended the same no matter what I’d say
Kids had no courtesy remember one day I was
Begging the bullies please just not in the face on the counna tomorrows picture day
They hit me anyway came home with a fat lip n a bruise under my left eye

As I reminisce the man in the mirror grows only more familiar
My history is his explanation it’s funny though he almost looks like he wants to say something
I guess we’re both to strained to say it or maybe pain just keeps it at bay
Maybe the years of restraint make the flood gates nearly unbreakable

Sometimes I envy those who can play their tiny violins
While I grew acclimatized to all this violence
My two fists became the instrument
Like I was playing a theremin when I look at him his fists are balled too but knuckles with no bruises
Looks like physical stature caught up used to wish I’d be as big as my old man
That way no man would make me ever feel helpless again
Maybe he’s living proof some wishes come true he’s also proof
the past will always haunt you

seemingly got alot to live for I’ve grown up have the body id always wished for
But eyes don’t lie that tiny spark is gone somewhere in the frenzy
that final bitta hope must’ve up and just left us that’s one thing I can’t envy
Never convince yourself hope is the enemy the end of a rope never gets closer
maybe I really am him
If that’s the case his restraint is in my hands
So maybe it’s just time that I said it

We didn’t deserve the live grenade we were handed at 8
Dad was throwing grown man’s temper tantrums that doesn’t excuse his child abuse
However mom deserved a lot better
And it’s okay to still ache cause of it
They say you can’t fix a broken mirror but I just put my reflection back together

Dr. Elias Voss

“There exists a peculiar cruelty in the conscience of man: it demands repentance long after it has forgotten the crime”

Dr. Elias Voss had never considered himself an innocent man. Innocence, he believed, was merely the privilege of those who had not yet been made to remember. There were, of course, certain inconsistencies in this conviction. He could recall no crime sufficiently monstrous to warrant the peculiar anguish that accompanied his every waking hour, nor could he identify the precise moment at which his existence had become an exercise in perpetual atonement. Nevertheless, the absence of evidence had never persuaded him of his innocence. On the contrary, he regarded it as perhaps the most damning evidence of all.

For what was forgetfulness, if not the final refuge of the guilty?

He had often contemplated whether remorse preceded wrongdoing or whether wrongdoing merely furnished remorse with an object upon which to fasten itself. The distinction, though apparently trivial, had come to occupy him with an almost pathological intensity. If a man suffered for a crime he could not remember, was his suffering proof of guilt? And if the crime had never occurred, what, precisely, had he been punished for?

Such questions ordinarily visited him in the hours preceding dawn, when the distinction between memory and imagination became sufficiently tenuous that he could no longer determine which of the two had first betrayed him.

Dr. Elias Voss had long regarded affection as a peculiar form of human negligence. To love another was, in his estimation, to overlook the innumerable deficiencies of their character, to forgive what ought not to be forgiven, and to place one's happiness in the custody of another's inevitable failures.

It was for this reason that he had never understood his parents.

They were good people. This, Elias knew with a certainty that bordered on resentment. They had taken him into their modest Chicago home when he had been little more than a stranger, and had offered him a tenderness so unconditional that he came, in time, to regard it as an injustice. For what had he done to deserve such devotion? What conceivable virtue could he have possessed that warranted the affection of two people whose goodness so plainly exceeded his own?

He had spent much of his adult life attempting to answer these questions. Eventually, he arrived at the conclusion that there was no answer, and that their love was consequently a mistake.

His visits became infrequent. His telephone calls are shorter. He excused his absences with the demands of his profession, although he privately considered this explanation another small addition to the vast catalogue of his dishonesty.

He did not avoid his parents because he disliked their company. On the contrary, their presence was among the few things in the world capable of momentarily quieting the incessant accusations of his conscience. It was precisely this comfort that frightened him. He had come to believe that anything which afforded him happiness must eventually suffer for having done so.

And he could not bear the thought of making them suffer.

There was, of course, a considerable irony in the profession he had chosen.

Elias was a neurologist of considerable distinction, a man whose competence had earned him the admiration of colleagues and the gratitude of patients. He possessed an almost unnatural capacity for remaining composed in the presence of catastrophe. His diagnoses were precise, his judgment rarely questioned, and his professional reputation such that strangers occasionally traveled considerable distances merely to obtain his opinion.

He despised every aspect of it.

Medicine, to Elias, had never been a vocation in the ordinary sense. It was neither a passion nor an expression of some benevolent impulse toward mankind. Rather, it was a sentence he had imposed upon himself, an indefinite obligation to preserve lives in compensation for those he believed himself responsible for destroying.

He did not count the people he saved.

He counted the ones he could not.

And although the latter were comparatively few, they occupied a disproportionate portion of his existence.

It was shortly after seven in the morning when the telephone rang.

Elias regarded the instrument with an expression of mild apprehension. He had developed an instinctive aversion to telephone calls, having discovered that they seldom delivered anything which could not be postponed and frequently demanded emotional responses he felt incapable of providing.

Nevertheless, he answered.

"Dr. Voss speaking."

"Elias?"

He closed his eyes.

"Hello, Mother."

"Have you been eating properly?"

There was no greeting, no preliminary inquiry into the condition of his day. His mother had long since abandoned such formalities, having apparently concluded that her son's continued existence required more immediate verification.

"Yes, Mother."

"And sleeping?"

"When I can."

"That isn't an answer."

A silence followed.

He imagined her seated beside the kitchen window, one hand wrapped around the telephone cord, her expression arranged into that familiar mixture of tenderness and suspicion which he had come to recognize as maternal concern.

"Elias, are you all right?"

He glanced toward the window of his office. Chicago lay beneath a colorless morning sky, its buildings appearing almost indistinguishable through the pale October mist.

"I'm all right, Mom. I swear."

The lie emerged with such practiced ease that he scarcely recognized it as one.

For several years, Elias had entertained recurring thoughts of ending his life. He regarded death neither as a terror nor as a particularly unfortunate conclusion to his existence. On the contrary, he had sometimes imagined it as the only conceivable interruption to the relentless prosecution occurring within his own mind.

Yet whenever the thought approached something resembling a decision, he recoiled. Not from fear.

From the belief that death would constitute an undeserved acquittal.

A man who had committed an unforgivable offense, he reasoned, ought not to be permitted the luxury of escaping its consequences. To cease suffering would be to abandon the very punishment that made his continued existence tolerable.

And so he lived.

Not because he believed himself worthy of life, but because he believed himself unworthy of release.

"Elias?"

"Yes, Mother?"

"How has your memory been? Have you been taking your medicine? They told you consistency was important."

His fingers tightened almost imperceptibly around the receiver.

"My memory is perfectly fine."

"You said that last time."

"And I was correct last time."

"Your doctor said—"

"I am a doctor, Mother."

There was a brief pause.

"I know what you are, Elias."

Something in her voice troubled him.

It was not anger. Nor disappointment. It was the quiet exhaustion of someone who had spent years attempting to reach a person determined to remain inaccessible.

"Just promise me you're taking care of yourself."

"I promise."

He wondered whether his mother recognized the ease with which he manufactured these assurances, and whether she accepted them because she believed him or because she had grown weary of questioning him.

They exchanged a few more words, none of particular significance, and eventually said goodbye.

Elias hung the phone.

For some time, he remained motionless.

His life was strangely cruel, he thought, he was loved by those whose affection he could neither comprehend nor adequately return. Their goodness did not diminish his guilt. It magnified it. Every expression of concern became another obligation he was certain to disappoint.

On the morning of October seventeenth, however, such considerations were interrupted by the death of a child.

A hurried knock sounded against his office door.

"Dr. Voss?"

He turned.

A young nurse stood in the doorway, her face pale, her breathing uneven.

"It's the boy. Benjamin."

Elias rose.

"What about him?"

"Dr. Clariss tried everything. There were complications, and—"

"What complications?"

"The malformation ruptured. Dr. Clariss took him into surgery, but the hemorrhage was extensive. They couldn't control the bleeding."

For several seconds Elias said nothing. 

"No."

The word escaped him with a strange, almost childish disbelief.

"No, I told Clariss to call me if his condition deteriorated. I specifically told him—"

"I'm sorry, Doctor."

"Why wasn't I informed?"

The nurse lowered her eyes.

Elias was already moving toward the door. Then he stopped, took a knee and covered his eyes. 

The boy was eight years old.

His name was Benjamin.

And Elias, who had never met him before that morning, would spend the remainder of his life believing he had murdered him. Along with many others.

Does anybody have any idea about where to publish my poems and how??

CHAPTER ONE

Strangers

Nobody notices strangers.

Adrian Cole had spent years believing that. Every morning, the plaza outside the subway entrance in downtown Westbridge filled with people rushing to work, most too busy to pay attention to anyone around them. Adrian sat on a metal bench near the intersection, watching the crowd move past while a small black notebook rested on his knee. He had been there for fifty-three minutes, and the only person who had looked at him for more than a second was a child being pulled along by his mother.

He opened the notebook and turned to a fresh line.

Observation #217

People remember what catches their attention, not necessarily what happens in front of them.

He read the sentence again. It wasn’t a new idea. He had spent years watching people in places like this, noticing how little they seemed to remember about the strangers they passed. But lately, he had started wondering whether being overlooked was as useful as he had always believed. There was a difference between going unnoticed and knowing what people had failed to notice, and Adrian wasn’t sure he understood that difference as well as he thought.

Across the intersection, a security camera turned toward the subway entrance. Adrian followed its movement until it reached the end of its sweep, then watched as it slowly returned. He had seen the same pattern many times before. The camera covered the crossing, the pavement outside a row of shops, and part of the road, but a narrow section beside a building remained outside its view for several seconds at a time.

He looked down at his notebook and added another line beneath the observation.

People trust what they can see. They rarely question what they can’t.

A bus passed between him and the camera, blocking his view for a moment. When it moved on, a man in a dark coat was standing near the building, looking toward the intersection. Adrian hadn’t noticed him arrive. The man checked his watch, glanced at the camera, then walked away without crossing the road.

Adrian watched him disappear around the corner. Perhaps he was waiting for someone. Perhaps he had simply changed his mind about where he was going. There was no way to know from a few seconds of watching, and Adrian knew better than to mistake a guess for a fact.

He wrote nothing about the man.

Instead, he closed the notebook and stood. The crowd carried him across the intersection, past a woman hurrying to catch a train and a cyclist arguing with a driver who had stopped too far into the crossing. Adrian moved around them and continued toward a newspaper stand at the corner.

A television behind the glass was showing the morning news. He might have walked past without paying attention, but the reporter’s words made him stop.

“…Westbridge police are investigating after a body was discovered late last night near Riverside District.”

The screen showed a stretch of road beside the river, with police lights flashing behind yellow tape. The reporter stood near the edge of the walking path, speaking over the sound of passing traffic.

“The body was discovered shortly after midnight, just two blocks from Central Plaza. Police have not yet released the victim’s identity, and investigators are asking anyone who was in the area last night to come forward.”

Adrian stared at the screen. He knew Riverside District. He had walked along the river the night before, past the streetlights and the metal railing that separated the path from the water. He could remember the cold air against his face and the sound of cars moving along the road behind him.

What he couldn’t remember was leaving.

He tried to picture the journey home, but his thoughts stopped somewhere between the river and his apartment. He couldn’t recall unlocking his front door, turning on the lights, or getting ready for bed. At first, he told himself he had simply been tired. People forgot ordinary details all the time, and a missing part of an evening didn’t automatically mean something was wrong.

Then he checked the time on his phone and realised he had been awake for hours without once questioning how he had got home.

Adrian had always trusted his memory. He kept his notebook because he liked having a record of things he might otherwise forget, not because he struggled to remember his own life. The small details usually stayed with him long after other people had moved on. Yet when he tried to fill in the missing hours, the harder he concentrated, the less certain he became.

The television changed to a shot of a police car parked beside the river.

“…investigators are reviewing security footage from nearby streets as they work to establish the victim’s final movements.”

Adrian looked toward the camera above the intersection. He had no reason to believe he had anything to do with the death. He hadn’t even seen the victim, and being near Riverside the night before didn’t make him a suspect. Still, the mention of security footage made him think about every camera along the route he had taken.

If he had walked past one, there might be a record of him being there. If he had gone somewhere else afterward, there might be a record of that too. For the first time, Adrian found himself hoping the cameras had captured something useful, even if he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what it was.

He turned away from the television and started toward the subway entrance. As he walked, he pushed back his sleeve to check the time again, and noticed a thin scratch just below his wrist. The skin around it was red, and the mark looked recent. He turned his hand beneath the light, trying to remember catching it on the railing beside the river, but nothing came to him.

He might have scratched himself without noticing. That was possible. What bothered him was that he couldn’t remember enough about the night to decide whether that explanation made sense.

By the time he reached the subway stairs, he had taken out his phone and opened his recent calls. There was nothing unusual. He checked his messages, then his calendar, looking for anything that might help him piece the evening together. Most of it was ordinary, the kind of information he could have checked on any morning, but there was no sign of where he had been after Riverside.

He was about to put the phone away when it vibrated in his hand.

An unknown number had sent him a message.

Did you sleep well?

Adrian read it twice. The words were ordinary enough, but the timing made them feel different. He looked at the number, hoping he might recognise it, then opened the sender’s details. There was no name or profile picture, and nothing to suggest who might be contacting him.

He typed a reply.

Who is this?

The message was delivered, but no answer came.

A train rumbled beneath the pavement as people began descending the stairs around him. Adrian stepped aside to let them pass, still staring at the screen. It could have been a wrong number or a prank. Someone might have sent the message without knowing anything about his night, and he was already looking for connections because the news had unsettled him.

He knew that was possible. He also knew that the message had arrived just after he discovered he couldn’t account for several hours of his life.

He looked at the scratch on his wrist, then back at the phone. Something about the words bothered him more than it should have. The sender hadn’t asked where he had been or what he was doing. They had asked whether he had slept well, as though they already knew he had gone to bed.

Adrian opened the message again and began typing another reply, but stopped before he could finish. He wasn’t sure what to ask. If the sender was a stranger, demanding an explanation might tell him nothing. If it was someone he knew, he didn’t want to reveal how little he remembered.

He locked the screen and slipped the phone into his pocket.

For years, Adrian had believed that paying attention gave him an advantage. He could notice a change in someone’s behaviour, remember a face from a crowd, or spot a detail that others had overlooked. But he had never considered what would happen if he missed something important himself.

The missing hours were no longer just an inconvenience. Someone might know where he had been, what he had done, and why he couldn’t remember it. Until he found out who had sent the message, he had no way of knowing whether he was being warned, threatened, or simply frightened by a coincidence.

Adrian descended the subway stairs, joining the crowd on its way underground. Above him, the security cameras continued their slow sweep across the plaza, recording the people who passed beneath them.

He had spent years studying what people failed to notice.

Now he had to find out what he had missed.

I’m a hobby writer working on my first literary fiction novel. This is the opening paragraph of chapter one, roughly 180 words. I’ve rewritten it five times, but I’m unsure if the opening hook lands.

My main worry: Is the main character’s internal conflict clear enough too quickly? Or is it too vague, leaving readers confused about what’s at stake? I’d also love feedback on pacing and whether the dialogue feels natural, not forced.

The old café smelled like burnt bread and rain. Clara stared at the chipped mug in her hands, watching steam curl thin and vanish before it reached her face. She’d come here every Tuesday for three years, but today the quiet felt different, heavy. The man sitting across hadn’t spoken in ten minutes. He pushed a folded photograph across the table. “You don’t have to forgive them,” he said. “But you do have to stop running.”
Clara’s fingers hovered above the photo. She knew what it showed. The house she left behind, the sister she abandoned. For a second she considered sliding it back, standing up and walking out like she always did. But her hands shook. She didn’t move.

That’s the excerpt. I’m trying to hint at family trauma without info-dumping everything in chapter one.
What parts feel flat? Does this make you curious about Clara’s past? Any sentences I should cut or rewrite? Thank you for any honest feedback.

Hi everyone, I'm working on a dark supernatural thriller about an Englishman living in New York City, hitting rock bottom before taking a remote caretaker job up state. Looking for quick feedback on the dialogue, pacing, and whether this opening scene hooks you!

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The heavy, rhythmic thud of boots in the hallway cut through his thoughts. Three sharp knocks rattled the thin plywood of his front door. Doug didn't need to look through the peephole to know who it was.

Mr. Anderson, the landlord, stood in the threshold before Doug could even fully swing the door open. Anderson was a short, thickset man whose breath always smelled faintly of peppermint and cheap cigars. He carried a clipboard like a shield.

"I heard about the plant, Mr. Williams," Anderson said, not bothering with a greeting. He didn't look Doug in the eye; instead, his gaze wandered past Doug's shoulder, assessing the state of the apartment's carpet. "Bad business, truly. But the first of the month is three days away."

"I know, Mr. Anderson," Doug said, his voice dropping into a low, defensive register. "I’m looking. I actually just found something up north. A caretaker gig. I just need a little time to get the first check, maybe a two-week grace period on the—"

"If you don't pay, you don't stay," Anderson interrupted, his tone shifting from professional indifference to cold finality. "That’s the rule of the house, Douglas. I’ve got a waiting list of kids from the community college who can pay three months upfront with their parents' money. I can’t do charity. You need to vacate the apartment by tomorrow morning. If the keys aren't on the counter by noon, I’m changing the locks and putting the furniture on the curb."

The only person who ever called him Douglas was his Mum.

Doug looked at the man’s polished leather shoes, then up at his greasy forehead. There was no anger left in him, no spark of righteous indignation. Just a profound, crushing exhaustion.

"Understood," Doug said quietly.

He closed the door, listening to the landlord's heavy boots retreat down the hallway until the building fell silent again.

With you I'm a puzzle that is solved

Without you, I'm a heart that's never learned to love

All of the cubes matched when I met you

The prettiest butterfly chose a milkweed that was falling

My fingers face withdrawal when your fingers sway somewhere alone

My eyes fade to black when there's no silhouette made of a lavender

When you speak, I listen and I want to store your melody in my seventh sense

With you, there's peace whispering a prayer

Without you, I'm a civilian of their world and demon is the mayor

When I found you, I found the missing piece

I was forbidden from seeing Autum, then I found June

A draft of the final fight scene for a suspense thrill novel I'm working on. I don't want it to sound too "Hollywoodish" or "unrealistic. What do you think? Also, it involves the physics of an MRI suite --- does it seem plausible? Feedback and suggestions are welcomed.

THE FINAL SCENE

It took 22 minutes for Tonya to complete Frank Mancusio’s scan. Not bad.
 Now she removed Frank from the scanner, Frank sat up and hopped off the motorized bed, stretching, and they headed out the room. “How are you?”
“I’m good, not as bad as I thought. I still prefer spelunking though.” he and Tonya chuckled. “Well, How’s my brain? Did it look…you know….cancerous?”

“I can’t give a diagnosis, but the doctor will contact you and you did a good job.” He smiled and she patted his arm. “Remember what you said? God is in control.”

“Exactly,” he grinned. “Gotta take my own advice as a pastor, huh?” 

She smiled at him. “We’re all human,” they stepped out of the  control room and turned left down the short hallway before rounding right. 

“It’s quiet. Where is everyone?”

“You’re the last patient. We’re actually closing up,” she said, pointing toward the changing room. “Go ahead and get dressed. I’m gonna start cleaning up in the scanner room and I’ll come get you to let you out in a few minutes.” 

Frank smiled, waving as he turned into the changing room. Tonya pivoted and walked back to the scanner room where she moved the motorized bed and began her closing duties; sanitizing the bed and front bore, disposing the linens in the hamper, wiping down counter and any other items before returning to the control room to scan the results of Frank’s scans into Dr. Gupta.

–wait, what was that noise?

No, maybe nothing. She needed to let Frank out through the lobby. She could return and finish powering down the system and the computer monitors.  Reclipping her badge on the scrubs pants, Tonya disposed of her gloves and her mask and  headed out of the control room, down the short hallway —

 “CODE SILVER. CODE SILVER” the PA system announced overhead, stopping Tonya dead in her tracks.

Wait–what? Cold Silver. Oh shoot, that meant someone with a weapon—
“TONYA, YOU SKANK!” someone screamed. 
She jerked back, gasping.

And then she screamed. 

Because right in front of her, stood Derrick. 

A pissed-off Derrick with a face contorted in anger. Baggy jeans held up with an iron belt buckle, a white tank top stained with someone’s blood, a stainless steel chain roped around his neck.

And he held a butterfly knife to the neck of a terrified Frank Mancusio.

It’s amazing the dozens of thoughts that zip through your head in just a few seconds, and for Tonya, they came like lightning; I’m dreaming. He’s not standing there. He found me. Frank. What is happening? This can’t be. Lord I — 

“Did you miss me, boo?” Derrick hissed wickedly, yanking Frank back more. 

Tonya blinked, holding her breath. Come on girl, move, run, do something—

“Did you?!” he roared, and she flinched, gasping loudly. 
She closed her eyes, heart pounding. Calm him down. Make peace. No, wait. No. It didn’t work–

“Oh you’re scared, aren’t you?” She opened her eyes when he said this, and he looked at her with fury…and elation. 

He’s not just angry. He’s enjoying this. 
 “Yeah, you should be,” he said. 
She squeezed her eyes shut. This was the moment to face her fear. 
Lord, I need your help

She opened her eyes.  “What are you doing here?” she asked coolly. 

“I always know where you are!” He screamed.

She looked at Frank briefly and then Derrick.
“Let him go,” she ordered him. 
“Shut-up skank!”
“Let him go, Derrick!” she hissed, fists clinched.

“YOU RUINED ME, SKANK!”

“You ruined yourself!” Tonya shot back boldly.  “Let him go now!”
His eyes widened, surprised at her,  surprised at her tenacity, and he momentarily lowered his arm —
—-and suddenly yanked  Frank backward and slashed his neck.

Tonya reacted instinctively, medical training finally kicking in, and she bolted for Frank as he sank to one knee, gasping. She yanked off her scrubs top and jammed it into Frank’s neck as he fell forward.  “Stay with me,” she held it to his throat, blood oozing through the material, and he put his own hand there.  “We’lll get you h—”

Derrick’s foot smashed into Tonya’s nose from the side, hard.

She fell backwards while momentary pain and blinding light pierced through her nasal cavity. Tonya struggled to sit up, shaking her head, stinging tears blotting her vision, tasting blood that dripped from her nose. 
Derrick stepped over Frank, who’d collapsed completely on the floor. She climbed toward Frank, but Derrick suddenly grabbed her fiercely by her African braids, yanking her to her feet and jamming the knife under her jaw, eyes of fury and thrill boring into her, his other head digging into her scalp. 
“He’s dead, skank,” Derrick snarled. “And I’m the last person you’ll see.” He chuckled gleefully, scraping the knife across her painfully bleeding nose before licking the blood-stained knife with a chuckle.

In that split second, something switched in Tonya's mind, and she mentally replaced the pain with adrenaline-fueled resolve to survive, to fight.

Yes, fight, the small voice echoed in her soul. You’ll survive this.

She proprioceptively knew her right knee was between his legs, right in that perfect spot. Aw yes, eyes, throat, groin.  

—she rammed her knee into his groin. Hard. “BASTARD!” 

Derrick doubled over in pain, releasing her as he clutched his jewels. But he wouldn’t remain down and out for long. Tonya turned, ignoring the blood dripping from her nose, dashing erratically for the emergency exit next to the equipment room. 
“You WITCH!” his voice echoed down the corridor. 
She slammed her body into the door, the impact vibrating through her injured nose. 
But the door held firm. What?
Tonya threw her weight into the door again, wincing in pain.
Nothing. The electronic lock had failed. 
Not this again! She jumped backward, holding her nose, panning the area quickly for another way—
Derrick rushed at her, knife poised to shank. 
She screamed and dove for the ground and into a barrel roll, staggering to her feet just as Derrick twisted around and swiped the knife at her, the blade’s tip slashing the skin of her back briefly as she fled back down the corridor. The other emergency exit, the one by the CT scanner  room, if she could just –
Derrick slammed into her. She’d barely run 15 feet. 
They crashed to the ground. Tonya’s nose and shoulder smacking the floor, while Derrick landed on her briefly before bouncing off her and falling to the right. 
Pain shot through her face and shoulder and Tonya pushed herself up, disoriented but only for a moment. She turned her to her right to see Derrick lunging for her, knife raised.
She instinctively pulled herself into a ball as he landed on her, knife swinging.
But Tonya shielded her neck and torso, blocking the blows with her arms, writhing on the floor and kicking at him while screaming. With her erratic movement he only managed to inflict superficial cuts and gashes to her arms, hands and side as she feverishly pushed back. She saw his chained neck through the gap of her raised arms.  Throat. 
Just as she jabbed her bloody knuckles against his throat, the Adam’s apple, Derrick plowed the knife deep into her right shoulder. He jerked back, yanking the knife out and clutching his throat, and Tonya fell backward, screaming in pain—
—and someone whacked a broomstick against Derrick's back and head.
Marisa
Derrick fell forward against Tonya  and she rolled away from him, pain shooting through her right shoulder from where he stabbed her.  She looked up to see Marisa bring the broomstick down on Derrick’s back again just as he cursed and jerked upward to his feet, clutching the knife.  
Tonya staggered to her feet haphazardly, pushing through the pain and dizziness, and Marisa lifted the broomstick a third time.
Derrick whirled around, jamming the knife into Marisa’s abdomen before she could swing  down.
“NO!” Tonya rushed forward with a burst of adrenaline as Marisa collapsed to the ground, the broomstick falling out of her hand. Derrick pounced on Marisa, crouching to stab her once more. 
Tonya kicked Derrick in his side before he could. 
He recoiled, cussing,  and Tonya seized fallen broomstick with both hands, raising it over her head to bash his head—
Pain ripped through her right shoulder and down her arm, which seized up, and she dropped the stick, doubling over and grabbing her arm.
That’s when Derrick backhanded her, hard. 
She stumbled back, blinding pain in her face mingling with her nose pain. “Darnit!” she managed. Once more disorientation took over, and she swayed a bit  as Derrick towered over her with furious eyes and a look of delight.
Her nose and face throbbed and she groaned in pain and tried to study her gait. OK, OK, focus–focus.
She looked up to see  Derrick standing before her, arms spread, the knife firm in one hand, his body poised to attack if she tried to run past him.
“Go ahead. I dare you.” 
Another bout of disorientation.  Focus, she thought. Lord, help me focus.
The other emergency exit. She lunged toward her left. 
He blocked her, swiping at her with the knife. 
She jumped back, the blade narrowly missing her face. She lunged for her right.
He slashed the blade across her chest, the blade tearing tank top fabric and nicking her skin underneath. She shrieked in pain and anguish, staggering back more.
In that moment time slowed. Endless thoughts in mere milliseconds. 

Marisa lay crumpled in a ball, behind Derrick, possibly dead. Goodness no. Frank, further down, also lay motionless and most likely dead. Please no. The first useless emergency exit to her right down the corridor. Derrick’s swift moves blocking her from the other exit. The MRI suite just a few feet behind her. Her nose and shoulder possibly broken and tendons torn. Derrick viciously taunting her before —

--Wait—.

The MRI suite is right behind me.

The chrome steel chain around his neck.

His iron belt buckle.

That stupid knife he’s holding.
Ferromagnetic.
A walking magnet attraction. A way to stop him. 
But he’s quick, too quick. 
Take a chance, the small voice said.

“OK, Jesus,” she muttered thickly.  “Let’s do it.”

“Your God can’t help you!” He screamed, hearing her mumble this.

And with that, Tonya pivoted and sprinted at the suite door, slamming into it with her good side. 

He charged right after her.

“Police! Grab him!” Marisa suddenly screamed, her voice strained but explosive enough to stop Derrick, who whipped around.  
It bought Tonya time to slap her badge against the panel– beep!
She tumbled into the room quickly, just as Derrick, cursing at the distraction, dashed forward and slammed his body into the door, swiping the knife at her. 
Tonya ducked, grabbed a rolling chair with her hand and shoved it in his direction as he  pushed through the doorway.
He fell over their chair, allowing her to stumble to the airlock RF shielding door and pull down the handle.
Cussing, he rammed the chair to the side. 
She yanked the RF door open with all her weight.  
He charged forward. 
She threw herself into the scanner room, the thump-hiss of the machine greeting her—
---Derrick plowed his knife  into her upper right back, hard, with a shhk sound, penetrating deep into muscle and dermis, and -- 
  —Tonya jerked forward, falling to her knees, the knife sliding out of her flesh.  Tonya dragged herself desperately toward the scanner using her good arm and her knees.
Derrick clamored after her, snatching the cloth of her tank top from the back with his left hand, briefly noting he couldn’t hold the knife steadily with his right, unaware of the magnetic force pulling it. In his rage and lust, he’d already ignored  the warning signs, the thump-hiss of the machine, and the light on the doors that had screamed “DANGER! MAGNET IS ALWAYS ON.” 
Despite his grip on her tank top, Tonya yanked herself forward, falling against the bore’s front near the scanner bed, well within the missile projectile effect area.
But Derrick didn’t care, he threw his weight forward to ram the knife into her back —
While Tonya threw herself to the right at the same time, crashing onto her already-injured right arm and shoulder, narrowing missing his aim —
--just as the magnetic force suddenly seized the knife and ripped it out of Derrick’s grip violently. 
“What th—”
CLANG! CLANG! -
--and had he not thrown his weight into his knife-stabbing, the invisible force would have just simply yanked the knife out of his hand and nothing more. But with his body in motion, coupled with the magnetic pull’s torque, Derrick lurched forward and crashed against the upper part just inside the bore–
—and the invisible force snatched his thick chrome steel necklace chain like a tightrope, yanking it to the surface, and taking him with it–
“AAAAH SHIIII—”
While the knife, after clanking back and forth from its attempt to align with the isocenter, had settled on the bottom part just inside the bore, blade facing upward  – 
TWHUMMP THUMP!

–where his body thudded against the inside, the blade piercing his chest.

SCHKK 
Then, silence.

Well, except for the thump-hiss, or the heartbeat of the magnet.

I am working on a historical fiction piece. Some feedback would be great. What's working? Do you get the premise? The full draft is here: https://greerjacksonbooks.substack.com/p/e691c664-6b41-4b5e-91a8-2905eceba422

You are a dive-bar kinda person. So you want to eat at Helping Hands because you know that’s where the good food is.

By good, I’m talking neck bones so juicy that they can only be eaten indelicately. They must be sucked and slurped in a way that would shock your mother--she is a no-elbows-on-the-table kinda woman.

But there is no shame allowed at Helping Hands. You are free to eat your rice smothered in neck bone gravy with a spoon, a tablespoon no less. And you can use that same spoon to tear off a chunk of your pound cake when it’s time.

Anyone and all interested in the common pursuit of a full belly are welcome. You are welcome even if you don’t have two nickels to rub together, as your prudent mother likes to say. Some people eat for free. Some people pay seven nickels to eat. Others donate more because the food is just that good.

In the Free Press, Kay Savage said a man paid three dollars for a cup of coffee at Helping Hands. That’s what you paid for the two white dress shirts you own--one of which you are wearing to go over there and eat today.

3700 Gratiot, Gratiot and Mount Elliot is not a pressed white shirt part of town. It’s where you go to pick up a job for the day. It’s more of a neighborhood coveralls. But you also heard that Mother Waddles puts a fresh white tablecloth on each table over there at Helping Hands, and even a few flowers. And since you are your mother’s child, a crisp white shirt just seems appropriate somehow.

You can see the line before you even get off the bus. But it’s not windy today, so you’ll survive a 30-minute wait to get inside, even though it’s October. And they are handing out their famous coffee to the people waiting.

When it’s your turn, the lady in front says welcome and points you to a table with an empty chair. She doesn’t mention the donation can in her hand. But you put in your dime and quarter anyway.

The table is a bit small for six people. But two of them are little kids, so that helps. The adults look up and nod at you, friendlier than you were expecting for Skid Row. But the kids keep eating.

Mother Waddles is pouring coffee and touching shoulders on the other side of the room. But except for the coffee instead of booze, it feels like a dive bar in here, you think--small, cozy, you could say cramped. These people know each other. And there is a literal bar with stools where people are eating. The gossiping that must go down over there!

Today’s meal is oxtail soup, not neckbones and rice like you were hoping. But soup makes sense for October, and it is good--sweet from carrots, spicy from a bit of black pepper. It makes your nose run a bit. It’s the kind of soup that keeps you from getting sick.

And there’s cornbread too. Well, it’s a corn pone, a hoecake. But it’s hot. It’s got those crispy edges. And the inside is creamy and soft, almost like cornmeal porridge. There is nothing better for sopping up oxtail juice.

A few pieces fall on your crisp white shirt with each bite and make a yellowish grease stain. But still, it’s not a bad meal for 35 cents. And there are flowers and white tablecloths, just like you read about. But they have glass tops over them to keep stains down.

Hey everyone! I’m a new writer, and I’ve recently started working on my first psychological thriller, The Observer.

The story follows Adrian Cole, a man who’s spent most of his life being overlooked by the people around him. He’s always been observant, noticing the little things others miss. But when he starts losing hours of his memory and finds himself connected to a series of murders, he begins to question what’s real and what he can trust.
I’m going for a psychological thriller with mystery, suspense, and twists that make you look back at everything you’ve read differently.

I’ve just finished the first chapter, “Strangers,” and I’d really appreciate it if some of you could read it and give me your honest thoughts.

A few things I’d love feedback on:
Does the opening grab your attention?
Does it make you curious about what happens next?
Does the writing feel natural and easy to follow?
Is there anything that feels confusing, boring, or needs improvement?

I’m genuinely open to criticism, so don’t feel like you have to be nice just for the sake of it. I’m still learning, and I’d rather know what isn’t working so I can improve.

I’ll paste the first chapter below. Thanks to anyone who takes the time to read it. I appreciate it.
_________________________________________

Chapter One: Strangers

Nobody notices strangers.

Adrian Cole had spent years proving it.

Every morning, the same crowd filled the plaza outside the subway entrance in downtown Westbridge. People rushed through the intersection with coffee cups in their hands and their eyes fixed on their phones. Cars moved slowly through the traffic, horns sounded in the distance, and footsteps echoed against the pavement.

Everyone seemed to be going somewhere.

And yet, nobody really looked at anyone.

Adrian sat on a metal bench across from the intersection, a small black notebook resting on his knee. From there, he could see four crosswalks, two security cameras, and hundreds of people moving through the plaza.

He had been sitting there for fifty-three minutes.

In that time, exactly one person had looked directly at him.

A child.

Adults rarely looked. They glanced at faces as they passed, but their eyes moved on before they had a chance to remember anything.

Adrian opened his notebook and uncapped his pen.

Observation #217

In crowded places, people rarely remember unfamiliar faces, even moments after passing them.

He tapped the pen against the page.

This wasn't a guess. He had tested it dozens of times over the past year. Subway platforms, grocery stores, busy streets. Different places, different people, the same result.

People noticed movement. They noticed obstacles. They noticed anything that interrupted their routine.

But a stranger sitting quietly on a bench?

Most people would forget he was there before they had even walked away.

Adrian knew because he had spent most of his life being that stranger.

At school, he had been the boy in the corner. He had few friends and rarely spoke unless somebody spoke to him first. He wasn't bullied, and nobody hated him. Most people simply didn't think about him at all.

When classmates made plans, they rarely remembered to include him. When teachers called attendance, his name was just another name on the list.

After a while, Adrian stopped expecting people to notice him.

Instead, he started noticing them.

He paid attention to the little things people did without thinking. The way someone's mood changed when a certain person entered a room. The way a smile disappeared when nobody was looking. The way people sometimes said one thing but did another.

Nobody had taught him to observe. It had happened naturally, over years of sitting quietly while life unfolded around him.

By the time he was older, observing had become second nature. He listened more than he spoke, watched before he acted, and remembered details other people overlooked.

He never felt the need to tell anyone what he noticed.

It was simply how he experienced the world.

Now, he had turned that habit into something he could test.

Adrian looked up at the security camera mounted above the intersection.

It was slowly turning from one side of the street to the other.

Then he smiled.

Because he knew something most people in Westbridge didn't.

Even the cameras missed things.

He had spent months watching the cameras around the plaza. They followed the same patterns, turning from one side to the other before returning to where they had started.

People trusted cameras because they believed cameras saw everything.

Adrian knew better.

A camera could record a street without recording every detail that mattered. A person could pass through a busy intersection and leave almost nothing behind in the minds of the people around them.

And sometimes, even a camera could miss the moment that mattered.

He checked the time on his phone.

The camera turned again.

Adrian closed his notebook and stood.

No one noticed.

He stepped into the morning crowd, moving with the people crossing the street. A woman hurried past with her eyes fixed on her phone. Two teenagers brushed shoulders while laughing at something on a screen. A man nearly walked into Adrian before muttering a quick apology and continuing without looking back.

Adrian watched him disappear into the crowd.

Ten seconds later, the man probably couldn't have described what Adrian looked like.

Adrian crossed the street and stopped beside a newspaper stand.

Behind the glass, a television played the morning news. The sound was low, almost lost beneath the traffic.

He opened his notebook again.

Observation #218

An individual can move through dozens of strangers without leaving a lasting memory.

He paused before writing another line.

The safest place to disappear is in plain sight.

Adrian looked at the sentence for a moment, then closed the notebook.

Behind him, the television grew louder.

"...Westbridge police are investigating after a body was discovered late last night near Riverside District."

Adrian stopped.

He turned toward the television.

The reporter stood in front of a stretch of road near the river. Police lights flashed behind her, and yellow tape blocked off part of the pavement.

"...the identity of the victim has not yet been released. Investigators are asking anyone who was in the area last night to come forward."

The vendor inside the stand reached for the remote and turned up the volume.

"...the body was discovered shortly after midnight, along the Riverside walking path, just two blocks from Central Plaza."

Two blocks.

Adrian slowly closed his notebook.

He knew Riverside District.

He had walked there the night before.

He could remember the streetlights reflecting off the water. He could remember the metal railing that ran along the path and the sound of cars passing on the road behind him.

He remembered being there.

But when he tried to picture what had happened afterward, his mind went blank.

Adrian stood still, staring at the television.

Maybe he had gone straight home. Maybe he had stopped somewhere along the way. There were plenty of ordinary explanations for a night he couldn't remember clearly.

But then he tried to picture himself arriving at his apartment.

Nothing.

He couldn't remember unlocking his front door. He couldn't remember taking off his coat or going to bed.

He couldn't remember getting home at all.

Adrian took out his phone and checked the time.

8:17 a.m.

He tried once more to picture the walk from Riverside to his apartment.

The road. The streetlights. The buildings.

Then nothing.

It wasn't like trying to remember a dream that faded the harder he chased it. The memories before that point were clear. He could recall the smallest details of the walk.

But the hours that followed were missing.

He rubbed the back of his neck.

Adrian had always trusted his memory. Remembering small details was part of what made his observations useful. He could recall conversations from weeks earlier and recognize changes in people's behavior that others never noticed.

Yet now, there was a blank space where an entire part of his night should have been.

Behind him, the news continued.

"...police have not confirmed whether the death is being treated as suspicious. Security footage from nearby streets is now being reviewed."

Security footage.

Adrian looked up at the camera above the intersection.

For a moment, he watched it turn from one side of the street to the other.

Then he looked away.

He had no reason to believe the body had anything to do with him. He hadn't even heard the victim's name. Being near Riverside the night before didn't make him guilty of anything.

Still, he couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong.

He slipped his notebook into his coat pocket and started walking.

The morning crowd moved around him, adjusting their paths without giving him much thought. People passed on either side, already busy with their own lives.

Just like always.

Halfway down the block, Adrian glanced at his hand.

A thin scratch ran across the skin just below his wrist.

He stopped walking.

The mark was small, but the skin around it was red. It looked fresh.

He turned his hand toward the light, studying it.

It could have come from anything. A rough wall. A loose nail. The metal railing beside the river.

He tried to remember catching his hand on something the night before.

Nothing came to mind.

Adrian lowered his arm.

He was certain the scratch hadn't been there when he left his apartment yesterday.

Or at least, he thought he was certain.

That was the problem.

He could no longer trust what he remembered about the night before.

He looked back toward the newspaper stand. The television was still showing the report, with the same stretch of road and the same flashing police lights.

Then he looked toward Riverside District.

For the first time that morning, he wondered whether he should be worried about the missing hours.

Not because he had proof that he had done something wrong.

But because he had no proof that he hadn't.

Adrian started walking again, faster this time.

He needed to get home. He needed to check his apartment, look through his messages, and work out what he had done the night before.

There had to be something he could use to fill in the missing hours.

A receipt. A message. A call. Anything.

As he approached the subway entrance, his phone vibrated.

A message from an unknown number.

Did you sleep well?

Adrian stopped.

He read it again, then looked at the number. There was no name attached to it, no profile picture, nothing that told him who had sent it.

He typed a reply.

Who is this?

He waited.

No answer came.

A train rumbled beneath the pavement, and the crowd began moving toward the entrance. Someone brushed past his shoulder. Another person stepped around him without looking up.

Adrian barely noticed them.

His attention was fixed on the screen.

The message didn't prove anything. It could have been a wrong number, a prank, or someone he knew trying to get a reaction out of him.

But whoever had sent it had contacted him on the same morning he had discovered he couldn't account for part of the previous night.

He looked down at the scratch on his wrist.

Then back at the message.

He had spent years watching people, studying their habits, and learning how easily someone could go unnoticed.

He had always believed that if something important happened in front of him, he would notice.

But what if something important had happened while he wasn't paying attention?

What if it had happened while he was somewhere he couldn't remember being?

Adrian put his phone away and descended the subway stairs.

Above him, the morning crowd continued through Westbridge as if nothing had happened.

The cameras kept turning.

The strangers kept walking.

And somewhere in the city, someone knew exactly what Adrian had done the night before.

Even if Adrian didn't.

I am writing a small anthology for my daughter's birthday gift this year. I plan to have it printed as a hardcover book with illustrations. It features funny, fantastical retellings of real events, as well as more thematic short stories. I would love feedback on one to see if it is any good. I am not a writer by a long shot, so I'm hoping some of the more qualified people here can give me some notes! [4458]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MHNjmQGC9e1xju9CcsvWx6tY0i2zJp3ly6EK4xzmcPI/edit?usp=sharing

The Softened Hours
Plants came before mammals.
The first land plants appeared 470 million years ago, greening a world in slow, patient increments. Mammals wouldn't arrive until 200 million years ago—latecomers to a world shaped by root and leaf. We, like to think ourselves central to the story, barely present at all.

A few hundred thousand years of human breath against a backdrop so vast it resists comprehension.
Plainly: the world did not begin with us. It learned to live long before we learned how to name it.

Daytime belongs to edges—tables, doorways, borders and the hard outlines of things insisting on being known. But there are other hours, softer ones, the world loosens its grip on certainty. In those hours, something older seems nearer. Not visible, — but waiting, seemingly always.

The first time, I was drinking.
That is a fact I neither excuse nor lean upon. It simply is. And matters less now, because what came did not remain confined to that condition. It followed me—into sobriety, into ordinary sleep, into the unremarkable nights that make up most of a life.

They are here.
Not strangers in the usual sense, not familiar either. They appear as older middle-aged folk—not frail, not diminished, but settled. As if they've long outlived the need to hurry. Their movements are measured. Each gesture seems to carry weight, as though time itself were something handled carefully, not spent carelessly as we do.

They take form slowly, as though gathering themselves from the room. A figure near a chair, another by the doorway. Not intruding—never that—but present in a way that feels prearranged, like the air had been holding a place for them long before I noticed it.

There are few words.
I cannot say with certainty there are any words. Communication gathers around them like pressure—as meaning that has not yet decided to become language. It is felt first. Understood only as much as I am able to.

And then, always, the same moment.

I begin to follow.
I try to ask.
And everything stops.
Not fades. Not leaves. Stops.

The room holds itself in suspension so complete it feels arranged—like a photograph just taken, or a thought just lost. Sound and motion ceases. My own sense of time seems to hesitate, as though unsure whether it is permitted to continue.

Then the trepidation.
Not fear. Not panic. Something quieter, a discernment. The awareness that I've crossed into something that does not behave according to the rules I know.

My hand rises. Always the same gesture: palm outward, as though asking someone to wait—or to stop. I have never decided which. In that stillness, I understood something I cannot fully explain. These are not people, the thought did not come as language. It arrived whole, already formed. They are trees.

Not in the literal sense—not bark and branch shaped into human likeness—but something deeper. Living cells, ancient beyond reckoning, taking on a form I can bear to witness. A translation perhaps. A kindness. An acceptable way for me to receive what they are.

After that realization, they did not disappear. If anything, they seemed to settle firmly into presence. As though something had been acknowledged—some quiet agreement reached without words.

I do not know what they want.
I do not know if “want” is even the right word. But there is intention. That much I am certain.

And once— at the very beginning—there was more.
There was a hierarchy among them, not imposed, but recognized. Two presences standing apart without separating themselves.

In human terms, I recognized a king and a queen, though the words feel insufficient and slightly wrong.
With them came something else. A rhythm.

Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Tock.

Not heard with the ears, but perceived—steady, inevitable, indifferent to understanding. Time, not as we measure it, but as something that measures us. With that rhythm came images.
Not shown, Impressed.

A world undone. Not in fire or spectacle, but in utter failure. Systems collapsing not with violence, but with exhaustion. The long unraveling of things that once held. Afterward—care.

Hands, or something like hands, tending to what remained. Seeds. The last of them. Guarded not with urgency, but with certainty. As though this, too, had always been part of the design.

An ending.
A keeping.
A beginning.

I didn't ask for these things.
I wouldn't know how.
But they were given nonetheless.
And since, I have had the distinct and unsettling sense that I am not the only one being shown.

Somewhere, in softened hours across the world, others sit in quiet rooms and feel that same pressure of meaning gathering just beyond language.

I cannot prove this. I cannot even defend it.
But I know the feeling of it. And I have learned, at least, this much: When they come, it is better not to ask. It is better simply to witness.

Because whatever they are, they have been waiting far longer than we have been capable of noticing.

And they do not hurry.

She's born in June and he's born in December

A tale that'll be chanted for ages was written by a lost man

Written by the man who never met November

It was me and him when he was counting his last breath

He told me to burn this poem into ashes after his death

There was a red flower I once saw from my windowsill

I knew she was my Autumn, so I reopened the same page

Which had the smell of smoke

lines I've never read before

I never let his immortal kiss the grains of sand

I wrote a line which made me a poet of his kind which was unplanned

Rain

Oh rain

Don't you cry when monsoon is gone

Beautiful things are never meant to stay forever

I cry

I must

Sweetheart

I cannot abandon the love of my life

He taught me how to love

How to live

How to fall

How to feel

Our emotions have been expressed from centuries

Does that mean we will always meet again?

If there's a thing called reincarnation, then let me be your every single time

I want to know if I actually have any skills or if I'm just delusional; I've been thinking about finishing and publishing this over the next few years.

It follows a love philosophy story between two people named Andrew and Elizabeth; it opens on a page of him losing his mind, possibly about to kill himself, and then flashes backwards to when they first meet.

Loving Nothing But Her.

"I have been broken, my soul sworn in agony. I feel as if there is nobody better than her. Maybe I feel like it's over?. There's no point without her, she was my everything after all. I say, while my hand is down on a sharp, talkative trigger about to blow the already faded memories away. As I'm feeling these thoughts, I think to myself about her. About how she treated me. About how real the love I’m feeling actually is. I'm thinking about whether she's worth my life. But I was going to spend my entire life with her, right? How can I continue breathing knowing that we were supposed to spend our last breaths together? Is this what she wanted? She knew this would do this to me. “Why would she do this to me?”. I whisper into my pillow, anger leaking out of me uncontrollably. A voidless feeling overwhelms my body, I don't know how to process these feelings. I start to think if my love was real. I start to wonder if love is even real. I feel myself descend into a world where fear is ruled by love. Even the fear of death is trumped and stomped by love, but is it really?. “If she loved me enough she would've fixed what was wrong. She wouldn't have pushed me away.” I silently whisper to the banshees with broken hearts, who did wipe their memories clean. If love was real, you wouldn't be able to throw it away. The intense feeling I have isn't the feeling of losing a loved one. It's the feeling of losing love. “If love was objective, how is it also chosen?”. Well it's not. From all my experiences with love I don't think love can be objective, or even real at all. From the cruel screech of an angry mother, or the loud shout from a stressed father. People do not show love unconditionally, only when they can or want to. I think to myself that there will never be another, but how do I know this, I'm young, I have lots of life left. I haven't experienced love more than once so why do I feel like this is the end?. I try to rationalize why I feel the way I do but to no avail am I successful. I cannot escape the rapid thoughts of a bliss feeling of lifelessness. I think in these moments it's worth it, but I try to think realistically. In 10 years I will not feel the same about her. I will be a different person. I will think differently; that is what I think now. At least…"

I really like the version of me when I'm with you
No, seriously I do
I love you

And I'll never let any hardships cross our way
These days you don't seem to miss your ex
Do you know where he is now?
Well, I can't explain what I did to him, where and how

Everyone used to say that I looked like my mother. I was just as clever, just as beautiful, with the same sparkle in my eyes. We had the same blonde hair, the same laugh. One day, I was sure, I would do important work too, just like my mother. Maybe even work for the Union.

I smiled sadly at my reflection, trying to picture my mother’s face in my mind. I couldn’t see any resemblance between us anymore. I had dyed my hair brown so I would draw less attention to myself. My eyes were empty, and I couldn’t remember the last time I had truly laughed.

Still, I hoped my mother would be proud of me.

I heard a creak from the hallway and quickly wiped the tears from my cheeks. The door swung open with a squeak, and Lee walked in. Brown curls bounced around his head, and his tiny body was swallowed by a sweater that was far too big for him.

I tried, unsuccessfully, to smile. Luckily, Lee was far too caught up in his own problems to notice my sadness.

“Anah, Thomas took my toy car,” Lee complained, crossing his arms as he flopped down onto the bed.

“Have you asked him to give it back?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

My sadness curled up into a little corner of my mind.

Not now. Never.

I couldn’t let myself feel it.

Lee shook his head. “He won’t give it back.”

“You don’t know that if you don’t ask,” I said.

“I’m actually too scared to. Sorry, Anah.”

Lee’s eyebrows drooped with disappointment. I ruffled his dark, curly hair.

“No need to be sorry. How about we go ask him together?” I asked gently.

Lee shrugged, but the smile on his face told me that he actually liked the idea. I placed a hand on his back, almost as if I were his mother, and guided him towards the door.

Thomas wasn’t happy when Lee and I asked for the toy car.

“Um… no.”

He gave us a fake smile as he tossed the car into the air and caught it again.

“I could tell Martha or Sandy that you’ve been stealing toys from little kids again,” I said with a sly grin.

Thomas’s eyebrows pulled together.

“Snitch,” he muttered, just loud enough for me to hear.

Grumpily, he shoved the little red car, flames painted along its sides, into Lee’s small, clammy hand. Lee thanked him, but Thomas was already stomping away. His red hair bounced angrily around his ears, and his long arms swung at his sides.

Lee ran off to join his friends, driving the car across the long kitchen table, over the couch, through the kitchen, and making it jump over the faucet.

I put my hand on the doorknob, but glanced back one last time at Thomas, who was still slumped angrily on the couch.

How dare he? He was almost my age, yet he was stealing toys from a little kid.

A shiver of anger ran through me, and my hand began to glow with heat.

The doorknob turned red-hot beneath my fingers.

Shit.

I jerked my hand away and froze.

Had anyone seen me?

I looked around, half expecting to be handed over to the Union at any moment. The room was bursting with children, all of them seemingly absorbed in their own little worlds. A few boys were sprawled across the couches, Game Boys clutched tightly in their hands. Kids around Lee’s age were building a pillow fort, while a few girls sat at the picnic table reading a book.

I let out a relieved breath, my heart still pounding in my throat.

No one had seen.

I pulled the door open and ran down the hallway to my room. Once inside, I collapsed onto the bed and dug my nails into my skin until it turned red, leaving little half-moon marks behind.

I really had to stop letting things get to me so easily. Otherwise…

“No. Don’t think about it,” I whispered to myself, rubbing my temples.

But in that brief moment of hesitation, I had seen it again.

It felt as though the blood in my veins had frozen.

“Stop, Anah,” I begged myself, rubbing my temples even harder.

I jumped to my feet and began pacing.

I felt like a wild animal trapped in a cage. There was nowhere for me to go. I was stuck in this orphanage for at least another three years, but my entire life had been one long game of hide-and-seek.

The Union had finished counting to ten long ago.

They had been looking for me for years.

And all I could do was keep hiding.

I felt tears sting my eyes. My fingertips grew warm.

“Please, stop.”

I dug my nails into my palms and thought of my mother.

I had to stay strong.

I took a deep breath.

The only thing I could do was prepare myself for the day i had to face the Union

I lifted my pillow and pulled out the little notebook hidden underneath it. The leather cover was surprisingly cold beneath my fingers, yet somehow comforting and familiar.

I opened it.

The worn, yellowed pages greeted me like they did every day. In my mother’s handwriting, the greatest secrets of the Union were written down as casually as if they were notes from a school lesson.

I flipped through the notebook and stopped at a passage.

It was about a werewolf my mother had known well.

Dead.

Once again, I realized just how important it was that I never reveal myself.

I knew things about the Union that no other magical being knew. I knew how to destabilize it from the inside.

But if I were caught, I wouldn’t just die.

The Union could find my mother’s notebook.

And then…

The most important magical safe havens would be discovered within a week.

All those people would die.

Because of me.

This is a story I’ve been working on. I’m done with pt 1 (the first half, about 70 pages in journal front and back) and am moving it over to my notes app and editing it as I go.
I just need critiques,advice, and opinions plus maybe a little moral support if I can get it and chapter 1 isn’t complete crap.
Feel free to be harsh.

The Drunkard and the Frontier
By Pressy the button

Ch.1

There once was a drunkard who lived on the very edge of existence. At that edge was a rock that held the only signs of civilization for lightyears. From this boulder there was a forwards and a backwards that was easily distinguishable from one another. Due to the constant momentum of the pebble if one looked backward they’d see all of existence stretched out before them. Looking forward one would see the making of existence as electrons and protons gained their charges, atoms came together, and one would see the very fabric of reality being woven together in a fanciful show of lights and colors.
This rock was a magical place known as the Frontier. The Frontier was the place where stories that inspired the denizens of the next existence took place. It’s the place where the parables that laid the foundation for the next one happened.
The citizens of the Frontier came from all over time and space knowing this is the place of stories, and in stories anything was possible. Many had come hoping to be heroes in myths and tales not realizing most didn’t get to choose the part they played. Stories had many different characters and usually one to three heroes. Most also didn’t realize that with such a multitude of stories taking place one could easily be a hero of one story, yet a villian, side character, antagonist, protagonists, side character, and/or a background character in another’s story. There were only a few who realized while hopes, actions, and intentions could shape what character and what story you’re in. Those were usually discounted by the powers that shape and chose the stories.
The Drunkard had come to the Frontier from a time and place that he never felt he belonged. He was still a drunkard there, but it was harsher for a drunk. One was made feel less than because of their problem. Forced to feel as though they were out of place while still getting sold their addiction.
He couldn’t explain why he was a drunk when and then. Truth be told when he was asked the only answer he could give was “it made the time pass quicker.” That answer had never been to anyone’s satisfaction, not even his own. At the time when the drunkard had heard of the Frontier he was told it was the place where stories happen. He had thought to himself, “stories need a drunk.” It had made him think that maybe there was somewhere he wouldn’t feel out of place. Somewhere he wouldn’t feel like a waste of space. The thought had brought him so much comfort that he knew he had to go there.
He couldn’t tell you how he had arrived there. Upon waking up from a blackout he had just found himself there. For a while, he was happy feeling as though he had found the place he belong.
He spent his days in the Frontier’s bar drinking as he watched other characters pass through. There were some that came back to the bar, but most stories were bloody and filled with death fueled by the hopes and dreams of those on the Frontier. So many simply never returned. The Drunkard would sit at the bar drinking and trading stories with Tabitha, the keeper of tabs as he referred to her in his head. Tabitha spent her days running the bars and writing down the stories of the others on the Frontier.
One day, he had even found love out on the Frontier. She had accepted him for who he really was, and he had found that that was something he had always wanted but never realized. During that time of his life the drinking slowed, but never ceased. It slowed because he wanted time to last longer when he was with her.
Eventually, he learned the drunk wasn’t supposed to have happiness. He learned the drunkard was supposed to have tragic reason to drink. The Drunk should be a sad cautionary tale of how wrong one’s life could go whether by their own hands or another’s. He didn’t realize that after his wife died. No, it wasn’t until the second tragedy struck that he finally got the lesson being taught.
The Drunkard felt as though he belonged, but it was in a place that seemed to want to keep him miserable. Now he drank to keep away the happy memories that haunted him even in his sleep. He drank to go to sleep and he drank to wake up. He couldn’t tell you the day because they were all the same for him. How he told the time was by whether or not the bar was open. When the bar closed he’d stumble home with a bottle of something strong in hand. It was empty by the time he arrived and so he’d open another. That was his life for years or decades. He really didn’t know. He just continued on and on.
One day he had an idea. It was one that only the Drunkard could have. “If anything could happen in a story why do they have to be so bloody? If a story could be anything why did he have to be miserable?”
It was on that day, at least he thinks it was that day that he approached Tabitha with the suggestion of a drinking contest. Tabitha was always looking for some sort of entertainment for the bar so she needed very little convincing. All it took was the Drunk adding the stipulation that the loser pays both tabs. A sign was soon sitting in the bar’s window stating, “see if can out drink the Drunkard. All contenders welcome. Loser pays both tabs. If you want to wager more at least make it interesting.”
It started small and slow. Maybe a person new to the Frontier who didn’t know of the Drunkard’s reputation, or someone who did but felt confident in their drinking skills. All of those went the same way. Three or four drinks, five if they were experienced. Then the other contenders would either pass out, lose their confidence, or would simply be too drunk to continue. The Drunk would watch them with a little disappointment and just continue drinking. He would always remind the challenger afterwards to spread the word.
After some unspecified amount of time, people and other beings started coming to the Frontier specifically for the drinking contest. Some of them were just people looking for a challenge, others were just sure of themselves, and some were drunks just like him.
The first person who made an interesting wager was a cowboy. Who knows exactly when or where they were from with their handle bar mustache and a sidearm on their hip. They had sauntered up to the bar with click clack of their boots and the jingling of their spurs. With the spiral trends of fashion and the strangeness of their sidearm there wasn’t any telling when they arrived from.
The Cowboy once reaching Tabitha at the bar said to her in a gruff voice with a strange accent, “I’m here to outdrink whatever sorry sonofabitch you got here.” Tabitha, having seen it all in her time on the Frontier simply pointed him towards the Drunkard. The Drunk was at the end of the bar doing what he always did, pouring them down his gullet.
To the Cowboy this disheveled man in clothes the seemed to big for him looked like an easy win. Wearing a jacket that wasn’t buttoned right. Some were missing from the jacket, others the Drunk had just missed when he had buttoned up (whenever the hell that was), and others were just buttoned to the wrong ones. It was stained with old drinks, dirt from drunken falls, and some stains one just wouldn’t want to identify. He seemed to already be on the verge of passing out with the way he was slumped over his drinks. A bunch of empty bottles filled the spot to his left, and a half-filled bottle of something strong sat to his right. The Cowboy was filled with confidence at this sight.
He felt a bit sad for the drunk knowing this was all he had, and that the Cowboy was about to take it all from him. All it took was the Cowboy clearing his throat, “uh-ergh,” that was the sound he made to get the Drunkard’s attention. The Drunk simply eyed the cowboy and got up from his chair. Swaying and almost falling over as he made his way to a table that was set up to allow all in the bar to watch without having to move. He fell into the chair as though he couldn’t have walked any farther.
The Cowboy knew he could do this. After all, he was a gunslinger who shot straight even when he was seeing double. His breakfast was always followed with a few glasses of whiskey, and he kept that pace all day. He was used to drinking while robbing trains and other modes of transportation. So, how could he not be filled with confidence that he could out drink the pitiful creature in front of him while robbing it of the only thing it had.
The Cowboy had wanted a wager to make it interesting, but he had only decided it when he had seen the Drunk. Maybe it was pity at knowing he’d leave this creature without even a reputation to cling to. Maybe the Cowboy was hoping to scare the Drunkard into forfeiting. He couldn’t tell you as he sat his side arm on the table and he said, “if I win, I’m going to shoot you straight in the face. Right between the eyes,” it wasn’t a question, “and if you win you can do the same.”
Tabitha spoke before the Drunkard could slur his words. “Wagerin’ lives very interestin’ indeed, but there will be no shootin’ in my bar, ya hear! You do that outside. Now what do you say?” She asked the Drunkard.
“If he winsh he can shoot me dead. I’m good with that, but I wantsh something elshe from you, if-a I win you go on a wild wander for me,” he said pointing a dirty finger at the Cowboy, “ and a you tell everyone and everything about thish bar, thish contesht, and thish drunk who will out drink anyone and anything. How’sh that sound?” He questioned the Cowboy with half closed lids.
“Seems cheap for me, but hell I accept’”
With the terms laid out Tabitha brought out a large bottle of a proof that should be deadly. Setting two glasses down she then filled them with the precision of a machine. 2 centimeters from the top. So, if you spilled a drop it was your fault and not hers.
The Cowboy tried to fix the Drunkard with a steely gaze. He expected them to lock eyes like what would happen in his quickdraw duels, but as he did the Drunk was already pouring the poison down his gullet. The Cowboy was confuse for a moment as Tabitha poured the man another. He watched as the Drunkard struggled to wait for him to catch up. The old gunslinger not wanting to be outdone shot it back in the blink of an eye. The only effects of the first that he felt was the heat in his abdomen.
The moment his glass touched the table Tabitha was already pouring more into it as the Drunk was finishing his second.
“I’m not pourin’ you another one until he catches up,” Tabitha declared with authority to the Drunk.
“Oh Tabi pleash I swearsh I’ll be a patient. Tabi pleash he’sh jusht so slow…. Pleash.”
The Cowboy took offense to that and poured the second straight down his throat without even tasting it. “ Now you listen here,” the Cowboy exclaimed with a tone full of indignation, “I’ll keep up with ya I just thought that we’d at least make eye contact before you started drainin’ them!”
“No,” was the only reply he got from the Drunkard as Tabitha first poured the Cowboy a third as the Drunk watched greedily as he waited for Tabitha to fill his. Once both glasses were poured, it was a race to get to the bottom. “Clink” was followed by “clunk” as the Cowboy was just a bit slower than the Drunkard.
After the third one, the cowboy was starting to feel the alcohol. He didn’t know what he was drinking. He just knew that it was strong, and it was hitting him all at once as he felt his face heat up, and his eyes watered a bit. He felt himself sway in his chair. He knew if he spoke he would sound more like the Drunkard than himself. Once the fourth was poured though he shot it back as quickly as was possible for him in an attempt to out speed his opponent. Even with his small head start, it wasn’t enough. His “clunk” followed the alcoholic’s “clink.”

He felt his face heat not just from the alcohol, but also from anger at this thing in front of him. The alcohol didn’t seem like it had changed the Drunk’s disposition at all. The only change the Cowboy could see in his opponent was that he was slumped just a little bit more in his chair.
“Fuck am I drinking againsht a machine,” he let out in exasperation.
“Nah I’m all biological,” was the reply he got from the Drunkard who had been about to pour the fifth one down the blackhole he called a throat. Then, the Cowboy heard the dreaded “clink” of the Drunk’s glass being set on the table in the split second he had blinked. The Cowboy put the glass to his mouth. He hesitated as the cool glass rested upon his lips. The smell of it now was sickening to his nostrils. He wondered if his mustache and nose hair wear shriveling up and burning away. He quickly slung his head back. It went down easily enough. A river of fire down a dark cave landing in a churning lake of acid.
“Clunk,” his glass hit the table. As the Cowboy held his head up by a mat of his hair he heard the “swoosh” of the glasses being filled. By now he could only focus on the table and his glass. The dark patterns in the wood of the table looked as though they were dancing as he swayed with one eye open and the other closed.
A “clink” brought him back from the dance in the table. He was brought back to the contest he was participating in. He could feel all eyes were on him. Everyone in the bar was eagerly was eagerly awaiting for him to drink or fail. Or worse yet, to give up. He wasn’t going to give them that satisfaction though. No, he was a cowboy, a real gunslinger, a robber, a bounty hunter, a winner; no he would not give them that satisfaction! So he fixed the Drunkard with what he thought to be a look of determination. Then, he brought the glass to his lips.
The last thing he heard was the Drunk asking him a question he couldn’t quite make out. Next thing he knew he was being woken up by the Drunk.
“Hey-a. Hey-a it’sh the next day guy. You losht. You-a remember what ya said ya’d do? Pleashe get-a on with it.” The words pounded down on the Cowboy. It felt like a blade splitting open his head. They echoed around in the cavern of his skull and banged on his temples. He thought his head might explode from the worst hangover he had ever experienced. It was so bad he actually considered quitting drinking for a few minutes. Then, he came to his senses.
“Before I do anything I need a glass of whiskey and one of water.”
“Then-a you’ll go and do what-a you said you would?”
The cowboy pulled himself up to a standing position as he nodded. That was followed by him stumbling over to Tabitha.
“I need a whiskey and a water. Not in the same glass, little lady.”
“You need to settle your tab,” was the curt reply she gave as she poured him a whiskey followed by a water. She grabbed out one of the bottles that was the Drunkard’s drink of choice, and skid it down to the end of the bar that was the Drunk’s spot. It came to a stop as he fell into his chair. She then pulled out a thick leather bound book, and looked the Cowboy in the eyes as she asked him, “what’s your story?”
“What?”
“What’s ya story? That’s the cost of your tab,” she said dryly.
“What? Story? Whatcha mean by that,” he asked confusedly replacing the words once they left with whiskey.
“Tell me about ya life. What have ya done before and/or after ya arrived here?”
“I’ve done quite a bit before gettin’ here. Do you really have the time for?”
“ I have all the time I need. Don’t think ya gettin’ out of payin’ this tab. Those were some expensive drinks ya drank,” Tabitha spoke eyeing the old man like he might run. The Cowboy just sat on down and started at the beginning as Tabitha listened intently and took notes. She only ever stopped to pour drinks, but she never seemed to missed a beat or fall behind in her writing. It went on like that for some hours as the Cowboy told her everything that he had ever done. It just poured out of him like whiskey from a bottle.

cosmic trip

world ain't mine...

neither I wish it to be mine .

I wondered will I ever be able to caress myself ?

her body made up of scars mind restlessly pondering bout stars,

she's amort yet melodic...

maybe shooting star isn't enough to fill her thrust

her crave as massive as cosmos

immerser than blackhole,

her mind combating space for selfhood, while battling with stars

she wheezes stardust!

get high on nebula...

her eyes as divine as rings of Saturn;

desolate like Luna/moon

her eyes perpetually fond of constellation,

smile reflection of cluster of orb

her naevus personify constellation ,

as void haul her, towards itself

she opened her eyes ,

but pie in the sky isn't over yet

~Sneha Negi

Just sharing this here for a little inspo - because david mamet said it best - always be closing! Even writers!

https://brevity.wordpress.com/2026/10/13/the-writers-abcs/

And if you want to come to a Q&A tomorrow about selling work, read to the end of the essay -

She’d always cry hysterically after sex, beg me to forgive her for her breaking body, her frozen heart. I told her it was normal to feel that way. I was as pleased to meet her as i was to pleasure her, to let her into my heart. 
We met at a lake where it rained, but now it’s flooded over time, accrued into a marsh in the sea. 
She had always been a broken girl. When she was a kid, she’d count roadkill, masturbate to odd pornography. She peed the bed until she was much too old. She never fit in with her friends, her family. Or at least she thought so; in retrospect, she said, maybe it was all a manifestation of who she thought she was.
She was always apologizing. Felt guilty for everything she did, cried when she said too much and knew too little. Cut herself for the smallest mistakes.
She told me something everyone else knew, but i didn’t.
She told me she loved the moon, showed me how she’d keep the windows open to see it’s light.
“It’s strange,” she’d say, “I always thought night was flooded with the dark.”
But one day the windows were blown open, and she saw the moon’s light for the first time, or at least recognized it.
“I’d never felt so cared for.”
I asked her if I made her feel that way and she closed the window. We slept together in silence.
Our sex was rowdy, but she’d hit my pelvis harshly and apologize like I was a holy temple. She always treated my body like god. Always held me like i was an angel. I held hers like a corpse, frail as she was, handling her like glass with care. I think i held her too little.
She started slipping away from my grasp.
Skipped dinner.
Talked more with the moon than she did me.
Took too many pills.
“My hope is that one day, these’ll kill me,” she joked, and I looked at her gravely.
I saw her eyes bloom with the thought of being carried away by the universe. Taken between heaven and earth.
I always knew that the universe was one big thing, she always wanted to go outside of it.
Outside the limitations.
She was once bold and quaint and queer to those around her.
Adventurous, happy.
But then i got to know her, and I saw how her eyes weren’t blue, but unmistakably gray.
She left her dishes in the sink, half-full, whispering secrets to the moon. I sometimes heard her say my name, curse it.
I found a note in the closet. I hurried to our bedroom, found her alive, staring at the yellow popcorn ceiling. She refused to go outside.
“Here are the only stars I need,” she said, and threw up like a dog.
She was bedridden for months, frail. The doctors said she had deep-rooted hatred that infected her bones like a cancer. I pitied her, cradled her, made her chicken soup.
“Don’t act sad when i die.” she said, calloused.
I didn’t appreciate her enough at the time to be grateful for those words.
“Now, now,” I said, i wish i said anything else.
She had told me she was sick long ago, but I didn’t see it until her skin was yellow with it. The window panes once broke, and when she awoke, a bug had crawled from inside it into her mouth. She wasn’t mad, told me she felt that way too.
I asked her why, and she said she was simply unwanted, crawling between window panes and empty universes was the same. She told me she wanted to make like a wave, to recede into the sea. 
I asked her what she believed in.
She told me she believed she was as much universe as i was, and it made me mad. I couldn’t fathom the universe being the same thing as me, and me being anything like her. I resented that notion, resented the universe, i told her. She just sighed and let go of my hand.
Sometimes, I awoke to her crying in the night.
Little sobs like waves that’d retreat to her body when she’d fall asleep. I never said anything.
One day, she got what she wanted.
She died, sick with the sadness in her bones. Put herself out of her misery, shot herself a grand seven times.
I stand here, holding her ashes, gripping them like they are all i have.
We were never happy, i resent myself for trying.
Maybe someone else could have loved her.
I miss that woman, crying at the moon, swallowing tears like waves.
Maybe I was like her all along.

And oh the sound of you
Muffled by the new music i like listening to
Each stroke
And each feeling they provoke

So much pain yet so much satisfaction
Of knowing you’re back to cure the depression
I felt during the whole time
During the whole time you ceased to be mine

Yet for the whole duration of our time apart
I still picked at the skin you took from a part
Of my being
Hoping each piece will serve as a countdown until your next arriving

These blood droplets, coagulating while you create more,
The feeling of my cold pointer finger wiping them away like the sea on the shore,
Always seems to make my body warm up to my core.