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I can't remember to forget you
Sometimes when I look at Matthew's eyes in the right light, they are almost blue.
Just when the light from the window comes right on his face, late in morning, during Greek literature classes. His eyes would wander and I'll catch a glimpse of yours. All the things that your eyes once promised, I see in his too.
Your eyes were always that shade, until the last moment on your deathbed. You opened them one last time, asked me to call for your daughter, but you couldn't finish your words: you just stared at me, for a while. Did you recognize me? In those last moments, before I closed your eyes and called your family, were you aware that it was me, back to see you one last time?
Wendy suspected nothing: she was barely two years old when I bode you farewell, from a train window to another. She couldn't possibly recognize me when she hired me as your nurse.
I remember your hand stopping just shy of the emergency brake. You had always been the wise one: I'm sure you regretted nothing.
Matthew has graduated, he's taking a sabbatical before going to University. He would like to see Italy, like you did, and then Eastern Europe which he has read so much about. Long lost Kingdoms that just returned to Europe after centuries under the Ottomans. He was so kind as to bring a corsage to all his lady teachers, and mine had a pink rosebud. I feared that he might turn more like his father, but somehow you left an imprint on him. All those afternoons spent in his grandfather's library allowed your lingering presence to mold him.
He says that he will come tell me everything when he'll be back. I smile, and tell him that they always tell that, and they never do, but I don't mind: he's a man now. He's not offended, his smile just turns broader as he waves goodbye.
I was not calling him a liar, it's just that in a year's time, Professor Gwendolyne will have died in an accident, and another woman, vaguely similar, will appear in his life. I have been building her identity for the past ten years, so I could spend some time by his side. Maybe this time things will turn out better.
Matthew has died in Flanders fields He dreamed of going to help overrun Serbia, but he died just by the other side of the Channel.
They brought his body back, and now he lies by your side, in what should have been Wendy's place.
Somebody might ask why Professor Gwendolyne shadow is by your grave, why is she crying over your headstone while poppies blow. They might carry for years the memory of that ghost, but sooner or later they will forget, like they always do.
Matthew's student friend was never born, and she's already dead. I will go see the rising of a new China, trying to forget you, like I never do.
Just when the light from the window comes right on his face, late in morning, during Greek literature classes. His eyes would wander and I'll catch a glimpse of yours. All the things that your eyes once promised, I see in his too.
Your eyes were always that shade, until the last moment on your deathbed. You opened them one last time, asked me to call for your daughter, but you couldn't finish your words: you just stared at me, for a while. Did you recognize me? In those last moments, before I closed your eyes and called your family, were you aware that it was me, back to see you one last time?
Wendy suspected nothing: she was barely two years old when I bode you farewell, from a train window to another. She couldn't possibly recognize me when she hired me as your nurse.
I remember your hand stopping just shy of the emergency brake. You had always been the wise one: I'm sure you regretted nothing.
Matthew has graduated, he's taking a sabbatical before going to University. He would like to see Italy, like you did, and then Eastern Europe which he has read so much about. Long lost Kingdoms that just returned to Europe after centuries under the Ottomans. He was so kind as to bring a corsage to all his lady teachers, and mine had a pink rosebud. I feared that he might turn more like his father, but somehow you left an imprint on him. All those afternoons spent in his grandfather's library allowed your lingering presence to mold him.
He says that he will come tell me everything when he'll be back. I smile, and tell him that they always tell that, and they never do, but I don't mind: he's a man now. He's not offended, his smile just turns broader as he waves goodbye.
I was not calling him a liar, it's just that in a year's time, Professor Gwendolyne will have died in an accident, and another woman, vaguely similar, will appear in his life. I have been building her identity for the past ten years, so I could spend some time by his side. Maybe this time things will turn out better.
Matthew has died in Flanders fields He dreamed of going to help overrun Serbia, but he died just by the other side of the Channel.
They brought his body back, and now he lies by your side, in what should have been Wendy's place.
Somebody might ask why Professor Gwendolyne shadow is by your grave, why is she crying over your headstone while poppies blow. They might carry for years the memory of that ghost, but sooner or later they will forget, like they always do.
Matthew's student friend was never born, and she's already dead. I will go see the rising of a new China, trying to forget you, like I never do.
First, a few technical details I cannot ignore:
I'm not sure whether all of this is correct, but here is is what I understand is going on. The story is set during World War 1. The female narrator, on the side of the allies (quite possibly US or Canadian), has secretly followed someone close to her, and later follows that person's son Matthew, into war. She does that to remain close to him, assuming fake identities (e.g. that of Professor Gwendolyne). Also mentioned is Wendy, Matthew's sister, who is a military nurse. At first I thought these people are the narrator's husband and children, but it seems improbable since Matthew only seems to know her as his teacher and Wendy does not recognise her at all. Maybe she is the father's former lover.
The biggest problem I see with the story is how hard it is to understand. To be fair, hermeticism in not necessarily a bad thing, and in fact it's the story's biggest upside as well, as it demands the reader to look deeper. I just don't enjoy stories that require research and analyzing every paragraph multiple times in order to be remotely understood. To be frank, this was quite confusing and frustrating to me, and I think it would be a better story if it were clearer.
Other than that I cannot find much to comment on. The last paragraph is a promise that the narrator will never succeed in the task of forgetting. It means the conflict is not resolved, but I wouldn't criticize that as it makes sense and fits the tone of the story.
His eyes would wander and I'll catch a glimpse of yours.You're in present tense though, so it's, "His eyes wander and I catch a glimpse of yours."
it's just that in a year's time, Professor GwendolyneMissing comma.
Matthew has died in Flanders fieldsMissing period, also past tense would be preferable.
Professor Gwendolyne shadowDo you mean, "Professor Gwendolyne's shadow?"
I'm not sure whether all of this is correct, but here is is what I understand is going on. The story is set during World War 1. The female narrator, on the side of the allies (quite possibly US or Canadian), has secretly followed someone close to her, and later follows that person's son Matthew, into war. She does that to remain close to him, assuming fake identities (e.g. that of Professor Gwendolyne). Also mentioned is Wendy, Matthew's sister, who is a military nurse. At first I thought these people are the narrator's husband and children, but it seems improbable since Matthew only seems to know her as his teacher and Wendy does not recognise her at all. Maybe she is the father's former lover.
The biggest problem I see with the story is how hard it is to understand. To be fair, hermeticism in not necessarily a bad thing, and in fact it's the story's biggest upside as well, as it demands the reader to look deeper. I just don't enjoy stories that require research and analyzing every paragraph multiple times in order to be remotely understood. To be frank, this was quite confusing and frustrating to me, and I think it would be a better story if it were clearer.
Other than that I cannot find much to comment on. The last paragraph is a promise that the narrator will never succeed in the task of forgetting. It means the conflict is not resolved, but I wouldn't criticize that as it makes sense and fits the tone of the story.
Nice spin of the classical tale of an immortal loving mortals and interweaving her history with that of a family.
I liked that most of the story was told through implications, it matched quite well the narrative framework you used.
I am aware of the tyranny of the word count, but a couple of sentence that hinted a bit more about the relationship of the narrator with the lover on whose grave she speaks would have been nice.
All in all well written with enough subtlety to be wistful and not at all obnoxious (a risk in this kind of stories). It didn't blow me away but it was a pleasant read.
I liked that most of the story was told through implications, it matched quite well the narrative framework you used.
I am aware of the tyranny of the word count, but a couple of sentence that hinted a bit more about the relationship of the narrator with the lover on whose grave she speaks would have been nice.
All in all well written with enough subtlety to be wistful and not at all obnoxious (a risk in this kind of stories). It didn't blow me away but it was a pleasant read.
This story might be too subtle for its own good. I think >>Orbiting_kettle's interpretation is probably correct, but I don't think I would have been able to figure it out on my own. But even after reading Kettle's explanation, a lot of the story is still confusing to me when I read it again.
Aside from the problems that >>Leo pointed out, the writing is pretty good, and I think you had a good idea in mind, but the story didn't quite live up to it.
And as a final note/reminder, you might want to take a look at the Writeoff style guide. This isn't something I'm going to dock you for, but it was a bit distracting to have this story formatted differently from all the other stories, and you don't want to ruin your anonymity in the future by formatting your stories differently. (Going against the style guide occasionally for artistic reasons (like "One Day I Shall See a Bird" seems to have done) is perfectly fine, but that doesn't appear to have been your intent here.)
Aside from the problems that >>Leo pointed out, the writing is pretty good, and I think you had a good idea in mind, but the story didn't quite live up to it.
And as a final note/reminder, you might want to take a look at the Writeoff style guide. This isn't something I'm going to dock you for, but it was a bit distracting to have this story formatted differently from all the other stories, and you don't want to ruin your anonymity in the future by formatting your stories differently. (Going against the style guide occasionally for artistic reasons (like "One Day I Shall See a Bird" seems to have done) is perfectly fine, but that doesn't appear to have been your intent here.)
...hmmm. If I hadn't glimpsed Kettle's post about it being an immortal, I honestly don't know what I'd have thought of this story.
That first paragraph especially was hard to grasp. Something about the comma-laden construction of the second line had me re-reading it three or four times to grasp which parts were important.
The inclusion of Flanders fields in the end was an interesting choice; that's a powerful poem, and even by association I felt it added something to the story. I don't know if what I got from it was exactly what you were intending, though... I'm half-expecting your mysterious narrator to start up some sort of vendetta now. :P
If this is, in fact, intended to be the chronicle of an immortal dealing with a family-line, I think your biggest weakness (and one reason I wouldn't have necessarily guessed that myself) is a lack of strong familial identifiers; I think you might have been better off injecting clear genealogical words like 'father, grandfather, son, daughter' as much as possible, in order to give a clear sense of when things were happening, and how each character related to the others. The focus on the nebulous 'you' makes some of this hard to puzzle out from context, and is a big part of why I'm not sure I would have guessed at this being an immortals story... although the 'ten years building' might have tipped me that direction anyways.
Interesting overall, but with a somewhat inscrutable narrative.
That first paragraph especially was hard to grasp. Something about the comma-laden construction of the second line had me re-reading it three or four times to grasp which parts were important.
The inclusion of Flanders fields in the end was an interesting choice; that's a powerful poem, and even by association I felt it added something to the story. I don't know if what I got from it was exactly what you were intending, though... I'm half-expecting your mysterious narrator to start up some sort of vendetta now. :P
If this is, in fact, intended to be the chronicle of an immortal dealing with a family-line, I think your biggest weakness (and one reason I wouldn't have necessarily guessed that myself) is a lack of strong familial identifiers; I think you might have been better off injecting clear genealogical words like 'father, grandfather, son, daughter' as much as possible, in order to give a clear sense of when things were happening, and how each character related to the others. The focus on the nebulous 'you' makes some of this hard to puzzle out from context, and is a big part of why I'm not sure I would have guessed at this being an immortals story... although the 'ten years building' might have tipped me that direction anyways.
Interesting overall, but with a somewhat inscrutable narrative.
Thank you for your feedback.
I am not completely sure what would be the deviations from the formatting guide. I've read them and tried to follow them, but it was my first time. Could you be more specific?
I agree that it is quite rough, thanks for signaling some actual errors. I cranked it out in 45 minutes because the friend that read Sgt. Ripper told me that it was very similar in style to another thing that I gave him to read. So I thought: "can I do something completely different?" and dusted one of the ideas that I had discarded.
Your intuition was correct: the protagonist is immortal, fell in love with someone in the late XIX century, he chose to form a family, she was hired as a nurse when he was old and senile, and then she starts stalking his grandson, his daughter's son. Then he dies in WWI.
Initially the protagonist was male and somehow inspired in Peter Pan's story, then i flipped both the sexes and the perspective (from the stalked to the stalker)
I am not completely sure what would be the deviations from the formatting guide. I've read them and tried to follow them, but it was my first time. Could you be more specific?
I agree that it is quite rough, thanks for signaling some actual errors. I cranked it out in 45 minutes because the friend that read Sgt. Ripper told me that it was very similar in style to another thing that I gave him to read. So I thought: "can I do something completely different?" and dusted one of the ideas that I had discarded.
Your intuition was correct: the protagonist is immortal, fell in love with someone in the late XIX century, he chose to form a family, she was hired as a nurse when he was old and senile, and then she starts stalking his grandson, his daughter's son. Then he dies in WWI.
Initially the protagonist was male and somehow inspired in Peter Pan's story, then i flipped both the sexes and the perspective (from the stalked to the stalker)
>>Peldrigal
I think that my comment about the formatting guide was referring to the breaks between paragraphs, or rather, the lack of them in several cases. Like I said, it's not a huge deal, and the biggest reason to worry about it is to maintain anonymity. For example, I notice that you did the same thing in Sgt. Ripper, though I think I was too distracted by the story to notice it. But if I had noticed it, I probably would have guessed that both were written by the same author. Since this was your first time here, I wouldn't have known it was you specifically, but if you do the same thing next time, it will be a dead giveaway to anyone who notices.
I think that my comment about the formatting guide was referring to the breaks between paragraphs, or rather, the lack of them in several cases. Like I said, it's not a huge deal, and the biggest reason to worry about it is to maintain anonymity. For example, I notice that you did the same thing in Sgt. Ripper, though I think I was too distracted by the story to notice it. But if I had noticed it, I probably would have guessed that both were written by the same author. Since this was your first time here, I wouldn't have known it was you specifically, but if you do the same thing next time, it will be a dead giveaway to anyone who notices.