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Look, I Just Want My Sandwich · Original Minific ·
Organised by RogerDodger
Word limit 400–750
Show rules for this event
...
KRYSTAL


7:08am




yo

Hey girl


7:21am



yo?

Seriously Dave, you’re starting with yo?


Oh good, you are there

Look I’m coming over before work. I need to get some stuff.


Stuff?!?

Are you kidding, Dave?

This isn’t how things work. You can’t just storm out in the middle of the night and breeze back to pick up your old shirts!


Not after my shirts.


Urgh, don’t be dense.

You always do this.

Just tell me what you want for once.

Please, baby...


8:01am



I’m outside.

You in?

Krystal

Come on

Open the damn door!


9:21am



I hate talking to you when you’re angry.

You know that don’t you?

We’re supposed to be partners, but you always did prefer to solve your problems with force.

You didn’t have to hammer on the door. I the neighbours must think terribly of us now.

I don’t suppose you care.


12:41pm



I’m coming back after work. Open the door this time.


Say please ;)


>:(

Can you take this seriously?


I am taking this seriously. I’m taking this very seriously. It’s you that doesn’t seem to understand what’s going on.

You broke up with me, buster. That means you get the traditional box of your crap on the curb when I feel like it. If I feel like it.


I’ll be over at four


Urgh, come on, Dave. Don’t be like that. It's a joke. You remember when we used to tell jokes? We were always laughing.


You were always laughing


... I. Look, Dave I know we’ve hit a rough patch, but couples are more than their arguments, right?

Right?

Come on, answer me! You want your shirts back or what?


I’ll be over at four


Urgh... you’re going to make me apologize, aren’t you?

You know how I feel about that.

We’re supposed to be living in the future, not the past.

...

Man, that makes me sound like a bitch, doesn’t it?

Look, would it help if I said I was sorry?


2:29pm



no


2:54pm



No? No! Dave you don’t just get to give a one word answer.


3:01pm



Say something.


3:03pm



Come on, you bastard!

Answer!


3:06pm



This isn’t fair. I’m trying to bare my soul here!


3:11pm



I’m not going to yell at an empty room.


4:23pm



Open up.


You know I’m not going to.

If I let you in, you leave and never come back.

I’m not letting that happen.


It’s my house too. You can’t keep me out forever


Sure I can. I can stay in here for weeks. You know me, Dave, I’m stubborn.


I’m not playing this game with you. I know you can hear me


Yeah, I can. But this is the only way to make you listen. You just yell and scream and then disappear off with your friends for days at a time.

And this time you won’t come back.

Please... just give us a chance.


what was his name?


... You don’t want to ask that, Dave.


don’t tell me what to do. WHAT WAS HIS NAME!?


Please, don’t.


You fucked him at my FUCKING sister’s wedding! WHAT WAS HIS NAME!


It doesn’t matter! Don’t you understand? It doesn’t matter because I came back home with you!

It was just a bit of fun.

I never meant to hurt you


You never meant me to find out

Krystal. It’s over, let me grab my stuff and leave.


ARGH! What is so important to you in this crappy apartment that isn’t me?

I’m offering you a chance to take it all back.

To put everything right and you just want to walk away?


you could apologise


Then let us just talk. Please! If you don’t want to talk why are you even here?!?


I left a sandwich from the wedding in the fridge


A sandwich! You want your sandwich back and not me!?! Are you insane?

Well you’re not getting it! I already ate your stupid sandwich!

Now please, give me a chance? We can work through everything if we just try.

Please, Dave.


4:44pm



Dave, I can’t hear you any more. Does that mean you want to talk?

Please, it shouldn’t end like this.


4:49pm



Don’t let it end like this.


8:59pm



Dave, I’m

...
« Prev   27   Next »
#1 ·
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Interesting medium, using the line breaks and the block quotes with left and right justifications to convey a back and forth text-message style.

You captured a failing relationship pretty well.
#2 ·
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Interesting stylistic choice, and I have to echo the previous comment, it captures quite well an ending relationship. The formatting was a clever way to capture the message exchange.

And here's my only serious criticism. While Dave had a pretty solid and consistent characterization, I feel that Krystal's line lack personality. Her writing style seems to change slightly, she uses complete sentences and seems always pretty calm when writing, without any of the small typos or wrong words one expects. Her lines are almost too clean and really don't tell us much about her. Nothing an edit couldn't solve anyway.

Nice job.
#3 ·
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This sort of experimental thing is one reason minifics are interesting. Perhaps one reason I'm bad at minifics is because I'm bad at experimental?

Hmm.

Anyways, both these characters are sorta jerks, honestly. Their relationships falls apart (more) and... I don't really care that much.

Not bad, but I'm not seeing a whole lot here, either. Still, the format was interesting.
#4 ·
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The interesting presentation elevates this from being mere relationship drama. Still, that's what the story is at it's core.

Now, I love stories where relationships are put through the grinder, but there has to be a feeling of what has been lost for the audience to care, a notion of how good things used to be to serve as a contrast to how bad they are now.

It wouldn't take much, either. You could have included a short exchange of them before the wedding to show how happy they were, then no talking forma a few days, them boom! Heated talks and pleas that fall con deaf ears.

As it is right now, I feel it's a very powerful piece that burns too quickly.
#5 ·
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Well, you win "least googleable title" for sure. :-) Almost as bad as that band named "The The" (though still less egotistical than the band who named themselves "The Band".) I joke, but it's actually an issue for the story. As soon as I saw it was a texting-format story, the title gave away the ending. As such, we knew there'd be no resolution, and we (the readers) would be left hanging mid-conversation.

The second issue I have is just that... we're left hanging without a resolution. Before that, we're given some very strong emotions, and realistic views of a relationship falling apart. It's shown well, especially considering the format, but that's the problem. It's exactly what we expect it to look like. There's nothing to take away from the story... no "lesson learned," no new perspective on things. I have to ask "What's the message?" and find I can't give an answer beyond "don't cheat on your SO", which is already kind of known wisdom.

Lastly... sandwich? If it wasn't for the prompt, the way he states that as the thing he wants from the house would seem ridiculous, and as such, needs to be explained. But it's not really, so it feels forced in.

tl;dr Good use of a format I (typically) dislike, but needs a resolution.
#6 ·
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This is hardly interesting besides the formatting effort. Which is, however, quite a clever move, since it dispenses you from writing. I mean, there's a plot, but no real style or even sentence. The story comes across as very choppy, which is inevitable given the choice you made. It also smacks of teenage or very young adulthood, and that doesn't help in building a sense of strong drama. I mean, it seems what you describe is just a (lackadaisical) breakup between two 20 year old or so lovers.

At that, I'd say it's not very original. I'm sure I've read almost the same story in a former WriteOff. Can't remember exactly which one though.

So while it's not bad, it's not a whopper either.
#7 ·
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Sorry, Author, but I'm not sure I have anything to add here that hasn't already been said already. The formatting and style is decent, but the conflict didn't feel very alive to me, and I'm not sure that the content did a good enough job of rounding out these characters enough for me to care what happens to them and their relationship. As a short piece I'm not sure it works for me, but as a scene in a larger narrative it would probably fair much better.

Thanks for sharing your work.
#8 ·
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Good lord....I don't have much to even go about from here thanks to the format alone. Um....So it was a read. Um....enjoyable....that would be adding too much sugar on top of it. I didn't enjoy it. In fact the sandwich part came in and I groaned out loud in real life. Um...so it's a not a story. It's a wall of texting. Angry texting about a broken up relationship that could have been explored through a good story plot even. Um, I don't know what to do at this point besides stick to what I've been doing.

NEGATIVES
Story?-It just didn't feel like a story at all. You're given lines from the characters that hint at certain actions and events taking place without much of an explanation to them.

Tension-The fact that this story hits you hard with a struggle from the get go makes it feel old real fast. The way the story never seems to break off from it's usual conflict of "he said, she said" moments. I see enough of this in real life to be entertained by it. So it was actually saddening.

POSITIVES
Topic-The Sandwich part of the story came out as a line to smite the other character and that's all we really get from the topic you were handed to write about.

Variety-Loved the fact you took a spin on a different angle here. Not giving us a normal story but something else to enjoy. The fact that's it's not a story in itself is what's really hurting it, but still a fun read nonetheless.

This piece reminded me of a game. A simple series of "let''s play" videos on Youtube already spoiled the ending for me on this Though the purpose of the game being played through nothing but a series of texting and typing in answers made way for opening up thought process into the whole equation. Yes it was a good effort but we alreayd know the ending to deal with some sandwich and someone just getting even angrier. What's even worse is that the story seems to falling deeper into that angry to the point where it becomes cringe-like to it's onlookers/witnesses. I wanna say it's a good try and a lovely piece but it just fell far from the points I'm looking at towards my own voting list.
#9 ·
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Interesting style. Interesting prose. Overall, enjoyed the narration.
#10 ·
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I just realized this didn't make finals, and I'm sorry to see it washed out. It was fifth on my prelim slate.