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Resurrection

by LMJT 

Posted: 13 April 2011
Word Count: 500
Summary: Hello all, I've not been around for a while, so apologies for that. Hope you're all well. This is my entry for the resurrection challenge. Thanks.


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Anna sits on the bare mattress and watches her mother fuss with the chintz-style curtains.

She catches her father’s eye and he shakes his head. As usual, they are in silent agreement about Carole’s neuroses.

‘Leave it, Carole,’ Andrew says. ‘She can sort it out later.’

Carole ignores him and continues to puffle the curtains, the metal hoops clattering against the rail with increased frenzy.

A moment later, the curtains are pulled smoothly and the September sunshine is dammed.

‘There we are,’ Carole says, opening and closing the curtains with newfound ease. ‘That’s better, isn’t it?’

Anna nods obligingly. ‘Great,’ she says. ‘Thanks Mum.’

Her mother’s eyes scan the room and Anna knows that she is desperate to see something – anything - that will keep here, that will keep her useful.

Andrew glances at his watch. ‘We should be getting back,’ he says.

‘For God’s sake, Andrew,’ Carole says. ‘We’ve only just got here.’

She opens a holdall of Anna’s clothes and Anna purses her lips. At this tipping point of independence, she wants nothing more than to be left alone; to unpack her belongings in this new room in this new building with its prospectus promises of the best days of her life.

She knows well enough, though, that even suggesting solitude would incite one of her mother’s martyr-like monologues; one that would mark every misdemeanour in Anna’s eighteen years, rise in volume and severity and climax with a slammed door or slapped face. Such a performance is bad enough in private, let alone in public.

As she joins her mother hanging clothes in the wardrobe, Anna overhears her father talking to another family in the corridor.

When they all laugh loudly, Carole says, ‘Why can’t he leave people alone? Tell him to get in here and make himself useful.’

‘It’s fine, Mum,’ Anna says quickly and without thinking. ‘He’s only talking.’

Carole’s expression darkens at once and Anna feels her own face flush red.

‘Fine,’ Carole says, snatching up her handbag from the desk by the window.

She strides out of the room and cuts Andrew’s anecdote dead with, ‘Come on. We’re going.’

In the car park, Anna embraces her father while her mother leans against the halls of residence smoking her second cigarette in five minutes.

When Andrew starts the engine, Carole passes Anna without a word and steps into the passenger seat.

Across the car park, twin girls cheerily wave goodbye to their parents who clamber into an old camper van and Anna feels a swell of rage towards her mother for ruining this day.

As Carole winds down the window, words Anna’s never been brave enough to say balance on the tip of her tongue.
Her heart races as she ducks down, but, as she opens her mouth, she sees tears blur in her mother’s eyes. The sight is at once satisfying and unsettling.

In a voice so quiet that the words are almost lost in the breeze, Carole says, ‘Take care, won’t you?’






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Comments by other Members



Manusha at 22:48 on 13 April 2011  Report this post
When I got to the word puffle, I smiled. I had to look it up online straightaway to see if it was a new word, I hoped it was because I liked it. I then realised where I’d heard it – from my kids, because all I got was references to the virtual pets called ‘Puffles’. But here its use is as a verb not a noun, so it’s in. Resurrection is here too because it’s a new life at college.

I must be getting a bit slow, because I didn’t really get the ending until a second read. When I did though, it really struck me. Despite her mental health her mother really does care – she just finds it hard to show it. It hits home to Anna too. A touching ending.

My main niggle-pick, and what I felt that caused the lack of clarity, is with the use of the names of Anna’s parents. When I read it again, translating Andrew into father and Carole into mother, I could make better sense of it. If this is from Anna’s POV shouldn’t we be seeing the characters according to her vision? Otherwise it feels like were viewing this from the POV of a fourth person in the room. Anna would look at her mother and think ‘Mother’ not Carole, so we as the reader should hear Carole referred to as Mother also. Likewise with Andrew, I kept thinking that Andrew and her father were different people. Surely Andrew is ‘Father’ to her?

E.g.

‘Leave it, Carole,’ her father says, ‘She can sort it out later.’

‘There we are,’ her mother says, opening and closing the curtains with newfound ease.


As Carole winds down the window, words Anna’s never been brave enough to say balance on the tip of her tongue.

You need ‘that’ between ‘words’ and ‘Anna’s never been brave enough, etc.’

As far as I understand it, it’s because ‘words’ here is a subordinating clause; it needs an explanation to complete it. ‘Anna’s never been brave enough to say balance on the tip of her tongue’ is the main clause that completes the idea, but the two need a subordinating conjunction like ‘that’ to link them together.

words that Anna’s never been brave enough to say balance on the tip of her tongue.

I sometimes worry about commenting so closely on someone’s work, because it can seem so, well, critical. But I do find that when I spend the time to really look at it, I end up seeing and feeling the story far more than I ever would have done with just a normal read. So thanks very much for your thoughtful story, Liam. ;

Regards, Andy


V`yonne at 23:47 on 13 April 2011  Report this post
Well that's a nicely drawn oiece with real tensions and lots at stake. The characters are complex for so short a piece and that's good. I felt as if there wqas lots of back story and they seemed real. I thought the present tense worked well here too.

tusker at 07:11 on 14 April 2011  Report this post
Nice to see you back, Liam.

I enjoyed this story. Great characters. Neurotic, fussing mother unable to show true feelings, and the quiet, patient father who will never please his wife.

Immediately, I could see the couple and the scene portrayed. That last sad line was a telling moment in Carole's family life.

Jennifer

LMJT at 22:57 on 14 April 2011  Report this post
Hello all and thanks so much for reading and commenting.

Andy - Thanks for your insightful comments. I really appreciate the time you've taken to feedback so constuctively.

You're quite right about the parents names. I'd been wondering about what to do about that as I wrote the piece and, now you've pointed it out, I can see that it doesn't work so well in Anna's POV. As you say, we should see them as Mum and Dad as we're watching them through Anna's eyes. I'll rewrite soon.

You're right, too, about the missing 'that', so thanks for such a thorough read!

Oonah - Thank you for your comments. I'm pleased the characters seem complex. This is a piece of work I really enjoyed and am thinking of expanding, so it's good to hear the characters and the scene work well.

Jennifer - Thanks. Again, it's good to hear that the characters work. I was woried the mother would dominate the scene, but it seems to work well.

Thanks all, all of you.

Liam

Little_Miss_B at 00:13 on 15 April 2011  Report this post
Hi,
I'm new here, so please excuse the intrusion. I really enjoyed this piece. I especially liked the phrase "with its prospectus promises of the best days of her life"
Just one tiny niggle- should "that will keep here" read "that will keep her here" ?
A x

Manusha at 09:28 on 15 April 2011  Report this post
Welcome aboard, Little Miss B.

Regards, Andy

Forbes at 02:07 on 16 April 2011  Report this post
Nice piece Liam.

Such tension and back story in so small a flash. I have a problem with so many small paragraphs, I'd bulk them together a bit more - but that's just me! The MC's ambiguity regarding her mother comes a cross clearly, and her sympathy (maybe undeserved?) for her father too.

I really liked this.

Avis


Desormais at 06:50 on 16 April 2011  Report this post
This was great, and I felt I wanted to read so much more about this threesome. Loved the word 'puffle'. Welcome back, good to read your work again.
Sandra

crowspark at 10:13 on 16 April 2011  Report this post
Welcome back, Liam.
I really like this flash which feels very authentic and is a moving read.
Loved, "prospectus promises".
Really well written.
My only suggestion, if you are going to keep it short, would be to drop a stronger hint than "September sunshine" (neat!) much earlier to orient the reader to the uni situation.
Thanks for the read.
Bill

Prospero at 08:10 on 17 April 2011  Report this post
Very fine, Liam, very fine. This is a well drawn and crafted piece of writing.

Best

Prosp


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