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:iconcjwilde:
Firstly, I enjoyed reading this. It's certainly a great idea for a fiction piece. The scene is structured well, the dialogue is fast-paced and interesting and I liked your use of the cliffhanger. I always say that every flash fiction piece or short story (I was unsure on what to think of this as, and settled on flash fiction because of the brevity) should end on an unexpected twist, or spin. Although the vision was at first mundane, as her intentions seemed relatively clear, her story built up to the ending well and left me wanting to read more. :aww:

As this is a critique, and you are a friend, I am going to be ruthless and hope that you take more from it than if I was to be a kind stranger! I will begin with your grammar; after reading your writing and studying your progression, I have to note that storytelling and orthography are your strong points, but there is a chink in your armour when it comes to sentence structure. Here, I noticed a few mistakes. In the first paragraph, your sentences were long-winded and there was a flood of commas; I felt it would have read more cleanly if you had chopped up her description.

In the third paragraph, a particular comma stood out where there should have been a period after "Come in, come in," as the continuation describes the man's actions independent of his dialogue. Further on, when he asks Carly to open up to him - "Carly, please just open up to me." - this sentence, I felt, needed to be emphasised to set the scene of the conversation, and so to pace it correctly a period may have also done better than a comma after 'Carly'.

Then in the eleventh paragraph, I noticed a misuse of a semi-colon. In the sentence, "...she was red in the face; from effort and embarrassment, and took a big gulp of her lemonade..." should have read, "...she was red in the face from effort and embarrassment; she took a big gulp of her lemonade..." or, of course, you could remove it altogether and swap for another period to break up the paragraph a little (I read it back and both sound good). It's your call! Finally, like the 'come in, come in' comma incident, there should also be a period rather than a comma after the man says, "One thing I must insist is on this contract," for the same reason as before.

With regards to the story, again, I enjoyed the build-up and was gripped by the twist. Are they about to have sex, or will she merely give him a cup to masturbate into? I like how you have left this completely open-ended. I might have liked a little more tension in the atmosphere to compliment the climax, however, such as more descriptive body language or more insight into what she was thinking, or feeling.

Otherwise, this is a great piece and I'm enjoying reading your 'short story a day' efforts. Keep up the great work. :huggle:
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:iconaimeeraindrop:
=AimeeRaindrop Apr 24, 2012  Professional Writer
Thank you ever so much for this critique! :) I'm really glad to have some advice and I will definitely be revisiting this piece with your advice in mind!

And I'm glad to hear you are enjoying my short story a day challenge. It's tough but I'm enjoying doing it! And I'm so glad I've got back in my writing groove ;)

Once again - thanks so much :heart: :glomp:
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:iconcjwilde:
~CJWilde Apr 24, 2012  Student Writer
It was my pleasure! Keep up the good work. :huggle:
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