forum Writing Competition!
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tune
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@AmmyPajammy

When using the prompts, does the exact sentence as written have to be used? For example, if I were to use "What [the hell] is that thing?" instead of "What in the world is that thing?" would it still count?

@AmmyPajammy

Also, I'm almost exclusively a fanfiction writer, and although I've been bobbing and weaving around any reference to that fact with everything that I've written for this site so far, I feel like my work has become a bit generic for it. Would I be penalized for making obvious references to the fact that my entry is fanfiction?

Deleted user

No, it doesn't have to be the exact same sentence, Ammy, but I have to be able to tell that it's at least pretty close. Athlete, isn't there a place for plot generating on this site?

red

Oh umm I have a question since I'm new to this stuff. So um how do you post your entry? Cause I'm not used to this sort of thing and stuff

Deleted user

Copy the entire thing and just paste it here. If you try to do it by sharing a Google Doc, it messes up the entire chat and nobody will be able to get on it.

@TryToDoItWrite

Heyo, I know this is a lot more to ask of the judges, but can yall give us a critique on each entry so that we can understand why who won won and help us grow as writers? I'm writing something totally out of my normal genre to stretch myself, and i'd love some feedback :))

Deleted user

For this contest? I'd be glad to give my own personal criticism.

@TryToDoItWrite

Yay! I'd love it! Honestly, I finished my story, and I'm ready to post it. I probably won't get a chance to later so I'll do it now.

M.M.L

Soo I have a short story and it goes over 500 words. I have a point that I can cut it off at but it's still in the 700s. Is that ok? If I don't use the cut off it's in the thousands.

Deleted user

Any stories are fine as long as they're in the limit!

@TryToDoItWrite

To heck with it!!! I'm posting now so i don't forget.
This is called: Hopeless Romantic. It's a romance…i don't write romance…send help…(its about 1.8k)

“A good story is first and foremost a beginning and an ending. Your beginning must set the tone. Give the reader something to hope for, something to care about.”

I scribbled the professor’s words down, not wanting to miss a sentence. The fifty other college students in the room were doing the same—well, almost all of the fifty.
He sat in the row in front of me, kissing some girl. They were going at it rather passionately for a brand new couple. He’d been with a different girl only days before.
I tried to concentrate on the lesson but, I could hear them making out. I could hear every sound.
“—there is an art and a science to a good story—”
Lips smacked together, again and again.
“—and the only way to bring the two together—”
The smacking and sucking continued.
“—the art is the feelings—”
A giggle.
“—the science is the words—”
A low moan.
I’d had enough. I kicked the back of the seat in front of me and the couple pulled away from each other, gasping like two free divers resurfacing. Both of them turned around to glare at me. I glared right back.
“Do you mind? I’m trying to listen to the lecture,” I hissed. “Or had it escaped your attention that we are, in fact, in a lecture hall?”
I tried to get back on track with the lesson, but the couple still managed to distract me. They didn’t return to kissing, but instead began to argue in low tones.
I couldn’t understand the whispers until the girl stood, said harshly, “Fine. We’re through,” and walked out.
He stayed.

When class was over, he caught up with me.
“Great going. She broke up with me.”
Those were his first words to me.
“Nice to meet you too,” I said sarcastically. “Kate Shelley.”
“Seth Jackson. But seriously, you ruined my relationship.”
“Relationship?” I scoffed. “How much of a romantic relationship could you have had in only two days?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you stalking me?”
“No,” I said firmly. “I’m just observant. You were with a different girl on Monday.”
“Either way, two days is plenty of time for romance,” he said.
I rolled my eyes, and said with a voice as cold as ice, “You know nothing about real romance.” Then I walked away. I was done talking to Seth Jackson.

The disappointment of his last relationship evidently didn’t last long. That Friday, in Creative Writing 102, he didn’t sit in his normal seat.
I looked up from my notebook as he sat right next to me.
“What are you doing?”
“Sitting.” He settled back as if to confirm his answer.
“You know what I mean.”
“Do I?”
“You,” I said slowly, as if talking to a four-year-old child, “are sitting here—” I pointed to his seat. “—and not there.” I pointed to the row in front of us.
He grinned. “Yeah, I am.”
“Why?”
“Can I not sit where I want?”
“That’s not what I meant,” I said, annoyed. My knuckles turned white on the pencil still gripped in my hand. I tried to ignore him and went back to writing in the notebook. I was in the middle of a climatic scene, and it was tedious to work out all the plot points.
Seth Jackson leaned over to read it. I shifted away. He leaned closer. I snapped the notebook shut.
He sighed and sat back. “I just wanted to read some of your stuff.”
“Why?” I asked sharply.
“What a person writes is a widow into what they think and believe.”
I blinked. “That was oddly profound.”
His self-satisfied smirk was back. “I have more intelligence than you expected? Figures.” Then, without a second warning, he snatched the notebook out of my hand.
“Hey!” I made a grab for the book, but he pulled it out of reach.
“I’ll give it back. I just need a window into what you think and believe.” He winked.
I stared at him.
He continued, “I’m going to prove to you that I know what a real relationship looks like. You’ll see that I’m quite the romantic.”
“Sure.”
Little did I know that he was completely serious.

The next day Seth Jackson returned my notebook. I was writing on my laptop in the Commons when he plopped down on the couch I was occupying.
“What are you doing?”
A slow grin spread across his face. “Sitting.”
We were like a broken record, repeating conversations. He coughed lightly. “I believe your line is: You know what I mean.”
I heaved a long-suffering, drawn-out, sigh of defeat. I closed my laptop, stood up, and began to walk away.
But he pulled my notebook out of his bag and said, “Don’t you want this?”
I did want it. I walked back. I sat down.
He tossed it into my lap. “Your stuff is really good,” he said. “And your fantasy is especially so, but…”
“But?”
He shook his head in mock disappointment. “Your romance is lacking. It’s too stiff to be natural.”
I laughed out-loud in disbelief. “That’s rich coming from you. You had two different girls within a week and call yourself a romantic.”
“Have you ever been in love?” He’d become suddenly serious. The change of tone caught me off-guard.
“What?”
He repeated the question, slower. “Have you ever been in love?”
I thought about it. I searched memories of my previous school-girl crushes, of my awkward dates, of my first kiss. “I don’t know.”
“I promise, you’ll know when it’s love.”
I was beginning to feel embarrassed and uncomfortable by the intensity of his gaze when his mood shifted again.
“Anyways,” he said lightly, standing up, “I thought I could help you out.”
“With what?”
“Your writing. I’ll simultaneously teach you how romance should go and prove that I am a romantic.”
“Logically, that doesn’t-”
“How does lunch tomorrow sound-”
“Wait-”
“At the little cafe on 4th street-”
“But-”
“At one o’clock?”
I sighed and gave into the inevitable. “How does one-thirty work for you?”

The first date. The most important date. The most awkward date.
Seth Jackson was already at the cafe when I got there. I’ll admit it: a twinge of nervousness raced through me when I saw him sitting at a small table, waiting for me. I shoved the feeling away.
As soon as he noticed me, he smiled and stood up.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hi.”
Yep. Awkward. Mentally, I slapped myself into being casual.
You’re not into him. You don’t care. You’re here to prove that he is an insensitive jerk.
He waited till I sat to sit himself.
“So,” he said.
“So…”
“This is the first date-”
“What an insightful observation.”
He laughed. “This is the first date, so there will be awkwardness and lots of small talk. That’s just how it goes. Though, as a general rule, I find that the less awkward the date, the better the next will go.”
“How many first dates have you gone on?”
He frowned, thinking, then answered, “Lost count.”
I rolled my eyes.
“And you?" he said. "First dates?”
“This would be my third.”
“See. I knew you were a rookie.”
“By my writing? My window into my thoughts and beliefs?”
“Of course,” he shrugged.
“Okay,” I said, crossing my arms and sitting back. “Tell me about myself.”
He accepted the challenge, grinning. “You have a large family.” He paused to check if he was right.
I kept my face impassive. “Go on.”
“They’re loud and noisy and while you love them, you were happy to move out. You love coffee and the color purple, and when you were a kid, you had a cat named Daisy.”
“Wild guessing, huh?”
“Am I wrong?”
“Almost totally, though-” I paused. “-I did have a cat named Daisy.”
He grinned. “See. I’m a genius.”

The date continued and so did the lecture about date etiquette.
“Now,” he said, sipping the coffee he’d ordered. “If he tries to kiss you after the first date, be suspicious. Most of the time he's just trying to get laid. ”
“And you know this from personal experience?”
He shrugged. I didn't understand what that meant, but I didn't press him about it.
“Is a kiss romantic after the second date?”
“No…”
“Third?”
He shook his head.
“Fourth? Fifth?”
“It depends.”
“On what?”
“A lot of things.” He waved his hand airily. “The people, the place, the time, the circumstance.”
“Are you-” I stopped myself. It was too embarrassing to ask.
“Am I what?”
Are you going to kiss me?
“Nothing.” I took a sip of coffee from an empty mug to hide my reddening face. “I need to leave soon.”
He checked his phone. “Yeah, me too.” He stood up and I followed suit.
“As far as your first dates have gone, how does this one rank?” He asked.
I deadpanned. “Awful. You?”
“Just terrible.” Seth Jackson couldn’t keep the smile off his face and out of his voice.

We’d exchanged phone numbers at some point during the date. He called me the next day.
“How about a second date then?”
“Not in a million years, Seth Jackson.”

The second date was at the movie theatre. On the way there, he explained that only overbearing couple kiss in the theatre. I said that was ridiculous coming from someone who made out with a girl in Creative Writing 102.

The third date he took me to a fancy restaurant and brought me red roses.
“How romantic is that? So romantic. Just admit that I am.”
“Those words will never come out of my mouth.”
“Oh, come on!”

The fourth was a moonlit picnic and stargazing.
“Romantic?”
“Not even a little bit.”
I was lying.

I don’t remember the moment I realized I was in love with Seth Jackson. I just…was.
I found myself waiting anxiously for our next date. I found myself smiling when he walked into a room. I found myself desperate to look at him and talk to him.
Stupid Seth Jackson and his stupid smile.

He drove me home, as he so often did, after one of our dates. I’d lost count.
I sat for a second longer in the car than I normally did.
“What is it?” He’d sensed the hesitation.
“Why’d you do it?”
That was clearly not what he expected. “What?”
“Why’d you sit next to me and steal my notebook and promise to prove you were romantic?”
He smiled softly.
“You know, the first day of that class, I noticed you. I vowed that if I ever got the perfect chance, I’d talk to you.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously. I thought you were the most beautiful person I’d ever seen.” He leaned toward me and I had to laugh.
“Fine, you win. You’re a hopeless romantic.” I closed the gap between us until our noses were almost touching.
“That’s all I wanted to hear.”
Then Seth Jackson kissed me.

“And remember, class. An ending is really a beginning—the end of what you tell and the beginning of what the reader imagines. Leave space for speculation and the possibility of a whole new story.”

Deleted user

@TryToDoItWrite oh my god I wasn't going to read your story because usually I don't read other competitor's stories until after results are released, but I'm SO glad I did because it was freaking amazing!!! I'm a sucker for romance and that was just

aaaAAAHHHHHH!!!!!