Beautiful. It made me want to watch Hepburn movies and cry into my pillow. :) Really well written!

OH. MY. GOD. (I'm struggling with a kind of awe that makes me feel utterly incoherent and I'm trying to get it out of my system now.)

This is the most painfully, heart-achingly beautiful and meaningful story I have read on this site (and maybe even one for my list of ever beyond this site too). I want to memorize it and tattoo quotes of it across my memory and carry it around with me always. I want to look honestly at people I know and associate them with this kind of poetry that is at once objective and critical and idealized and abstract and sewn together with so much feeling.

I cannot convey to you how phenomenal this was, but you have achieved something meaningful (or at least it feels that way to me) and I want you to know that. I've been hoping for something like this, reading purposefully through stories and stories and stories for someone who could see the imperfections of people and write about them like they are necessary. And they are. And I don't cry over love stories or Shakespearean tragedies or nature documentaries when the lion eats the antelope, but I cried at this. Not because it was so sad or even so beautiful (although I cry over beauty more often than sadness), but because it was so honest and I could feel how present you were within it and how much it meant to you. I don't think you weren't trying to make it mean something to me (but maybe you were), only to yourself, and that is why it did end up meaning something to me.

Yeah, I ramble a lot and I'm sorry, but I have to keep it up for a while longer because I have over 8,0 characters left and I could use them all if I thought you were actually interested in reading a review that long.

I just... never actually expected to find something like this on FP, even though I've always wanted to. And I never expected to find it outside of FP either, because sometimes it seems like there are too many rules about writing in the real world and this story kind of goes beyond them in a way. There's something singular and unique about it and I think I'm getting incoherent again.

Pen is so relatable (and yet untouchable, because she's made up of so much I wish I could be, but feel like I only am in my imagination) and even more so when balanced against Connor's flaws and how his imperfections sometimes give her more imperfections too. The threads of resistance and communal need are so tangible between them. And Connor is so unidealized and actual. I know people like him. I've dated boys like him that are stupid and self-destructive and say hateful things sometimes and surprise you with their honest moments and start to feel poetic when you aren't paying enough attention (and become emotionally dangerous because in those inattentive moments).

Usually I hate when people don't use quotations for dialog and I was surprised at how well it works here. That and the roman numerals and the italic preambles made me feel like the story was being read to me in a whisper, like I was privy to it (and that it was so personal) instead of reading something that was openly posted to the world. All of the little details in the technical way you wrote this just fit so well with the quirky style of the narrative.

I also adored the haphazard way you tossed in references and how it was the haphazardness that made them so important or expressive or whatever it was that they were because I can't find the right word. It gave such a breath of life to the characters though. It made me laugh at them sometimes for attempting to be pretentious, but love them because secretly I knew they meshed too well with their personalities to actually be pretentious. Instead it really just came off as some kind of statement on the way they laced laced their words with knowledge so even when they were saying nothing it still felt substantial.

And and and there was a line. Somewhere. About Conor. And I wanted to remember it so I could tell you how if it had been the only line you had written about him, it was so perfect and descriptive of his personality that I would have felt like I knew everything about him. Just from that one line. And I do feel that way. And I also feel like I've tried to write that line before, but I could never find the words and that's how I feel about this whole story. Not only that I wish I could write this phenomenally or that I've tried and don't feel like I've achieved, but that the lines... oh god, the individual lines are stories within themselves.

I'm going to have to re-read this just so I can find that line again.

And I know I will feel that way about a lot of lines within this and I will constantly have to come back to this, searching out lines and words and phrases, until I have memorized it. Because I was serious when I said that earlier.

This was a really amazing story. There was a genuineness . . . a raw realness to this story that's very hard to find. I also love the way it was written and even how in the end, you changed it to include quotation marks. I liked the parallel issues of a father who had left and a mother who had died. And Conner's attempts to make a dinner for Boris and Pen. The whole period issue was both funny and sad. Amazing job writing this . . . I loved it! Thank you so much for sharing it with us all.

Cassandra

This... This is incredible. I loved it. I feel very satisfied and emotional(?) after reading this- I thought it was brilliant. Your way of writing is different and awesome and memorable.

I think my favorite line is "She was the goddamn hunter and gatherer."

and the interaction(s) between Boris and Connor [the punch-in-the-eye bit was fantastic]

Well done.

All I can say is -

absolutely amazing.

This site is too small for writing like this.

Movies and books never ever make me cry but I think that if they did, this one probably would have.

I love the characters and the way you described them - made them imperfect but perfect for each other, I love the language you used. And I absolutely love this story.

Thank you so much for writing this. (:

Celia

wow, that was amazing

Aw, this was beautiful. I loved how you managed to show the characters so clearly, in all their flaws and insecurities, even though the writing style was so poetic and sometimes kind of abstract. The whole piece had a great flow to it. I enjoyed all the classical allusions as well, and the little feminist tibdits thrown in there - feminism is a rare thing on this website, haha. I really, really enjoyed this, it's one of the most well-written pieces I've seen on fictionpress.

*whisper* Wow. Never thought that a light-hearted stories author like yourself have such a deep insight on matters like that. I feel the bitter sweet of your message. It tugged at me and all I am capable of is sob while empathizing with you. But secretly, I'm not one for Angst. Yet, I'm going to read this again and understand it better. Oh, and good job on the headings at every interval. I like the originality of this story. Care to explain what is up with Conner? Is he an emotionally unstable boy who had lost his mother and gets drunk to drink off his sorrows? I have to admit that I took a very long time to finish reading this story while struggling to understand what you're implying. It's so...in depth? Haha.

I have no words. There are no words. You wrote them all. THIS FASCINATED ME AND IT'S TOO AMAZING FOR THIS SITE. Have you read Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko? This reminded me of that - something ancient and intelligent and cultural and mystifying yet altogether modern. (It's Native American. It's beautiful. Maybe when you get published - hmm, tomorrow sound good? - you guys can compete or something.)

;)becky

p.s. the dashes instead of quotes thing is pretty classy. read a book like that once but I can't remember what it is. except the dashes were everywhere, not just flashbacks. okay. being pointless because you made all the points.

p.p.s. this is the kind of story that deserves to be read again and again for the rest of your life, just to make sure you got everything. it deserves to be appreciated - man, it deserves to be APPRECIATED. so nuanced and so pure and so heartbreaking and so...I'm in love with you.

Your words are...the essence of what meaning in a story should be. They make me sit and think and second guess and wish I were smarter and motivate me to get out and be better.

The depth in your stories is astounding, and I truly think you should consider getting published. Very few works affect me, and what I've read from you is something very powerful.

Your writing is beautiful with its depth and I love it.

i love how u ended this story :) good one

This is quite possibly the most beautiful thing I have ever read on this site. Thank you for writing it. First of all, nerd that I am, there are no mistakes grammatically. None. You tweak the language and its constraints to fit your story and style, but there are no mistakes. More importantly, this is simply freaking brilliant. I feel like it is the happier (ironically) version of 'Eveline' - of course you had the transparent allusion in the beginning, but once you gave me that I saw parallels throughout, particularly in the relationship with her father (remembering mostly the bad, but also the good). And I love that Pen made the decision Eveline could not, and also that Connor did not force her onto the metaphorical boat, but that she really made the move.

Simply beautiful.

i have never read anything like this before and i love it. this style of writing drew me in from the start and i cant imagine how hard it might have been to write.

well done and congrats on a great story

Haeloed ;P

Loved it.

Absolutely beautiful. One of the greatest short stories I've ever read, I loved Pen and Connor and Boris, too. I liked the style, the allusions, and moon river. This was so real- their emotions, and fear, and how you wrote them falling for each other. great writing.