Joanna's Summer

I wrote this piece for an informal contest to try and get out of a prolonged writing hiatus and get myself back on track. It's not the best of my work, but it's not bad and I'd love it is you read it and critiqued like crazy. I love harsh people; they're

Sean meambled down the hall, his book bag hanging off one shoulder. He nodded at his friends when he passed them, but didn’t stop to talk. Then, he saw her. She was at her opened locked with her back to him. Sean paused and ran his hand over his hair. He hadn’t seen Joanna since last year. She’d been away at a camp in Colorado for the summer and had only been home for a couple days.   

 

Joanna put her bag in her locker; she wouldn’t need it at lunch. Glancing around herself in the hallway, she spotted her friend, Sean, standing alone near the water fountain. “Sean! Hey, Sean!” she called, waving and hurrying to greet him.

 

Sean jumped in surprise and then smiled. “Hey, Jo,” he said when she came up next to him. “How was Colorado?”

 

“Oh, it was great,” she said passively, turning to the cafeteria. “Do you want to have lunch?”

           

“Yeah, sure,” Sean said. He wondered why she’d waved off Colorado so quickly; that wasn’t something she would do.

 

They walked to the cafeteria playfully arm in arm. Joanna wanted to hear all about Sean’s summer, but kept the conversation far away from her own. Sean watched her carefully. Something was off; she didn’t seem right. “So, Jo, what class do you have next?” he asked.

 

Joanna pulled her schedule out of her pocket and scanned over it. “Ummm . . . it looks like . . . English with Mr. Lexington.”

 

“Me too,” Sean said. “Let’s go.”

 

Joanna folded up her schedule and put it back in her pocket with a sigh as Sean took both of their trays and threw them away. She smiled again when he walked back over. “I had Mr. Lexington last year for seminar. He’s a pretty cool guy,” Joanna commented when they stopped by her locker on the way to room 609.

 

“Yeah?” asked Sean.

 

“Yeah.”

 

They walked into the room. Sean felt as if Mr. Lexington watched them all the way to their seats. Sean turned his back on him and slouched down uncomfortably.

 

The bell rang and Mr. Lexington, a man who looked to be in his early sixties, walked to the front of the class with his roster.

 

“Hello, everyone, and welcome to tenth grade honors English. I don’t know your names yet, but I’d love to learn them and to help me do so quickly, you’ll be in alphabetical seating for a couple of weeks.”

 

There was a collective groan from the class but Sean wasn’t too worried about it; his last name was Graham and Joanna’s was Hepburn so there wasn’t much chance of someone sitting between them. He flashed Joanna a thumbs up and she laughed. Sean was taken aback; it was the first time he’d seen her actually look happy today. Joanna must have noticed because she gave him a funny look. He caught himself and smiled.

 

Mr. Lexington was putting people in order as he called roll. Sean’s name was called relatively quickly and he headed to a chair in the second row. He was surprised when Christy Halloway was called after him; she must be new.

 

“Crap,” he mumbled, glancing back at Joanna.

 

Joanna was called next and moved briskly into the seat next to Christy. Mr. Lexington paused at her name and watched her sit. “Joanna,” he said” I’m glad to have you back in class, and . . . I’m so sorry to hear about your mother.”

 

Sean felt his heart skip a beat as he whipped his head towards his friend. Her eyes had grown large in her head and the color drained from her face.

 

Mr. Lexington continued to call roll.

 

Joanna wasn’t seeing anything. She felt like everyone was staring at her and she wanted to get out of the classroom as quickly as possible. She sensed Sean’s eyes on her but pretended not to notice.

 

“Jo! Jo,” Sean whispered across Christy, who looked confused.

 

Joanna ignored him.

 

Class went by slower than ever before and Joanna didn’t speak the entire time. Sean was tired of filling out papers about his favorite bands and foods; teachers didn’t care anyway and he was worried about Joanna.

 

When the bell rang, he was out the door almost immediately. Joanna came out behind him. Sean grabbed her arm and stopped her. “What’s going on?” he asked firmly.

 

Joanna shook her head and pulled away, dropping her backpack on the floor. She looked down in surprise. Sean made another grab at her so she turned and walked hurriedly down the hall, leaving her bag on the floor where it had fallen.

 

Sean was incredulous. He picked up her bag and followed behind. She pushed through people in the crowded hall and Sean lost sight of her in the sea of heads.

 

The halls grew less crowded and then emptied when the bell rang. Sean was sure that Joanna hadn’t gone to class and was determined to find her. At the end of the hall was a door leading outside. Sean glanced out and spotted Joanna sitting under a tree. He left the building and approached her from behind.

 

“Jo,” he said softly.

 

Joanna looked up, surprised. Her face was still pale, but her eyes were red. She hoisted herself off the ground and made to leave, but she tripped on a root and fell.

 

Sean knelt next to her on the ground and gave her her backpack without saying a word. They sat in silence for several minutes.

 

“I was only in Colorado for a couple of weeks this summer,” Joanna said in a hushed, hollow voice. “I had to go home . . . Mom was really sick. They didn’t know what was wrong with her. We spent a lot of time at the hospital.” Joanna was crying now. Sean reached for her shoulder, but she moved out of his reach. “She died, Sean! She died!”

 

Sean didn’t know what to say or do. “Why didn’t you call me, Jo?” he finally asked.

 

Joanna shook her head and made to run away again but stumbled. Sean stood and leaned over her. “Jo . . . life—life’s slippery. Here,” he held out his hand, “take my hand.”

 

Joanna looked tearfully into his face before reaching up and taking his hand. He helped her to her feet and before she knew it she was in his arms, sobbing on his shoulder. He held her tightly as if he’d never let go. Joanna felt safe. “Sean,” she said.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“I can’t do this . . . I can’t handle it.”

 

“That’s why you’ve got me; I’m here for you,” Sean said, holding her even closer. He’d never seen Joanna so upset; it scared him and he wanted to do anything he could to fix it but he knew he couldn’t. “When did it happen?” he asked.

 

Joanna pushed away from him and he slackened his grip. She looked somewhat fearfully into his eyes before answering. “She . . . she died last week.” She was tripping over her words. “The doctors said there was nothing . . . they could do.” Joanna sniffled and wiped her eyes on her sleeve. Sean was afraid she was going to be ill.

 

“Come on, Jo; sit down,” he said, placing his hands on her shoulders and easing her back down the tree trunk.

 

Joanna leaned her head on Sean’s shoulder and gripped his hand tightly in her own. “I don’t know what to do. I just don’t know what to do,” she cried.

 

“Jo . . . I can’t fix this—” Sean began.

 

Joanna intercepted. “I know, Sean.”

 

Sean hushed her. “I can’t fix it, but I’ll do everything I can to make it easier. I can’t stand to see you like this.” Sean sighed and fell silent.

 

Joanna moved closer to him and snuggled against his arm, burying her face in his shirt. Sean put his free arm around her. They sat quietly in the shade of the tree until they heard the bell ring inside, startling them both.

 

“I had no idea we’d been out here so long,” Sean reflected in a whisper.

 

“Sean,” began Joanna.

 

“Yeah?”

 

Joanna sat, eyes downcast, for a moment before letting go of his hand. After what seemed to Sean an age, she looked into his eyes and reached up, taking his face in both hands, and pulled him in to kiss her. Sean was shocked, but he gave way and held on to her shoulders. She broke away, her face flushed and tearstained. “Sean,” she began again.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Thanks.” She sniffled again before standing and picking up her backpack. She held her hand out to Sean and he took it and stood up. Tears still streaking down her cheeks, she smiled sadly at him. “You’re the best friend I’ve ever had.”

 

Sean wrapped his arm around her shoulders and kissed her forehead before leading her slowly back into the school building. He’d always liked Joanna, but now he knew, seeing her in the deepest pain she’d ever had, that he would never stop.

Author's Note

I had a hard time with the ending in particular and I feel like it could be a lot better. Any suggestions?

This is now on the second version of the ending. I definitely like it better than the first version. I feel there's more closure and it leaves a better feel, but I still think it could be better.

Otherwise, please share any sort of feeling or peeve about my work. I like it when people are honest and can give me not only opinions, but reasons behind them.

Feel free to be harsh.

Reviews

[David Broderick]

That was a brilliant way to get my attention. You had me on the edge of my seat from when I discovered her mam had died, and I think you're use of short sentences and constant action really complimented the mood and added to that.
However, I do think your right with the ending, you'd built up so much tension, and i had so much anticipation, then things kind of just ... stopped. I think you should have gone for a much more melodramatic ending - her mothers just died, it should take more than a hug and a kiss to stop her from crying.
Overall, very good. You're writing style fit this story perfectly, but I would put a higher ratio of longer sentences if you ever wrote a piece with paragraphs worth of just description.
Redo the ending and this will be a very exiting and enjoyable story. I do hope you will, I'm very fond of this. Can you put some more of your work up? I would love to read more.

[David Broderick]

Nice last sentence - brilliant in fact. This is much better with the revised ending. Well done on that, by the way - whenever I come to rewrite anything, it never feels right, but the ending fits the story much better than the previous one.
Reading this again, I also noticed how I liked that you only focused on the two characters that mattered, and nothing else. I was only ever thinking about them and there problems the whole way through.
I would say more, but Hannah's beat me to it, and I agree with what she said completely.

[Hannah!]

I liked the ending. The last line is beautiful in sentiment, although it is rather awkwardly worded, and it does a really good job of giving the story an ending, I thought. I think that without that final paragraph, the story is just sort of floating in outer space...even now, with that paragraph, it doesn't feel over--but it feels over enough.

There's a lot of realism in this story, and I think that's a huge part of what makes it so much fun to read. Your characters had...definite personalities. At least, they were getting them. It's always hard to evaluate characterization in shorter pieces like this one, because there's so much that needs to be packed into such a short amount of space, but I really do think that you did a good job, especially with Sean. With Joanna, I think there could have been room to expand on her character, but that's got its own set of problems (since she's probably not feeling herself right now, anyway), and she had a fairly defined presence, anyway.

Overall, I really enjoyed this story. It was very well-written. Good work.

[Dusky]

Thanks for review! I'm returning the favor!
I liked this overall but I feel it could be more descriptive. It would add a bit more colour and emotion to the piece. Otherwise, it was pretty good!