{erudite}

This story is complete lulz and I'm sorry. I didn't realize that the gifting station closed in like six hours so it was like WRITE WRITE WRITE ELY WRITE and that's my only real excuse for this complete shitstorm I'm sorry.

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erudite

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There is a bench in the park that feels a lot older than its time. The wood is worn and the screws are starting to come loose in some places, but it is solid, if a little weather-weary. And the bench itself is weary as well, from both the weather and the weight of so many sad souls that have come, year after year, to press their aching butts into its face.

The bench, perhaps, would call them rude, but that would be absurd, because this bench cannot talk, nor feel tired, nor have existential thoughts about how they are older than their years would lead one to believe. In fact, most benches cannot talk or feel tired of think existential thoughts, and this bench was no exception.

There was, however, a small, brown hoothoot who could talk, or at least make unattractive chirping sounds, and could feel tired, and could think little existential thoughts in his own little mind-sphere above the worn bench, and he liked to pretend that the bench was tired and sad and exhausted like he was.

(And that, ladies and gentleman, is a psychological defense known as projection.)

But the little brown owl knew that he knew all, because he was a wise owl. The hoothoot knew that he was most certainly an owl, and that meant that he was most likely wise, and that was the end of any arguments he might’ve had about the matter.

And besides, the little brown hoothoot told himself, he had seen just as much as the bench had, which made them both very wise in their own respects, even if he was a wise owl and the bench was just a bench.

So the hoothoot gave a little quite hoot of contentment—for he was a hoothoot, after all, and it made perfect sense that he could hoot—and shuffled his little brown owl feathers and settled in carefully onto the his branch again, as he always did. And then the little hoothoot sat, content that he knew all.

A pair of the strange creatures with two legs walked by, their heads bowed, their furs draped around them. They were huddled under a strange, clothy device that the hoothoot knew was used to keep the rain from pelting them—he was a very wise hoothoot, after all, and he knew all—but the clothy device blew this way and that in a particularly intense gust of wind.

(The little brown hoothoot, however, didn’t go anywhere, because he knew all, especially how not to fall off of branches in the middle of storms.)

And the little two legs walked a little further on their two little legs, wearing all black like the two legs who walked beneath this particular tree tended to do, and then they sat on the bench, which no doubt must’ve felt tired of having its face met with butts.

(The little brown hoothoot, however, was smart enough not to sit on the ground like the bench did, and as such was not well-acquainted, nor would ever be well-acquainted, with the sensation of a butt in his face).

The two legs gathered together and started throwing flowers on the ground, which the hoothoot thought was absolutely absurd, and then they were making rain from their faces and spewing flowers on the ground from their little funny five-toothed mouths on the ends of their extra necks that they used to hold things instead of beaks, and the hoothoot had seen this all before.

(In fact, the hoothoot, as he would have you know, was a very wise creature who had seen and knew all).

And the two legs sat there for a while, throwing flowers on the ground (but carefully, carefully), and making strange sounds from the beaks on their heads, which were actually squishy instead of hard, so the sounds they made really didn’t sound like good hoothoot hoots after all.

And after a while, the little two legs left with their flowers and their clothy devices and their rain from their faces, and the little brown hoothoot was left wondering if he knew all after all.

For there were things in the world like the little clothy devices that the two legs carried that he didn’t really understand, because the two legs could open and close these strange little machines with a single movement of their not-beak mouths on the end of their extra long necks that attached to their torsos. The little brown hoothoot had found one of these devices once, found it all bent out of shape and discarded beneath the tree that he shared with the bench, but he could not find a way to make it open the way the two legs had. So instead the little clothy device was prone and inert, like a dead thing, on the ground and twisted into cruel shapes that reminded the little brown hoothoot of broken limbs, and eventually another two legs had come back for the little clothy device and taken it away.

And that made the little brown hoothoot feel a lot better, because that meant that there was a gap in his knowledge of the world, but when the clothy device was gone, he could go back to thinking about how he was a wise brown owl who knew all.

For there were things in the world like the reasons why the two legs threw flowers on the ground beneath the bench that they sat upon, and yet the two legs didn’t exactly throw the flowers but instead put them gently, gently on the ground, as if the ground and the flowers and everything about the situation were somehow sacred. And eventually, those, too, were washed away by the rain and the wind and sometimes even the snow, if it got that cold, and that made the hoothoot feel better because then he could pretend that the flowers were just dead flowers, which died like everything else and withered away.

But sometimes, the flowers stayed there and rotted away like a corpse would, little flowery petals withering first and then followed by the rest of the body, and the hoothoot would have to stare and put up with the smell and, above all, wonder why the two legs would leave their flowers there to die when they came back for their long-dead clothy devices time and time again.

For there were things in the world like the rain from the two legs’ faces that the hoothoot didn’t understand either, and he didn’t think he ever would. Surely they were gods for being able to make tiny versions of the clouds on their faces, but they didn’t do it very often. Only when they came to this bench with their clothy devices and their dead flowers and visited the little rocks that were scattered around the field that was shared by the tired tree and the tired bench and the tired hoothoot, who, finally, realized that he did not know all.

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attempted capture: hoothoot
character count: 6,357
success/failure: ---

 

I WILL CLAIM AND I WILL GRADE QUICKLY TO MAKE UP FOR MY FAILURE LAST TIME. AS IN I WILL READ AND WRITE GRADE AS SOON AS I'M DONE I PROMISE NO PROCRASTINATING!!

 

I TOLD YOU THIS WOULD BE QUICK. AND SHORTISH TOO. IN TIME FOR GIFT STATION, AND THAT'S ALL THAT COUNTS.

Story: Because of the stream of consciousness-esque format and just overall shortness, I’m dropping the conventional Intro/Plot/Climax structure and just gonna cover it all in one section.

That said, I’m still gonna start with the physical beginning. First of all, starting off the story with the bench. Instead of the “go-to” introduction with the Hoothoot, using the bench to begin the story was pretty clever - while the story wasn’t necessarily weaker otherwise, the idea presented shortly after of “projection” makes the beginning even more effective. We get this odd sense of sadness, a lack of sentience/understanding, alongside the humor of the butts, which provides an interesting juxtaposition from the beginning. This contrast directly mirrors the conflict that Hoothoot is having throughout the story, which is actually pretty neat! When this tone was presented, you carried it throughout the whole piece. Overall, strongly executed from the beginning!

I'm not so sure how relevant this comment is, but you did something pretty amazing for such a short piece - not only did you establish and maintain your tone throughout the story, but you were actually able to get an inkling of a "voice" from the narrator, a character that isn't technically a character!! Most easily pinpointed to the moment of "projection," readers were directly addressed for a brief moment ("ladies and gentlemen"). It was small, but it did change the story, if you're reading through it with a magnifying lens. The narrator is shown to be a him or a her rather than omniscient third, which I otherwise would've expected, but that one short line changed IT ALL. Not sure if this was intentional or not, but it did start to build the image of the narrator perhaps reading this story aloud (with the "projection" maybe being an instance where the narrator broke character?). It's cool either way you roll with this one - just wanted to draw attention to it and see what you had originally intended!

Then we meet the humans. While the Hoothoot obviously wouldn’t be expected to know all (lol) about the humans, the description of the “two legs” is pretty wtf-inducing. It was pretty cool at the beginning as this type of description always is, but I felt that it was kind of used too much without moderation. In conjunction with the run on/stream of consciousness, it can get a bit overwhelming. If you really wanted to keep the over-the-top descriptions as is, I would recommend limiting the other “confusing” aspects of your story around these parts. I enjoy those other factors more though, as the descriptions of the humans is already stressed well enough anyway, but it’s up to you!

I haven’t said this yet, but I honestly had no idea what/where/why the park bench was as it was. And I was okay with that! While I was a little confused about this when reading, it didn’t really matter to me up until the flowers. For some reason, I was under the impression that the “clothy” things were backpacks (and I’m still unsure if that’s right or not?) and as such was under the impression that the “two legs” were children - perhaps a bench in a schoolyard? However, the flowers really threw me off. Because I had latched onto the backpacks and in tandem with the over-the-top descriptions that Hoothoot would give, I was completely unable to piece together that the flowers were for graves at a cemetery until the VERY end. Not sure if this was intentional, but that hadn’t crossed my mind because of the other misleading things leading up to the reveal (who brings a backpack to a cemetery?)

EDIT: JK IT'S AN UMBRELLA HANNAH IS STUPID NEVER MIND THEN.

Finally, the conclusion. Hoothoot has grown up kinda!! While it is a sort of bitter-sweet ending, with Hoothoot realizing that a) he’s not the all-knowing, and b) DEAD THINGS, it was relatively happy - especially for you!! Hoothoot was a much more “realistic” character towards the end, having undergone the first few stages of character development in such a short time. Again, cemetery was definitely unexpected, but after reading those last few lines, ALL of my questions from the story were answered. Big reveal worked well, but it did cause some debatable confusion in different parts of the story.

Grammar: Run-ons. Knowing you and your writing style, I’m 8000% sure they were intentional, but even then, they were a little much. Combined with the descriptions, it tends to get a little bit confusing. I understand the stream of consciousness kinda dictates a style similar to this, but it’s important to moderate! Other than that, like two typos and two sentences with awkward wording. Overall, thumbs up but just remember to keep it all in check!

Length: NO PROBLEMO, MA’AM.

Outcome: A very strong piece! The story was able to capture a myriad of emotions, even with its extreme shortness. The only criticism I really have is to make sure to moderate the uses of each slightly confusing component of the story. Separately, they each have their own, unique advantages, but when they come together, it does get muddled. Regardless, you exceeded the expectations of a Simple and created a neato story as well, so Hoothoot to the pretty lady! Was a pleasure to read, miss Ely!