(ANNE, a high school senior, is sitting in her car in the parking lot, waiting for her brother after school. Her face is red and she has obviously been crying. CARA, also a senior, is sitting in the passenger seat, where she obviously is not welcome. The conversation seems to be a continuation of a previous string of events and we find out that this tension is due in part to a letter CARA gave ANNE earlier in the day.)
CARA: Anne, Anne, listen to me. Look, I know this looks like... (sighs)... It looks like a lot of things. But I think...
ANNE: Shut up. Just leave me alone.
CARA: But you’re mad at me. At least let me try to explain why I did it. (ANNE glares pointedly at CARA) Alright, so I talked to my mom last night, and like I said in the letter, it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my entire life. I told her, well, not everything, but I told her... a lot... and she had a lot of good advice for us. She doesn’t think we have to stop being friends. I told her that was impossible. But she did bring up the verse about if your hand causes you to stumble...
ANNE: Yeah, I get it. You want to cut me off. You want me out of your life. You hate me. Well, guess what? I don’t hate you and I’m not leaving. Unlike some people, I don’t give up on friendships, even when they’re hard. Can we talk about this later?
CARA: No, we always talk about stuff “later”. That’s why this happened.
ANNE: Oh! So now this is all my fault? I think we can both agree this is a mutual misdemeanor.
CARA: No, no, no... I’m not blaming you. If anything, this is all my fault. Look, Anne, I love you, and I’m sorry I hurt you this much. (starting to cry) I know right now that more words are only going to make this worse. But I can’t change the facts, I can’t take back the pain, but I would if I could. If I could take it all away so you didn’t have to hurt, I would. But that’s not gonna happen. So, I did the only thing I could think of: I tried to get us help. Please, please try understand. I’m not trying to hurt you.
ANNE: Well, you did.
(Silence. Anne reaches up to wipe Cara’s tears. Cara turns away.)
CARA: (whispers) I know.
ANNE: So what am I supposed to say? I love you more than anyone in the world and you’re telling me you don’t want to be my friend anymore? You told your mom, Cara. You’re mom. That’s like, I don’t know... No more sleepovers for the rest of our lives. No more nothing. She’ll never let you hang out with me again. And what now? You tell me how we’re supposed to be “just friends”? What does that even mean? Cara, you promised---
CARA: I know, but I was wrong. We both were.
ANNE: Wait, are you saying the promise is off? Like, forever? Cara, this isn’t a joke, you swore that you would always be my blood sis---
CARA: No. We can’t be like that.
ANNE: But David and Jonathan! Cara, it’s from the Bible! It’s a covenant, so that when things like this happen, we’ll still know that it will all work out. Please, don’t do this to me. Promise me that when this is over, you’ll still be here. Please...
CARA: But we were wrong.
ANNE: Is that all you can say? “No, we were wrong?”
CARA: Well, I have a lot more to say if you’d let me.
ANNE: I’m done. Get out of the car, I’m going home. Actually, I’m not going home. I’m running away, but it’s not like it matters to you where I go.
CARA: Anne, calm down. I’ll leave, but promise me you wont do anything rash tonight. Anne? Anne, look at me. Promise?
ANNE: (deliberately not looking) I take no responsibility at this point.
CARA: (starting to cry again) Oh my gosh, Anne. No. Please. I’m sorry. Please, please just promise you wont... hurt yourself.
(ANNE simply watches as CARA cries, waiting for her to leave.)
CARA: I’m not getting out of this car until you swear that nothing is going to happen to you tonight. I’ll blame myself if you... if it happens again.
ANNE: (Exhasperated.) Ugh! Why would you care? You don’t. If you did, then you wouldn’t have talked to your mom. You would have waited for us to talk about this civilly. We could have figured it out.
CARA: For the past five months we’ve been trying to “figure it out,” Anne! And look at us now! We can’t even have a normal conversation with each other! And you’re back to cutting and me, I’m... I’m...
ANNE: Don’t say it.
CARA: We’re not okay! (Takes a deep breath and exhales slowly to stop her hiccuping sobs.) I want it to be okay. And I don’t know what we did to make it go wrong, but it is messed up now, Anne. My mom... my mom didn’t even want me to tell her everything.
ANNE: (Deliberately changing subjects.) I talked to Ms. Elliot today.
CARA: What?
ANNE: I told her about the letter.
CARA: What did you say? Oh my gosh, she probably thinks I’m---
ANNE: She’s not judging either one of us. That’s why I went to her. I thought it would be better to cry in her classroom than in the bathroom and risk the counselor finding me.
CARA: Oh... Well?
ANNE: She just hugged me and tried to get me to stop crying. I think I scared her pretty bad.
CARA: Was this during 8th period?
ANNE: Yeah, you were in athletics. I told Mrs. Carlson I needed to go to the library to take a test. I tried to hold it together after I read the letter... but I couldn’t. And I didn’t want to cry in the middle of study hall.
CARA: I’m sorry.
ANNE: Stop saying that.
CARA: Well, I am.
ANNE: “Sorry” doesn’t fix anything.
Oh my gosssssh i felt like i was right there in the car. Fabulous job Callie! I definitely wanted more on why they wouldn't be friends. My first thought was that they romantically involved? Then the troubled pasts with cutting? I just wanted more more more. Great balance of the emotions, and flipping who was in charge back and forth between the girls. I really liked this.
ReplyDeleteI think you did an awesome job of giving us only what we needed to know. You dropped clues but never came right out and said what was happening, which forced you to utilize your characters to divulge information. I think this is an excellent use of the Iceberg Technique that Professor Williams discussed in class. I found myself wanting to read the letter and know what was going on, which really increased the tension and suspense. Great story!
ReplyDeleteCallie
ReplyDeleteThis is a great story! I agree with Ali that I feel like I was in the backseat of the car feeling awkward listening to these two fight/ argue. I agree with Dalton in that I like how you tell us what we need to know, dropped clues but never gave us a detailed description of the story line and let us figure out the story line and specific things about your characters. Good job! I really enjoyed it!
SMW
Well first I wanted more on why they could not be friends, but that is just me. I felt like I was in the car next to them eavesdropping on their conversation. I could hear they way Cara was crying really hard and just felt broken. Great Job! I really loved it!
ReplyDeleteThis was wonderfully written! I felt like I was sitting in the back seat of the car listening to their whole conversation! Very well done!
ReplyDeleteThe dialogue is fantastic and natural. The emotions are powerful. There's a lot of mystery in this story. Maybe too much for the reader to handle. Some more clues maybe, more clues. I don't think you have to reveal everything, but more clues might work to make the reader at least have some idea of what they were talking about. Fantastic job with the dialogue.
ReplyDeleteYou write dialogue very well. The emotions are powerfully depicted. I loved reading it, I wanted more!
ReplyDeleteSo good!! I really liked it!! I just wish I had more information. The characters were really real in that fight but I wish that I knew more about the girls. Like what they were fighting about or what was written in the letter, why they got in the car together after the letter, and why did she cut? The story was not specific enough for me but it was so well written after I read it, I was frustrated. I just wanted more closure and information!
ReplyDelete-MJL