KP Critiques | Something Like Courage

Welcome back to another KP Critiques! This time, we are critiquing an amazing excerpt by Sandrina de Klerk from her story Something like Courage. 

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Now, onto the critique.

Something Like Courage

By Sandrina de Klerk

I can hear Dad walking around. 

I like this, but could you describe where he hears it? Is his dad on the same floor? Upstairs? Downstairs?

I roll over to my side--Josh is fast asleep. He always sleeps through things. And he’s so hard to wake up. I sigh and stare up at the clock on the wall. One AM. Hey, why is Dad walking around, anyway? 

There’s a weird feeling to the night...or morning, I guess. It’s like Christmas morning, but the wrong sort of strange excitement--like scary excitement. It’s almost kinda cool.

I'm really enjoying this narrator's voice. 🙂

I push the covers aside and shiver, on second thoughts thought, I take the top one and wrap it around me. The floor’s covered with lego--man, we should’ve listened to Dad and picked those up. 

Haha!

I hold back a yelp with every step and bite my lip. I wonder if I’ll grow up to hate these little plastic studs as much as Dad does. I’ve always loved playing with it them. Caleb’s better than me, he can build the most amazing stuff, and even when Josh and me I,  try to do it together, it’s not nearly as good. I guess me and Josh Josh and I argue too much? 

There’s a bang downstairs. Like a firecracker, but why would Dad set off firecrackers in the middle of the night? My hand freezes above the door handle. It’s one of those creepy moments after a loud noise, where everything’s so quiet, the world could have stopped. Like when someone breaks something and everyone just kinda stands there. Depending on what broke, you either want to laugh or cry.  

Really nice paragraph.

All I can hear is my heart beating like I have a stethoscope to my ears. I look back at Josh, he’s still sleeping. I want to wake him, but I’d have to yell. Okay, this is up to you, Jonno. I drop the bed covers right there and grab my chair to reach the shelf. It’s Dad’s old air-rifle. It doesn’t work any longer, the barrels a little skew.

This is really great. Perfect for a child character. 🙂

I’d begged him not to throw it out. Now I fumble to pull the barrel down and then back up. It clicks. There’s nothing in, but it sure feels better to know it can make the right sound. There’s more thumping downstairs. Then another shot. My hands are shaking. I’m shaking. Stop shaking...

I open the door, close it quietly, and stand alone in the cold, dark hallway. There are no lights up here. I mean, there are, they’re just not on. They never turn the lights on in the movies, right?

Haha.

I guess it makes a better...oh, what’s the word...like, picture? Feel? Josh has always been better at words... But it feels right. Like I’m in a movie, and I’m about to save Dad. Only it’s scarier. ‘Cause this is more real. And the actors know what’s coming around the corner. I don’t. 

I stick out my jaw and straighten my back. You’re not scared of the dark, Jonno. I take a deep breath and let the rifle sit comfortably in the nook of my shoulder. Just like Dad’s taught me. I leave the safety off for once since there’s nothing in it and it can’t really hurt anybody. I rest my cheek against the smooth butt, and I walk forward. There’s someone yelling down there. And it’s not Dad. 

I get that this character is more detached and he hasn't taken things seriously yet, but I think you should add in when the yelling started. After all, hearing yelling is a pretty terrifying thing so it would be strange for Jonathan to just briefly mention it. When does the yelling start? What is Jonathan's reaction? 

Okay, focus on moving quietly. One foot after the other, bare feet brushing on the carpet. I think I would like this better if I was in a movie. But movies aren’t real. Dad always says that.  

My hair keeps falling into my eyes. Stupid curls--I brush them away with the elbow of my left arm, covered in goosebumps. I hate the feeling of goosebumps, it makes it hard to concentrate. My teeth are chattering, and my breath sounds like a steam train. I reach the staircase. Downstairs there are lights on--not a lot, but enough. I see shadows. They’re fighting. There are grunts, no screams, no yelps. Just heavy breathing, and thumps and cracking and gasping...and the smell of blood. 

It makes me sick. I want to run back to bed and hide--Dad would protect us. But Dad wouldn’t run, Aragorn wouldn’t. 

You are doing such a great job telling this from a child's POV!

So I bite down hard on my lip and keep my teeth clenched, and I straighten my back and move along the edge of the wall with my gun that can’t do anything. When I reach the bottom, the fighting’s right around the corner, in our kitchen. The living room’s in front of me, and the shadows are still there. Okay, deep breath, Jonno. Come one on. I squeeze the gun, and I burst round the corner. 

“Stop!” My voice comes out so much stronger than I imagined it would. I’m actually kinda proud of that--oh, Dad! 

His head is bleeding, his face--there’s another guy, black clothes, dark hair, he’s bleeding too, but I don’t care about him. They’re wrestling on the ground. Dad’s got the guy’s hand, that holds a gun, to the floor. 

“Jonathan, get away!” Dad screams, not like a scared, high-pitched scream. But at the same time it's a genuinely terrified scream that’s soaked in...in courage. Because you can tell he’s not scared for himself. 

It all takes a second. I think. A gunshot. And Dad’s bleeding more, from the chest. And then another shot, but this time I feel it, and I cry. It burns like nothing ever before, I look down and I fall, bleeding, I keep falling and falling and Dad can’t reach me and--

Five years later.

“Dad!” I bolt. I’m drenched in sweat, I’m gasping for breath, my ears ring. Alex is sleeping. I’m in a dark bedroom. Again. Same dream. I should be used to it by now. But you gotta stop, Jon. A soldier can’t live like this. In the past. Dad’s gone. Josh is gone. 

You’re here now.

I grope for the lamp next to my bed. Where is it, where is it--ah, there. I blink and check the room. It’s clear. The window’s still closed--why on earth is the window closed?? I stagger towards it and shove it open. Deep gasps for air. Man, I’m hot. 

The house is silent, but for the sound of Alex’s breathing. It’s too silent. The wrong type of silence. Oh, my head hurts. I unwrap my hand from the warm handle on the window and open the bedroom door. My legs are unsteady as I stand in the middle of the upstairs hall. The door to Ryan and Jason’s room is open. Still no sound. 

But something doesn’t feel right.

Ryan. Gun. I slip into his room, the gun’s laying on the desk. It feels like Dad’s Sig, not quite as heavy. 

Ow, my head. 

It’s loaded, right? Okay, you can do this. I press myself against the wall and start down the stairs. I’m shaking. I mentally kick myself. Stop shaking. 

I reach the first landing. I hear something, I think, so I freeze. Nothing. Imagination. 

Keep going. 

It’s in the dark and the silence that every normal noise increases volume by about 80%. Every breath, every step on each stair. Moonlight mixed with streetlamps shines on the wall by the stairs, lighting up the dusty covers on the bookcase that sits on the first landing. 

I’m at the bottom now. I can hardly see right, my head pounds, my vision blurs. I can’t breathe. 

It’s dark, but not completely. I’m in the living room. The fairy-lights that hang over the apple-crates in the far corner. The single red spot of light on the TV. 

I scan the room. Nothing. I move on. The kitchen’s darkest, it faces off to the back yard. Just the few small spots of light on appliances and plug sockets. Nothing. 

One sound changes everything, I jerk and spin as I hear the front door click. I can’t see it from where I am. I grip the gun and level it. This is it. He’s here. 

My heart stops. Maybe not literally, but it sure feels like it in that second. Not again. It’s weird though, because in the same moment as being surprised, I never expected anything else.

I find him. Dark hair. He’s carrying a case. 

“Drop the case,” my voice is shaking. I raise my gun to him. The case--that’s gotta be where the gun is. 

The guy stares at me. “Jonathan?” 

“Drop the case!” I try to shout, but it’s weak. I aim in the direction of his head. I lean against the wall and steady my arm. 

He does. And raises his hands. “Jonathan, it’s me.” He sounds concerned. 

Don’t fall for it. 

He looks kinda like Tom. A disguise. 

"Jon.” Why does he keep talking? Why does he know my name? Of course he knows your name! He would...

I keep moving forward. Closer to him. Closer. I can feel my breathing quicken as fast as I try to slow it down.

"Jon, it's me. It's Tom. Thomas. It's okay, bud. It's just me. It's just Tom... It's okay, buddy. "

Trigger, Jonathan, you can't hesitate like this... He'll kill them all--

I pull it. A click. Nothing happens. The world spins, my head spins. Everything spins. I can’t--

The gun drops. My vision clears. Ragged breathing, sweat. I stagger against the wall. Why am I… “What…” I can’t force words out. It hurts.

I look up. Tom’s pressed against the wall.

My head! I groan and cradle it. Dad. Josh. Tom. 

I stumble over nothing. Tom runs forward and catches me before my head hits the floor. I try to fight him, but I can’t--

"It's okay, it's okay." Tom’s steady voice is there. I grab him like I'm grabbing onto the voice. Something firm. Something that’s real.

Everything hurts. I don’t know what happened...but Ryan’s gun prop is on the floor, Tom’s briefcase, and Tom’s got me, and my head aches, and I can’t see Dad, and the guy in black isn’t here, and I’m not falling. But I feel like I am.

Comments

Oh wow! I have to read more!

Your attention to detail is stunning, your dialogue is realistic, and overall this is very excellently written, so I don't have too much to critique.

I love how you inserted the flashback scene right before another, present-day scene that mirrors it. After the flashback scene- which ended in tragedy- we enter another scene that is similar, and so the suspense is doubled because we are expecting another tragedy to happen. Great job!

Another brilliant thing I noticed from your writing is how you managed to keep the unique voice in both timelines, and yet still show how he has matured - calling himself Jonathan now, instead of Jonno is just one example.

I'm not sure if your grammar errors were intentional, since it was from a child's POV. If it was, then I would still go ahead and stick to correct grammar. You do a really good job showing this from a child's POV anyway, so the grammar errors are a bit unnecessary. 

Overall, I really, really enjoyed reading this, Sandrina. The suspense is on-point and the mystery throughout makes me want to keep reading. So again, great job, and I hope to see more of your writing on Kingdom Pen in the future!

~ Erin Ramm

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