Writing How to Learn Engrish [PG]

[MissWem]

[COLOR=DarkRed]Argh! I spent over an hour with this window open trying to read it but couldn't because people kept talking to me then you had to go and do this!!

Why?

It's so short!!

Nobuhiro sounds really quite sweet though.

If you don't wear underwear I'll just assume you wear lingerie ^^"[/COLOR]

[KarmaOfChaos]

[color=deeppink][size=1]Short and sweet. I found myself laughing out loud a couple times reading this chapter, it's nice to see the old humour.

And I totally empathasize with Nobuhiro. Cold weather's a bitch. * snuggles into warm bathrobe *

-Karma[/size][/color]

[Godelsensei]

The first thing he noticed about the door, when he went up to open it, was that it was open. Not swung back on its hinges, in a painfully obvious fashion, but unlocked. He had locked the door?he knew he?d locked the door because, well, he always locked the door. But it wasn?t locked.
Had he locked the door? Yes, he had. He knew that he had locked the door because, just as he had finished doing so, the phone had started to ring and he had made a possibly critical decision to ignore it.
So, Nobuhiro decided that, instead of entering a house that might contain any one in the world, by this point, he would sit on his porch and think of who might have a copy of his house key. He had a vague memory of giving one to Junko, but could not be certain of this and doubted that she would have entered his house late at night and neglected to turn the lights on. Therein, he assured himself that his older sister was not, in fact, inside his house.
Could it be Toru? No?he never would have, under any circumstance, as much as he loved him, left a copy of his house key in the hands of his younger brother. He knew this, and was very relieved in its regard.
After deducing that no one but he himself had a copy of his house key, as far as he was aware, Toue Nobuhiro?s thought process went a little like this:
If I have the only key and remember locking the door before leaving, some one I do not want in my house is most definitely in my house, but why do I remember going to get a copy of my house key made, now that I think about it, and oh God: Emi.
Indeed, before slamming the door behind her and after hurling a desk lamp at him and missing, because he was never around any more and because his father had yelled at her for wearing a miniskirt or tight pants or something and also because she, incidentally, didn?t love him any more and was, it had turned out, a lesbian, she had said something along the lines of she was going to come back and kill him while he was sleeping.
Then it occurred to Nobuhiro that his ex-fiancée, who no one cared to talk about, especially around him, returning to kill him while he was sleeping was highly unlikely, seeing as she had moved to Australia, or so he had heard from a friend of hers who had approached him on his way home from work, one day, three weeks after leaving him and that had been a year and a half ago.
Nobuhiro wished he had more photographs to rip in half, the desire to do so entirely related to that subject, but they?d all been taken care of by this point and there was still some one in his house.
He wondered how they had decided to enter his house, specifically, and not any other. He surely hadn?t been the only one to not be home or to have turned the lights off before leaving that day. There was nothing special about his house: his garden wasn?t exactly a garden, per se, but some grass and a bush, and the house itself looked like every other on the street.
In fact, the building and property were both painfully regular. The intruder would probably realize this sooner or later and leave, to find Nobuhiro sitting, glumly, on the porch, wondering why any one would want to break into his house.
?Christ, I suck,? he said, to the night air. And he probably did.
[COLOR=Gray][FONT=Courier New]
I know it's short, but it's [i]there[/i], okay?

Okay.[/FONT][/COLOR]

[MissWem]

[COLOR=DarkRed]*Gibbers incoherently* YOU! *points finger at Godel*

I liked the last line alot. In fact the chapter was very amusing, especially when following his train of thought. Why on earth would she threatent to kill him when he's such an obviously harmless person?? WHY? The humanity![/COLOR]

[Godelsensei]

?Oh. It?s you.?
It took Nobuhiro less than half a second to have jumped to his feet, spun around, and pointed an accusing finger at the person standing in his doorway. ?Y-y?YOU!? He stuttered incoherently for a time before taking a few steps forward, furious, and stopping himself from slapping his little sister in the face. ?What the hell are you doing here?!? He paused for a moment, let his hand drop to his side, raised an eyebrow, and asked the obvious question of, ?And why are all the lights off??
?I was sleeping.?
?With the door unlocked?! What if some one aside from me had happened to come here! And where the hell did you get a key?? He exhaled loudly, exasperated and more confused than he?d been at any recent point he could remember.
?Junko-neesan gave it to me. And I worried you?d forget your keys again.? The girl stuck her chin out, managing to look almost exactly like Toru. Her hair was longer, though, and tied back, somehow contrasting with her striped pajama bottoms.
?Junko? You talked to Junko? Why are you here, anyway? And would you mind letting me in?? She stepped back and he shuffled past her, still irritated to the utmost degree, and tossed his jacket aside, not caring where it landed: it was his house, after all.
?I?m in Tokyo to visit a friend.?
?Then why aren?t you at your friend?s house??
?She wasn?t home when I went by.? He gave her a look, kicking his shoes off.
?She knows you?re coming, I take it??
?No.? Nobuhiro stopped walking towards the stairs and stood very still, his back still. He put together everything his sister had just told him, as best as he could, then burst out laughing. He remembered what his sister had said to him before he had gone to Tokyo, and it was almost a laugh of malice.
?He got rid of you, too??
?What??
?As in, he now has only one kid left, as far as he?s concerned, and as far as she?s going to act upon. Jesus, Reiko, what?d you do?? She said nothing. He waited. She kept saying nothing. ?Are you okay?? He waited for her to respond, but she didn?t, and he began to climb the stairs. ?Help yourself to anything in the fridge, Reiko. And answer the phone if it rings?I?m going to take a shower. Okay??
???kay.?

When Toue Nobuhiro left his bedroom in search of the kitchen, seeking a meal he could prepare in less than six minutes, he, for a second, was genuinely convinced that he was going to throw up. He would have rushed back into his bedroom to put on a shirt (he only ever slept in a pair of pants he found comfortable, but he had lived with his sister for over twenty years and had discounted having that female in the house as nothing special) but they had both already spotted him.
?There you are! What the hell? She kept telling me you didn?t live here and that she was going to call the police!? Winnie was flustered, a new look for her, as far as he had experienced. ?Who is this kid, anyway??
Reiko whirled around and demanded the same information of Winnie.
Nobuhiro stood, at the top of the stairs, shirtless, wondering what he ought to do. He could dive back over the threshold behind him and crawl into bed, waiting for the both of them to leave, then very quickly lock the door behind whoever exited last. But that wouldn?t be very tactful of him. So, instead, he decided to deal with it. ?This is my friend, Reiko. Her name is Winnie. Why did you tell her I didn?t live here??
His sister glared at him.
Winnie put her hands on her hips and looked at the floor. Reiko had put their shoes away, along with doing a general job of tidying up. He didn?t feel like thanking her, though. ?I think I?ll go now, Toue-san. Sorry for showing up so late.? She bowed stiffly, turned, and began to walk back down his driveway.
He stared at his sister, fuming, for a minute, then turned around and headed back the way he had come, himself. Only he followed this by running out the front door, having barely stepped into his shoes, still pulling on his jacket, wishing he?d been born any one else.

[COLOR=Gray][FONT=Courier New]I hate Reiko she iz such a b*****88 y duznt she just dye

Also, I have created a character I thoroughly dislike. That's quite an accomplishment, for me. o_o[/FONT][/COLOR]

[MissWem]

[QUOTE=Godelsensei]?Oh. It?s you.?
It took Nobuhiro less than half a second to have jumped to his feet, spun around, and pointed an accusing finger at the person standing in his doorway. ?Y-y?YOU!? He stuttered incoherently for a time before taking a few steps forward, furious, and stopping himself from slapping his little sister in the face.[/FONT][/COLOR][/QUOTE]
[COLOR=DarkRed][SIZE=1]You like totally stole my line! Did you? *confused* I had a moment of dejavu when I read that.

Well, for a character you seem to despise, she's fitting in nicely with the story. The poor guy, I'm really starting to feel sorry for him : ([/SIZE][/COLOR]

[KarmaOfChaos]

[color=deeppink][size=1]I like how you're creating pleanty of tension and problems and mystery around Nubohiro's family. This leaves the story open for a lot of development in that area. Also, it allows you to see where some of the character's motivation comes from, why they act the way they do.

I'm curious about meeting the father. Is he an asshole or all the kids just rebellious? Or perhaps a bit of both? * intrigued * The new character is also interesting, if a bitch. It's good to have at least one character in stories that absolutely everyone wants to shoot in the face. They make a good place to direct anger towards, and can create excellent plot twists. The family dynamics are also going to provide pleanty of material for you.

My only suggestion: it probably would have been more effective to combine the last two chapters into one. They both don't stand particularily well on their own, but together they would make a very good chapter with enough content to actually constitute a chapter.

Cha. Good stuff.

-Karma[/size][/color]