Writing The Otaku Prose Contest Round 2 (Anomaly VS. Shy)

[Mykul]

[CENTER]Hello again, and welcome to the

[SIZE="4"][B]GREAT OTAKU PROSE CONTEST[/B][/SIZE]

[SIZE="3"][B]Round 2[/B][/SIZE]

[FONT="Arial Black"][SIZE="4"][B]ANOMALY VERSUS SHY[/CENTER][/B][/SIZE][/FONT]
[SIZE="1"]
[CENTER]Voting is open to all Otaku members except Anomaly and Shy. Voters, please state your vote clearly. Also, please provide information that shows why you voted the way you did. [COLOR="Red"]The deadline for voting is Saturday, March 28.[/COLOR][/CENTER][/SIZE]

[FONT="Courier New"][B][U][SIZE="4"]The Challenge: Joyful and Triumphant[/SIZE][/U][/B][/FONT]
This challenge is meant to be the antithesis of that given to Vicky and DeLarge. Each contestant will write a piece between [SIZE="3"]400[/SIZE] and [SIZE="4"]800[/SIZE] words. The goal here is to lift the spirits of your reader. Voters, choose whichever story elevates your mood the highest.

[SIZE="1"][COLOR="Red"]All submissions should be in by Saturday, March 21.[/COLOR][/SIZE]

[OMNOMNOMALY]

[FONT="Garamond"]I held off as long as I could D: I finished like 2 days ago but I was doing the sneaky thing to see what I was up against =P anyways, here is my attempt at happiness. It was hard! Reeeeally far away from what I usually write. But I did try.


[I]Dear you,

Hey, it?s me. It?s Alexa.

We haven?t met yet, but there a few things I want to get straight: I?m not going to change who I am or change who you are, so that we have a better chance of lasting. If we?re meant to be, we?re meant to be, and other such cliché nonsense.

You?re going to win me over because you know a lot about books and you look really cute when you study because your mouth does this endearing twitch when you concentrate really hard.

We?re definitely going to argue sometimes. That?s just how it is. I?m not upset that we?re going to fight, everybody fights. If we don?t fight, that?s when I?ll be worried. You know those couples, the ones who say they never fight, that things are ?perfect?? They?re all liars. They are the most dysfunctional couples of them all. I don?t want to be perfect. You don?t want that either.

I am going to drive you nuts with my indecisiveness. Not because I have no direction in life or anything, but because I have such trouble making the smallest decisions. In the grocery store you?re going to tap your foot and check your watch constantly as I stand in front of the juice section for 15 minutes trying to decide which juice I?d like more. Do I want Tropicana orange juice? Omega 3 enriched Minute Maid? From concentrate or not? I have always loved apple orange peach? You?re going to drive me equally nuts because you cannot remember to put the toilet seat down. I?m going to make a fuss when I wake up early in the morning to go to work and I?m going to make sure I slam it down pretty loudly so I can wake you up. You?re going to call me an asshole. I?m definitely going to deserve it.

You?re going to meet my Mom and Dad. You?ll love my Mom! She?s pretty great. You?re going to get along really well. My Dad?s a bit more difficult to handle, but I know you can do it. He is probably going to try and teach you how to cook, which means that he likes you. This may be for the best as he is quite a good cook and I can?t cook for crap. Someone out of the two of us should know how to cook, you know, if we plan on living together. Dibs out.

We?re going to play video games together. You?ll scold me sometimes because I haven?t played a lot of the older games, but we?ll always agree that Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is a fantastic game. You?ll make fun of me for being awful at shooting games and I?ll occasionally get lucky in a fighting game and button-mash-combo my way to victory, and I?ll hold it over your head for days, especially in front of your friends. I?ll always kick your ass at any version of Katamari and I?ll sing along to those gibberish-sounding songs while doing it. I might teach you the secret, sometime, but you?ll have to be nice.

We?re going to have mandatory book club meetings, and by book club I mean just you and me. We?re going to spend days agonizing over what book to pick next and eventually have to devise a better system than just walking into Chapters and wandering around. The day where we spend so long in there that we almost get locked in is going to be the day that convinces us to have more of a plan.
We?re going to get a puppy. I think we might name him after a Pokemon. We both love puppies and we both love Pokemon so I?m thinking that it only makes sense. But it is up for debate, of course. I?m kind of allergic so we?re going to have to stock up on a lot of allergy medications. But it?s worth it, because puppies rock. I fucking love puppies.

And I just want you to know I?m not going to look for you. I don?t want you to look for me either, okay? It?s going to happen, if it?s supposed to, you know? No matter what, I?m never ever going to look. But I might ogle a bit. You know. Because I can.

I might be in love with you, eventually. Or I might just love you. I haven?t quite decided which of those I want, yet.

I know that I don?t know a lot of things, but I do know one thing for sure; we?re going to be happy, okay? I can?t promise a lot, but I can promise that.

Anyways, this is a lot to digest of course, so I?ll leave you to think about this.

Love eventually,

Alexa[/I]

795 words :O I actually had to cut it down... a lot xD
[/FONT]

[Shy]

[size=1][indent]Mr. Morton checked his phone again. Again. Again. Again. Hours had passed and still no response. 12:24. It was getting late, but there would be no way that he would be able to sleep tonight after what had happened.

Mr. Morton sat in his living room couch, doing everything in his power not to obsess over the static image on the small screen in front of him. He pet his cat, he organized the papers on his desk, he even watered the flowers that he had planted on the window ceil facing his favorite neighbor?s apartment.

Mr. Morton was a small man, and he lived in an even smaller apartment. He had to wake up early every morning for his job in the office, but chose to wake up even earlier still so that he could run his laps around the block. He was told it was a good way to meet women, but months passed and the only woman he ever saw was his elderly landlady. Just as bad, even after miles and miles of jogging he was still the same sad, round man he always was, only now with a few more gray hairs and a sweat-stained t-shirt.

Mr. Morton worked very hard for a job that didn?t treat him very well. He loved to write beautiful words, but he was paid to ugly ones. Sometimes these words made a contract, other times a termination notice, but they were never beautiful.

Mr. Morton came home every night sadder than the one before. He pet his cat, he took off his tie, and he sat in front of his keyboard, trying to remember exactly why he started to write in the first place. For years he sat there, and it wasn?t until he saw the beautiful woman across the way that he remembered.

Pearl. Just the mention of her name was enough to put butterflies in Mr. Morton?s stomach. They had been neighbors for years, and although he knew very little of her the few details that he did know made her seem absolutely perfect: She loved flowers, hip-hop music and always smiled as she and Mr. Morton exchanged glances from across the way. Now Mr. Morton was smiling too.

Mr. Morton wrote a poem for Pearl. He put it on her door, and three days later they went to a restaurant that neither of them felt comfortable eating at. Pearl ordered an expensive entrée; Mr. Morton had the salad. She talked about the kindergartners she taught; Mr. Morton talked about his cat. Pearl asked him if he was having an allergic reaction; Mr. Morton lied and said that his face always turned bright red when he eats Italian.

Mr. Morton walked down the street, and he was not alone. Pearl smiled, and thanked him for the dinner. She was beautiful. They approached her apartment. She leaned in for a kiss. Mr. Morton opened his mouth.

?[b]I love you.[/b]?

Mr. Morton came home that night much sadder than any night before. He pet his cat, he took off his tie, and he stared into his phone. For the first time Pearl?s window was closed. Mr. Morton sighed. Mr. Morton hated himself. Mr. Morton cried.

Mr. Morton wrote another note, this time to say goodbye. He left a message for his boss to let him know that he would not be coming into work ever again (or anywhere else for that matter.) He pet his cat one final time, and opened the door to leave. Mr. Morton saw a familiar figure smiling at him. Pearl said ?hello.?

Mr. Morton dropped to his knees to apologize. Pearl shook her head and handed him a note of her own. Pearl wrote poems too.

Mr. and Mrs. Morton are very happy now.[/size][/indent]

[Drizzt Do'urden]

After reading both I'm going to have to go with [B]Shy[/B].

It really was the one, between the two, that "lifted my spirits".

Not to take anything away from Anomaly, which was probably the more original of the two, but as far as the challenge goes. Shy's was the one that really hit the mark with the competition.

Great work both of you two, but my vote goes to [B]Shy.[/B]

[DeLarge]

[SIZE=1]Hmm. Tricky one. Anomaly's was happy all the way through, whereas Shy's was a little sad but with a really heart-warming moment that lifted it right up at the end.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=1]Shy's was more straightforward, whereas Anomaly's was done in an interesting way, from a fairly unique point of view. Interesting, though, that you both took love, or relationships as an umbrella topic, to be the most heartwarming and uplifting thing you could think of.

Shy, yours was pretty cheesy, but Anomaly's gave more of an impression of a real relationship - it wasn't a fairytale story of love, and I think that kind of swung it for me.

Kudos to you both, they were both really good fun to read, but my vote goes to [B]Anomaly[/B].
[/SIZE]

[Vicky]

[size=1]Difficult, definitely.

I was hoping that one of you would do something that didn't involve love, but ah well. Shy's was very forward and quite sweet, also well written, but my vote goes to Anomaly this time. Her piece managed to touch me more somehow and I like the point of view. I was quite impressed that Shy managed to give us quite a brilliant glimpse into the character's life in a few words but the few inklings of despair in there put me off. The ending to Shy's, however, was definitely the best out of the two.

I'm such a terrible critic...

...Anyway, [b]Anomaly[/b].

Totally awesome submissions guys. As you can tell I was stuck for reasons for why I picked my choice XD[/size]

[Rachmaninoff]

There were things about both that I liked. Anomaly's was the look to the person they were going to be happy with, Shy's more towards the person they actually ended up with. That made it hard to choose since they both had good points. In the end, I'm going to vote for [B]Shy[/B].

[Mykul]

Really? A tie? :animesigh

Here's what's going to happen:

[COLOR="Red"]I'm going to leave this thread open to voting until Tuesday Morning.[/COLOR]

If the tie isn't broken by then, I'll cast a single vote and break it myself.

[Aaryanna]

[COLOR="DarkGreen"][FONT="Tahoma"]Hmmmm, I'll vote. It's hard to pick since they both have nice tones of hope, love and expectation. There was only one thing I didn't care for and that was the bit of despair in Shy's. It just distracted a bit from the happy ending. So since that threw me off a tiny bit, I'll be giving my vote to [B]Anomaly[/B]. They were both fun to read guys. :catgirl:[/FONT][/COLOR]

[Mykul]

[quote name='Aaryanna'][COLOR="DarkGreen"][FONT="Tahoma"]Hmmmm, I'll vote. It's hard to pick since they both have nice tones of hope, love and expectation. There was only one thing I didn't care for and that was the bit of despair in Shy's. It just distracted a bit from the happy ending. So since that threw me off a tiny bit, I'll be giving my vote to [B]Anomaly[/B]. They were both fun to read guys. :catgirl:[/FONT][/COLOR][/QUOTE]

My savior :)

The winner is [SIZE="4"][FONT="Impact"]ANOMALY[/FONT][/SIZE]