Young Writers Society

Hey! Long time since i've been on here. Haven't been writing in ages but I started again recently. This is just something I scribbled down in about half an hour, and I'm not too experienced in writing novels so I don't expect it is the best. But was wondering if you guys could let me know what you think! Sorry in advance for any spelling mistakes, it was written in wordpad as my new computer doesn't have MS word! here it is:

I had never really adapted to my new life in London. I was always telling myself it's just as good as Lisburn, but I have never beleived myself for a second. I made some great friends in London, but none as great as the friend's I left behind, and living without a family is never easy. I despised having to do my own ironing, washing up and cooking. Cooking was the worst part because not only was it incredibly messy and difficult, but nothing I ever cooked ever tasted half decent. It was always burnt, or undercooked, and from time to time it would be both. I started getting rather depressed, and after living in London for a few months I started seeing a Therapist. I told him of all my trivial problems, and how I was down because I had yet another essay due in and no time to do it in, and how my hoover broke and I can't afford a new one so i'm just letting the dirt build up. But as soon as I mentioned what happened with my brother, and the recurring dreams i'd been having since the very day I first arrived in London he knew that all my problems came from this source. He was write, my mum was a terrible cook but I never copmlianed, and she never bothered herself to do any cleaning. Not like dad's new girlfriend Cindy, her house is never anything less than immaculate. But my own mother never lifted a finger and I never once complained. My therapist, he told me the reason I tried to blame my problems on trivial things like that was because they are much easier to control, and if our problems are easy to control then we don't really have any problems to begin with. But what happened to my brother, what was causing my emotional state was so far from my control that it was unberable.

I can remember the night my brother went missing as clear as ever, even today. I was set to go to London the next day. I wanted to go a few months early so I could get set up and settle in, ready for university in October. My friends were doing similar things, and we knew that very shortly we would all be parting ways. So we planned a big night out together, just me, my three closest friends and my brother Joe. But I couldn't bare to leave my mother alone on my last night in Northern Ireland. I have never been keen on change, which was why I wanted to go to London early, so I could adapt to the change of scenary before I would have to adapt to university life. I caught my mum crying in her room, she had her face burried in her pillow so I wouldn't hear her. But I did hear her, and it upset me so much that I burst into tears, right after I'd finished doing my make up. I was an emotional wreck that night, and couldn't face going out. I decided to stay home with my mum and spend my last night in Northern Ireland with her, after all we were incredibly close and I'd known her longer than any of my friends. My brother went out anyway, he quite fancied my friend Michelle and was desperate to get talking to her that night, although knowing my brother i'm sure he was hoping for more than just a chat. I sat up all night with my mum, we talked for ages about how things change, and debated for hours over weather it was a good thing or not. I concluded that it wasn't, because if we are happy with our situation then why is there the need to change it? My mum concluded it was a good thing, because if nothing changed then we would get bored with our current situation, however sometimes things change a lot faster than we would like them to. The conversation then moved on to more optimistic things, like the fact she had 'borrowed' a few bottles of wine from her friend's house last night. We cracked them open and drank until the early hours of the next morning. I tried my best to stay as sober as possible, knowing I had to travel later that day, and travelling with a hangover is one of the most miserable things you can do. My mum, not having to catch a plane, and trying to cope with the fact her only daughter is leaving the country, drank as much as she could.

It wasn't until just before 3am when mum exclaimed "where the hell is your brother?" that I realized something was wrong. She was to tipsy to be properly concenred, but I knew something was up. They went to chesters, which closes at a quarter past one in the morning, why wouldn't he be home yet? I tried to calm myself by telling myself he'd probably just gone back to Michelle's house or something. So i lifted my mobile and dialed his number, his phone rang but he didn't pick up. After just less than a minute it went onto the answerphone. I nearly fainted, I was in a right panic. I phoned back three times, each time no answer. My mum phoned him from her phone, and the house phone and she too became very concerned. When I phoned Michelle I got a very bad feeling in my stomach, and almost threw up.
"Michelle, have you seen Joe?" I asked in a panic, she was slightly tipsy and so I couldn't make out a word of her response. "Michelle, listen to me. Have you seen Joe?"
"Joe? Joe isn't here, I haven't seen Joe" she said. She wasn't tipsy. She sounded as if she was about to be sick.
"Did he go out with you tonight Michelle?" I asked, getting incredibly worried. She didn't speak, and a few seconds later I heard another voice on the phone.
"Hello?" It was the voice of my friend Sandra, who doesn't drink.
"Sandra thank god. Is Joe with you?"
"No he didn't show up at the house so we left without him. Thought he wasn't coming since you were staying home. ... Hello? Is everything all right?"

I was so worried that I couldn't speak, I just hung up the phone and looked at mum in horror, she looked back with a similar expression. It seemed that worst had come to worst.

We phoned everyone we knew, and everyone that Joe knew that night, desperate to track him down. My mum constantly phoned him on his mobile, but by 5am we had still had no luck and decided to phone the police. I didn't go to London after all, I stayed home and tried desperatly to help find my brother, but three months later he was still nowhere to be seen. It was the most peculiar thing, both him and his car had dissapeared of the face of the planet, there wasn't even a single clue as to where he might be. I spent months at home doing nothing but lying in bed crying, occasionally venturing downstairs to eat. I found a way to assign guilt to myself, as I tend to do with most things. If only I had been there, I could have protected him. I blamed myself for staying in, it took me years to realize that even if I had gone there would have been little I could have done. I don't even know what happened. Mum has always been hopeful that one day we will find him, but I was never as optimistic. Within the first 12 hours of him being gone I was almost certain I would never see him again.

One day at the beggining of september I remember coming downstairs to get some cereal. My mum was sitting downstairs reading the paper, and she so casually said to me "I suppose you'll be thinking of heading to London soon? you've less than a month before university starts". I felt another sickness in my stomach, and I started to shake. The idea of going to London now wasn't appealing at all, but I was very aware of the fact that I had no choice. If I didn't go, I would have nothing to do for a whole year, and as I had all ready been on a gap year I couldn't really afford to waste any more time in my life. I sat down and I told my mum I wasn't going, because I couldn't bare to leave her alone. But she was so insistant. Later that day I booked my flight, and left only three days later. Before my brother went missing, despite being incredibly upset for things having to change, I was slightly excited about London. There did seem to be some hope in it, but now it seemed gray and miserable. It offered now hope or optimisim, it was nothing more than an other stage in my life. A stage I didn't expect I would want to remember. My mum told me not to worry, I'm only feeling this now but after I have some more time I will come to terms with the idea of life without Joe, and I will be able to live my life once more. I was hopeful that things would turn out that way but they never did, almost six months after I was as miserable as I had ever been.

The first night I arrived in London, I had the most terrible dream. It has reccured at least once a week ever since that first night, and I still have it occasionally even now. The details of the dream differed slightly every time, but the basic frame of the dream would be my brother on a beach. I would be behind some trees, watching him from a distant as he walks along the beach. Almost 100% of the time the sea was wroth and it would be raining heavily. I remember however, on joe's birthday I dreamt that it was sunny, and he didn't die that time. Everyother time, he dies. Sometimes he get's shot from the distance, but I never see who is holding the gun. Sometimes he drowns himself, and sometimes he just dies. Falls over and doesn't get back up. The most disturbing dreams however, are the ones in which I am his cause of death. Sometimes I dream that all of a sudden I just start walking towards him, then I strangle him, and sometimes I drown him, and sometimes I mutilate him with a knife. My therapist says these dreams are my mind trying to offer an explanation as to what might have happened to him. Was he murdered? Did he kill himself? or did he die naturally? In the dreams where I kill him, my therapist says this is a result of me blaming myself for his death.

yes. so any crit you guys wnat to leave, it would be lovely

yes. so any crit you guys wnat to leave, it would be lovely

Alright, in order:

1. You didn't capitalize the first letter of the sentence. Come on, this is stuff they teach you in first grade!
2. Typo, should be want.
3. There should be a period at the end of the sentence.

Now for your story.

I had never really adapted to my new life in London.

Nice opening line.

I was always telling myself it's just as good as Lisburn, but I have never beleived myself for a second.

1. Typo, it should be believed.

I made some great friends in London, but none as great as the friend's I left behind, and living without a family is never easy.

2. The contraction "wasn't" would fit in better. This is because the final clause is imperfect.

I despised having to do my own ironing, washing up and cooking. Cooking was the worst part because not only was it incredibly messy and difficult, but nothing I ever cooked ever tasted half decent. It was always burnt, or undercooked, and from time to time it would be both.

This is good.

I started getting rather depressed, and after living in London for a few months I started seeing a Therapist. I told him of all my trivial problems, and how I was down because I had yet another essay due in and no time to do it in, and how my hoover broke and I can't afford a new one so i'm just letting the dirt build up. But as soon as I mentioned what happened with my brother, and the recurring dreams i'd been having since the very day I first arrived in London he knew that all my problems came from this source.

This should be made into a new paragraph.

He was write, my mum was a terrible cook but I never copmlianed, and she never bothered herself to do any cleaning.

1. Typo, write should be right.
2. Typo, copmlianed should be complained.
3. This sentence should be the start of a new paragraph.

Not like dad's new girlfriend Cindy, her house is never anything less than immaculate. But my own mother never lifted a finger and I never once complained.

Good.

My therapist, he told me the reason I tried to blame my problems on trivial things like that was because they are much easier to control, and if our problems are easy to control then we don't really have any problems to begin with.

1. "He" is already defined earlier in the sentence, so you don't need this word.

But what happened to my brother, what was causing my emotional state was so far from my control that it was unberable.

1. Typo, should be "unbearable".

Someone else can finish this.

Time for part 2.

I can remember the night my brother went missing as clear as ever, even today.

1. There is no reason for this to be included because ever includes "today".

I was set to go to London the next day. I wanted to go a few months early so I could get set up and settle in, ready for university in October.

1. Using the word "was" is an improper use of the imperfect tense. You use the imperfect when you're describing routine or vague past events (one easy way to remember the imperfect is that it is the "was"ing tense). If your character is describing a specific past even, you should use the past tense. In this particular case, the best word choice would be "had".

2. This doesn't match the rest of the sentence. Is it that your character was moving in so he would be ready for university in October? Rework this sentence so that we know what the character was preparing for, school or moving in.

My friends were doing similar things, and we knew that very shortly we would all be parting ways.

1. Preparing to move or preparing for school?
2. Since there are only two clauses, you don't need a comma in front of and.

So we planned a big night out together, just me, my three closest friends and my brother Joe.

1. This should be a colon.

But I couldn't bare to leave my mother alone on my last night in Northern Ireland.

1. Delete but; it is unnecessary.
2. Typo, should be "bear". Remember "I can't bear the pain," vs. "Bare Naked Ladies".

I have never been keen on change, which was why I wanted to go to London early, so I could adapt to the change of scenary before I would have to adapt to university life.

1. This sentence is a run on sentence. Delete the comma and the word "So" and replace it with a period.
2. Replace could with "wanted".
3. Replace "would have to adapt" with "adapted".

I caught my mum crying in her room, she had her face burried in her pillow so I wouldn't hear her.

1. Should be a semi-colon.
2. Typo, should be buried.

But I did hear her, and it upset me so much that I burst into tears, right after I'd finished doing my make up.

1. Delete this, it is unnecessary.
2. Delete the comma, there shouldn't be a break in the sentence here.
3. Make up should have a hyphen, "make-up".
4. Wait a minute, is our protagonist a he or a she? Either way, you should have mentioned this in the first paragraph, not the fourth or fifth one. This is an important detail about the character's identity! Also, why does she burst out in tears? Give us a reason!

I was an emotional wreck that night, and couldn't face going out.

Now you know why it is important to give us a reason, otherwise we wouldn't understand why she was an emotional wreck. By not giving a reason, you reduce the power fo the scene. If you write in an extra scene with some dialogue about why the characters mom was crying and how this affected your protagonist, then this sentence would become completely unnecessary.

I decided to stay home with my mum and spend my last night in Northern Ireland with her, after all we were incredibly close and I'd known her longer than any of my friends.

1. You can delete all of this.

My brother went out anyway, he quite fancied my friend Michelle and was desperate to get talking to her that night, although knowing my brother i'm sure he was hoping for more than just a chat.

1. Should be "he was".
2. Should be "talk"
3. Typo, should be "I'm". This is a contraction for "I am", this is why the I is capitalized.

I sat up all night with my mum, we talked for ages about how things change, and debated for hours over weather it was a good thing or not.

1. Make the sentence the beginning of a new paragraph.
2. Should be a period.
3. Should be "We".
4. Delete the comma, since there is only two clauses.
5. Typo, should be "whether". "Weather" is what your meterologist talks to you about on the evening news.

I concluded that it wasn't, because if we are happy with our situation then why is there the need to change it? My mum concluded it was a good thing, because if nothing changed then we would get bored with our current situation, however sometimes things change a lot faster than we would like them to. The conversation then moved on to more optimistic things, like the fact she had 'borrowed' a few bottles of wine from her friend's house last night. We cracked them open and drank until the early hours of the next morning. I tried my best to stay as sober as possible, knowing I had to travel later that day, and travelling with a hangover is one of the most miserable things you can do. My mum, not having to catch a plane, and trying to cope with the fact her only daughter is leaving the country, drank as much as she could.

All this is completely unnecessary because you summarized it in the beginning sentence. If you want certain elements (such as drinking or her opinion on change) then you can summarize them with the topic sentence. Once you've summarized it, you don't need to do a play by play.

That's all for now.

Hehe, thanks for that! wow I didn't realize how many mistakes I made! I really need to get Microsoft word! I'll go about fixing that right away, although I think i'm going to mash in this chapter with the second. So, did you think it was readable? interesting, or just boring?

The readability was really difficult, your big paragraphs usually could be broken into several paragraphs (remember one paragraph=1 Topic Sentence and 4+ details for the topic sentence).

It wasn't really interesting because there wasn't much in the way of suspense. In fact, the attitude was really anti-climatic.

Your mistake was in telling us that the brother was missing before you described her reaction. If it was only a paragraph of reaction, it might be better.

What you tried to do was build up the suspense by extending the reaction over several paragraphs, but the suspense was nullified because we already knew the end result! So, you spent a lot of time, but it had no effect because of a single sentence. So it did turn boring.

What I'd do to make it more interesting was to write it in the present tense. Just think of it. She's getting ready to go out and celebrate when she comes across her mom crying. She stays behind while her brother goes out. Mom and daughter talk a bit about change. After a while though, they get worried; where is her brother? She calls up her friends; they haven't seen him. This would be a suspensful start to your novel.

Ok, so here is the new chapter one! It's still slightly grammatically incorrect and with bad spelling, but it's the story that counts! So yes, please read it and feel free to crit!


"Will you get up!" Shouted Natasha as she slapped my bare legs with her rolled up magazine. I pulled my legs under the covers and hid my face in the pillow. She tutted and then proceded to hit me with her magazine a few more times. "Come on! you can't spend everyday in Bed. It's nearly lunch time!"
"I'm tired!" I argued, but Natasha knew I was lying.
"You went to bed at nine last night you bloody liar, now get up before I hurt you with this" she exclaimed as she held the magazine high, ready to thump me with it again. I realized I had no choice but to get up, Natasha seemed pretty detirmined to make me move so unless I wanted to spend the entire day being beaten to death by womans weekly, I had no choice. Slowly I pulled myself up and threw the covers to the side.
"All right, All right. I'm getting up" I said, admitting my defeat.
"Great. Hurry up and get dressed, your coming shopping with me and Melissa. I'll be in the kitchen" she said, smiling. She danced out of the room, as happy as she was every morning, shutting the door behind her. As soon as she was gone I crawled back into bed and closed my eyes, shopping was one of the last things I felt like doing right now. I had spent the last few saturdays in bed, and each week Natasha had tried her hardest to get me up. I knew this week she wasn't going to take no for an answer, she was becoming more and more persistent each week and I couldn't be bothered going through the whole ordeal once more. I tried to think of an excuse as to why I couldn't go shopping, but I couldn't think of a single thing Natasha was likely to beleive, and so against my will I pulled myself out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom.

When I first came to London almost a year ago, I was an emotional wreck. I had originally planned to move to London in July, even though University didn't start until September. I wanted to go over so that I could get myself all set up and get used to life alone. Most of my friends were doing the same thing, so the night before I left we had arranged a big night out together, for the last time. When I was at home in the bathroom getting myself all ready to go out, I heard crying coming from my mums room. I put down my make up and went into her room to find her crying in her pillow. I felt so terrible, the sight of her like this reduced me to tears. I hugged her and she told me she was gonig to miss me, and she was just upset that her youngest daughter was moving out. I realized how much I was going to miss her, and how much I loved her. I couldn't bare to leave her, so I decided not to go out that night after all. I wanted to spend my last night at home with my mother. My brother, however, was detirmined to go out anyway. He was only a year older than me so we shared many of the same friends. He wasn't going to university though, he all ready had a full time job as a sound technician for the BBC. He also tried to pitch ideas for reality television, but none of his ideas ever got picked up. So he went on out, but I stayed home with my mother. We got pizza, opened a couple of bottles of wine and spent the whole night sitting up talking. I tried my best to stay as sober as possible, knowing I had to travel later that day, and travelling with a hangover is one of the most miserable things you can do. My mum, not having to catch a plane, and trying to cope with the fact her only daughter is leaving the country, drank as much as she could.

By 3am we were both still awake, and my mum couldn't stand. She was talking away to me, complete rubbish of course. I wasn't listening, just nodding occasionally and trying my best not to fall asleep. I was just about ready to help her up to bed and go to sleep myself when she exclaimed "Where the bloody hell is yuor brother? He's normally home by now". When she said that I was filled with a terrible sense of forebodding, nothing short of dejavu. He had gone to Chesters in Moira, which closed at 1:15am every morning. Unless he had gone back to a friend's house, I had no idea where he was. I lifted my mobile and rang his number but he didn't pick up, and I was starting to panic. My brother, Joe, was the responsible one. It wasn't at all like him to go missing, and if he were going on to a friends house I was certain he would have called. I gave Michelle a ring, he had been with him. But the conversation I had with her was not at all pleasent, and made me feel sick to the stomach.

"Michelle, have you seen Joe?" I asked her in a panic. Her response was completely uncomprehensiable, and it became immiedatly clear that she was rather tipsy. "Michelle, listen to me. Have you seen Joe?"
"Joe? Joe isn't here, I haven't seen Joe". That's when I realized she wasn't tipsy, she was ready to throw up.
"Did he go out with you tonight Michelle?" I asked. I was starting to sweat now, and speaking very quickly.
"Hello?" It was the voice of my friend Sandra, who doesn't drink.
"Sandra thank god. Is Joe with you?"
"No he didn't show up at the house so we left without him. Thought he wasn't coming since you were staying home. ... Hello? Is everything all right?"

At this point I was in complete shock, and more worried than I had ever been before in my life. My mum was looking at me with tears in her eyes, she knew the news was bad. We spent the next two hours phoning everyone Joe knew, and constantly phoning him on his mobile and leaving messages, but by 5am we still had no idea where he could be. I didn't go to London the next day as planned, I stayed home and did everything I could to try and find Joe. For at least two weeks that was all my life consisted of, doing everything I could to track him down. Visiting every bar, asking if they'd seen him, tracking down everyone he knew, putting up posters, we did everything we could to try and find him. It was the most peculiar thing, both him and his car had dissapeared of the face of the planet, there wasn't even a single clue as to where he might be. I spent months at home doing nothing but lying in bed crying, occasionally venturing downstairs to eat. I even found a way to assign guilt to myself, as I tend to do with most things. If only I had been there, I could have protected him. I blamed myself for staying in, it took me years to realize that even if I had gone there would have been little I could have done. I don't even know what happened. Mum has always been hopeful that one day we will find him, but I was never as optimistic. Within the first 12 hours of him being gone I was almost certain I would never see him again.

One day at the beggining of september I remember coming downstairs to get some cereal. My mum was sitting downstairs reading the paper, and she so casually said to me "I suppose you'll be thinking of heading to London soon? you've less than a month before university starts". I felt another sickness in my stomach, and I started to shake. The idea of going to London now wasn't appealing at all, but I was very aware of the fact that I had no choice. If I didn't go, I would have nothing to do for a whole year, and would lose my place in Oxford.I sat down and I told my mum I wasn't going, because I couldn't bare to leave her alone. But she was so insistant. I told her I couldn't do it, and I broke down into tears. She comforted me, and insisted I went to London. I didn't want to go then, but knew it was what I had to do, and so later that day I booked my flight and left one week later. I wasn't optimistic about going at all, London didn't seem to offer me anything beneficial whatsoever. I just wanted to be at home, or wherever my brother was.

The first few months in London where torture. I had to go to university, come home and do assignments, and keep up with Natasha and her hectic social life. I spent most of my free time in bed attempting to sleep. Everything seemed to get me down, I despised having to do my own ironing, washing up and cooking. Cooking was the worst part because not only was it incredibly messy and difficult, but nothing I ever cooked ever tasted half decent. It was always burnt, or undercooked, and from time to time it would be both. My life was just not at all what I wanted it to be, and my brother was alwyas on my mind. The worst part about it however, where the nightmares. I had a nightmare the very first night I arrived in London, and it reccured for 3 months.

The details of the dream differed slightly every time, but the basic frame of the dream would be my brother on a beach. I would be behind some trees, watching him from a distant as he walks along. The sea would never be calm, it would always be rough and there was nearly always rain, and often thunder and lightening as well. I would watch him for a short time, and then eventually he would die. Sometimes he get's shot from a distance, but I never see who is holding the gun. Sometimes he drowns himself, and sometimes he just dies. Falls over and doesn't get back up. The most disturbing dreams however, are the ones in which I am his cause of death. Sometimes I dream that all of a sudden I just start walking towards him, then I strangle him, and sometimes I drown him, and sometimes I mutilate him with a knife. The dreams disturbed me so much that I went to see a Therapist about them. My therapist said these dreams are my mind trying to offer an explanation as to what might have happened to him. Was he murdered? Did he kill himself? or did he die naturally? In the dreams where I kill him, my therapist said this was a result of me blaming myself for his death. The first time I saw him, was on Joe's birthday. I remember that night I had the same dream, but there were some radical changes. It was sunny, it wasn't raining and Joe didn't die in the dream. It was nice.

Slowly but surely as I got used to life in London, and life without Joe, the dreams stopped, and the depression left with it. My life almost felt normal again for a while, but then towards the start of May the dreams started again and the depression returned with it.

I looked at myself in the dirty mirror. My hair was a complete mess, I didn't even know how to go about taming it. I had long naturally blonde hair, which had some black highlights in it at the minute. It came down past my shoulders and finished around the middle of my back. It was ridiculously long and I was planning to get it cut at the next oppurtunity. I grabbed a brush and started to tackle it. My fringe was getting too long now as well, it was getting in my eyes and annoying me quite a lot. I decided that as soon as I got it cut I would get rid of my fringe forever. When I had sorted my hair out, I cleaned my teeth and washed my face. Then I moved back into the bedroom to get dressed. I wasn't particularly in the mood for anything fancy so I just threw on a nice pair of jeans and a white t-shirt. My eyes were still heavy and I felt like getting back into bed and going to sleep. But instead I forced myself out into the kitchen where Natasha had all ready left me some breakfast. She'd made toast, which was a shame because she can't butter bread without tearing it apart.
"Wow, see? you look much better out of bed. How are you feeling?" she said as she bit into a bit of toast, spilling crumbs all down herself.
"I'm tired" I said, as I sat down and reached for the paper.
"Well don't worry, I just know once you get outside you'll be fine. I'm so glad your actually coming with us this week, but don't take all day on breakfast Chantelle. Melissa will be here in a few minutes". She smiled and lifted the paper away from in front of me. She folded it and went back into her room. "I'm just going to put on some lipstick. Be out in a second". I laughed and smiled. Natasha was really a nice girl, but she often came across as very rude and most of the time I wanted to smash her head against something.

Of course compared to my other friend Melisa, Natasha was a blessing. I liked to think of Melissa as being my friend only by association. She was very loud, very obnoxious and the most self-concious person I had ever met. She didn't go to university with me and Natasha, but she was Natasha's cousin and the two of them spent all their time together. Since Natasha was my best friend, this unfortunatly meant that I also had to spend a lot of time with Melissa. Before I had time to finish my mutilated toast the door bell rang and I had to get up and answer it. When Melissa saw me up a big silly smile stretched across her face and she threw her arms around me.
"Oh Chantelle! Natasha said you weren't coming! I'm so glad to see you up" she said, in her annoying squeaky voice. All I could do was smile though, it was nice to know so many people were concerned. Melissa had always claimed I was very funny, and she always said she liked me, so when I slipped back into a depression she was honestly concerned. She was actually quite a sympathetic person, and far more caring than I would have expected her to be as her apperance always portrays her as very self-obsorbant and self-concious.

"Now that your finally coming shopping with us, i'm going to take you somewhere nice and were going to get you a proper hair cut" she said as she took my tatty hair in her hands and looked at it with pity. I laughed.
"You know I was just thinking that this morning" I said.
"You were? I'm telling you, once we get you a nice hair-cut whatever your gonig through will be over. If you can't look fabulous, then you can't feel fabulous". She smiled and quickly danced past me into Natashas bedroom. I went back to my toast thinking about what she had just said. To an extent she was right, I mean everyone feels better about themselves when they know they look great. However when it comes to someone who is suffering from nightmares and depression, there is better advice to be given. But that sentence summed Melissa up rather well, 'If you can't look fabulous, you can't feel fabulous'. She was sympathetic, but completely obsessed with apperance and too materialistic for her own good.

Natasha didn't take long to finish getting ready, and so as soon as I finished my toast the three of us headed out. We spent the whole day shopping, and I actually had a really great day. After we'd been round most of the shops we stopped in Subway and got some lunch.
"So Natasha, you never told me what you thought of my new top" said Melissa as she took it out of her bag and held it up for us to see.
"To be honest, I don't like it" Natasha bravely admitted before taking a sip of her coke. The look on Melissa's face was very comical and I couldn't help but giggle a little bit. Natasha looked at me and smiled, happy to see I was enjoying myself but Melissa hardly noticed.
"Why on earth not? it's so cute!" Melissa demanded
"Well it is, but I've just never really thought cream was your colour" Natasha said "You always look very good in bright colours, I just can't see you in cream"
"Your talking rubbish, I always wear bright colours. I thought cream would be a nice change" she said, remaining insitant that she had made the right choice.
"Well I think you'll look lovely in it" I said. I was being sarcastic of course, and couldn't help but laugh. Melissa just shook her head and folded the top. She went put it back in her bag and started looking through her other bags. I hadn't noticed how much she had bought.
"Well you certainly did spend your money today, I don't even remeber being in topshop" I said noticing a topshop bag amongst her things.
"Oh I went in there while you two were at the toilet. I got the cutest hat in there, it will be perfect for summer. Oh, and did I show you what else I got? there handing these out on the streets, I think i'm going to apply"

She took a leaflet out of her bag and put it on the table. As soon as I read the title my heart stopped, and I felt like I was going to faint. Everything around me ceased to exist and I stared endlessly at the small leaflet until Melissa pulled it out of my view. "The Island" it said, in big capital letters, with a picture of a desert island beneath it. the main text read "A new reality television show to be broadcast on the BBC. Are you a survivor? Apply for your chance to survive on a desert island, and win up to six thousdand pounds in the process! Have you got what it takes? if so, we want to hear from you". There was a telephone number and an address beaneth it. I couldn't beleive it, I almost felt like I was about to throw up when I saw it. Suddenly it dissapeared from my view and I was in Subway again.
"Chantelle, earth to Chantelle?" Melissa said.
"Are you all right?" Natasha asked, sounding slightly more concerned than Melissa. I tried to answer them but a lump formed in my throat and I couldn't find the words.
"Chantelle?"
"My brother....My brother created this show. He created the island"

yes, so if anybody wants to crit this then they are welcome too!