Carmina wrote:A gasp. A lurch. Another nightmare.
He wakes, rolls toward her and puts his hand on her shoulder. She starts, shrinks from his touch.
“Don’t.” Her voice is thick. Did she start crying before or after the dream woke her? She seems to sound like that all the time now.
“I just wanted to…” Comfort you. Make it all right.
Um... perhaps it was just me, but when I first read this, I thought that the man was the one with the nightmare.
“Just don’t.” She sits up, reaches for her bathrobe and pulls it around her shoulders.
In the lurid green glow of the clock,
Lurid? LURID! What are you using that word for! Not only is it a strange word that interrupts the flow of the story, but it means several different things.
1. Causing shock or horror; gruesome.
2. Marked by sensationalism: a lurid account of the crime. See Synonyms at ghastly.
3. Glowing or shining with the glare of fire through a haze: lurid flames.
4. Sallow or pallid in color.
I suppose you might be able to get away with using the word if it was more common, but it isn't and it breaks up the flow of the story.
In the hall outside the bedroom, the dog stirs, whines, and resettles with her back against the bedroom door, which thumps against the door jam.
What are you trying to say?
Sorry Sweetie, you’re not allowed in here anymore.
The dog or the man? Since the paragraph above this wasn't too clear, now this sentence seems to lack meaning.
He rolls back to his side of the bed and looks at the clock. 2:ooa.m.
Use zeroes, not "o." It looks annoying.
How many nights like this? How long since they slept through the night, together, curled one with the other? It hasn’t been that long.
A tricky call, but I would go with hadn't. After all, you say "slept" so why not "hadn't?"
A few weeks? The change had been sudden, traumatic. He knows what caused it, the nightmares, the distance. Would never forget.
Would never forget. Who? Don't use the passive tense now!
And... that's all I could see. Yay!
Some of the characters were confusing, and you can make it better by clarifying some sentences.
Don't get me wrong! This was one of the better stories I've seen here!
And... um... I always figured the lady was raped.
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