"Cafe" Draft ver. 6

Sorry it took so fuckin' long for me to get around to this. Mighta missed some stuff, and I also have a tendency to write how I talk so all my advice and edits are written in a very casual tone. 1) giving him an always tired look even though he was energetic most of the time. Because of poor posture he tended to slouch constantly. 1a) "an always tired look" reads poorly. Rephrase it to "giving the impression that he was always tired" or something to that effect. 1b) Don't be afraid to use semicolons. The Oatmeal has a great comic on how to use them. "most of the time; because of poor posture, he tended to slouch constantly." 2) Despite being two years older than me we graduated at the same time this past spring. Not because he was dumb or anything like that. He was about average in terms of smarts. 2a) Read everything you write out loud. If you read the first sentence as written, there's no pause at all. It's a bit long for a sentence in a story that's written from an FPP. "...older than me, we graduated..." 2b) This is more a personal preference than anything else but when writing a story from an FPP, imagine that your writing is someone talking to you and telling you the story. "Not because he was dumb..." reads poorly to me, and you could rephrase it to "It wasn't because he was dumb..." or something to that effect. You could also use a semicolon here to connect the last two sentences. 3) “Sweet! I made it!” he cheered 3a) If your quotation ends with something that isn't a comma, grammar rules still apply as far as I know, so the H in "he" should be capitalized. You can also add in a comma after the word "cheered" 4) It's just that unless he was particularly interested in something he'd have an incredibly difficult time getting motivated. 4a) Comma between "something" and "he'd" 5) He'd wait til I left and laugh at my misfortune. 5a) Nitpicking, but in written dialogue, til usually has an apostraphe before it, so it would be 'til. 6) In my wallet was a five dollar bill between a crumbled receipt I was saving for some reason and a coupon for a free soda at a gas station. 6a) "...I was saving for some reason, and a coupon..." 7) She led me to a table close to the back and sat me down. Then she handed me the menu she was holding. 7a) These sentences don't need to be broken up. You could rephrase it to: "She led me to a table close to the back and sat me down, handing me the menu (that) she was holding." (That) being an optional word you can drop in. It won't change anything, but you ought to read the sentence out loud with and without the word "that" where I specified. 8) “Here you go! Enjoy!” she said 8a) Capitalize the S in she, since it comes after an exclamation mark. 9) To be honest I couldn't tell if this was suppose to be 9a) supposed to be. "I suppose." "You supposed?" etc. Wrong syntax or whatever. This applies to the following sentence as well. 10) "How is it?" she 10a) She 11) “Why the hell did you kiss me down there?” I blurted out. “Oh, that? I wanted to throw you off. Man, you were totally zoning out after that. Made it way easier to lead you up here. 11a) Consistency. You imply that they are now upstairs, but never explicitly state that they go upstairs. While a small thing to overlook, it still should be edited for consistency. 11 I) She grabbed my hand and led me to the back of the cafe. There was a staircase that led to a supply closet and a break room. 12) Despite my larger frame the bodysuit zipped up with little struggle 12a) "frame, the bodysuit" 13)through the mask's hair as if it was securely attached to my skull 13a) "mask's hair, as if" 14) or caring about my presence he quickly stripped 14a) "or caring" reads poorly. Consider rephrasing it to "nor regard" 14b) "presence, he" 15) petite short latino girl 15a) Latina is the feminine, latino being the masculine. 16) hollywood stereotype 16a) Hollywood is a proper noun. Capitalize the H. 17) “Yes!” he clapped 17a) He 17b) If you made it this far, I'm gonna assume you know what I'm going for when I nitpick about comma placement and capitalization after quotation marks. I'm gonna skip over those from this point on. 18) had a gray stubble 18a) Just "gray stubble" not "a gray stubble" as stubble is plural; it refers to all of the facial hair. 19) bunch of hollywood 19a) Proper noun. Hollywood. 20)for the job. And despite 20a) Not dialogue; try not to start non-dialogue sentences with and. If you want to do that, use a comma or find a replacement word/phrase. Instead of "And despite" you have a few options. You can remove the "and" from the sentence entirely, or say something like "In spite of" rather than "despite"

Himesama