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Yours Truly Chloe LaHaye
By GypsyGirl
07 May 2006
Okay this is about a seventeen year old girl from a small town in Wyoming who moves to NYC when her parents divorce.  I suck at summaries. Just read it.  Still in progress


May 5, 2005


I took a bus to New York. A bus.  All the way from Smithland, Wyoming to New York City.  Can you imagine how boring that was?  But Dad can’t afford a plane ticket.  Mom could have but she said she wasn’t going to take part in this, that just because the courts had handed me over to Dad didn’t mean that she had to pay for it.

I don’t know what to think about it.  I mean, I’ve always wanted to visit New York but I don’t know if I’d want to live there.  Especially in Brooklyn, where my dad lives.  I’ve never left Wyoming in my life; I just have this sinking feeling that the city is going to eat me alive.  You know that song, I can’t remember who sings it or what it’s called, but it has these lines “Let that city take you in; let that city spit you out.” Yeah, I’ve been making an effort not to listen to that song.

None of this would be happening if they hadn’t gotten a divorce.  I don’t get it.  For seventeen years, they never argued and all of a sudden, Mom blows up at Dad and kicks him out, Dad moves to New York, Dad files for custody, he gets his attorney to say all this crap about mom having a different man in the house every night (which may be partially true, but they never bother me), and without a say on my behalf, this frickin’ judge sends me, a small-town girl, half-way across the country (on a bus), to live with my dad in Brooklyn.

I got to the bus station at about three-o-clock this afternoon and looked at what I thought were directions on how to get to my dad’s apartment.  Only it wasn’t a set of directions; it was just the number of the apartment building and the street.  Thanks a lot, Dad.  I figured I’d have to find Washington Street on my own.

The city was pretty intimidating.  There were crazy street people on just about every corner, some of which would grab my arm and desperately beg for money.  There were guys who thought themselves to be “gangsters” (maybe some of them were) sitting outside smoking God knows what.  Every once in a while, I would here some sicko whistle behind me and I’d walk a little faster.  One guy seemed to be pretty decent so I asked him how to get to Apartment building 722 on Washington Street.  The guy gave me a smile that made me feel a little uncomfortable.  “Sure I know how to get there,” he said.  “I can give you a ride if you want.”

“Umm…thanks, but I think I can walk myself there if you can just tell me which way,” I answered nervously. 

“Come on, it’s too far to walk.” He grabbed my arm.  “I’ll give you a ride.”

“Get off of me, you creep!” I screamed, breaking loose of his grip.  Before he could grab me again, I saw a taxi pass by.  “Taxi!” I yelled at the top of my lungs, wondering why I hadn’t thought of that in the first place.  The cab stopped and I rushed in and slammed the door shut.

“What’s your hurry?” the driver asked.  “Got a hot date?”

“Not really,” I replied. “Apartment building 722 Washington Street.”

The taxi driver looked back at me incredulously.  “You want me to drive you there?”  I nodded, confused.  “All right.  If you say so.”  He drove about five buildings down ad stopped.  “Here we are,” he said.  “That’s about seventy-five cents.”

“THIS is Apartment building 722?” I asked, getting out.

“Yeah,” the taxi driver said, looking at me once more like I was crazy. 

“So I’ve been on Washington Street the whole time,” I said.

“Look, kid,” the guy said a little annoyed.  “You’re charming.  And I’d love to have a conversation with you, but right now I’ve got a job to do so can you just pay me and go?”  I did and he sped off.

Dad started talking as soon as I came in, asking me how was the trip (boring), did you find the place all right (not exactly), and oh my gawd, he missed me so much.  He went on and on about how great it’s going to be and how much I’m going to love my new school (Which happens to be called public school 136.  My gawd, does everything and everyone in this whole freaking city go by a number?)

The apartment is a piece of crap.  There’s water damage everywhere, the blinds on the windows are broken and starting to fall.  Oh, yeah and he couldn’t afford an extra bed, so guess what I get to sleep on? A mattress.  A mattress with an unzipped sleeping bag as my comforter.

Yep. I’m just going to LOVE the big city.

Yours truly,

                  …Chloe LaHaye

 

Reviews
What's the story
Written by Bottleblondesurfer (3590 comments posted) 7th May 2006
I didn't think I was going to like this but you have a writing style that rattles along and demands attention. Ifound I empathised with the girl quite quickly. The trouble is it is just an introduction to a story and we need to know what the story is. 
You're right, it didn't need a summary you took us right in straight away 
BBS
Another perspective...
Written by gerardconnolly (1186 comments posted) 8th May 2006
Sadly not at all my kind of thing. I find the child/parent rant session a bit of a crowded, if not cliched, market.  
 
On the positive side it strikes me as very competently written and skillfully thought out. For what it is worth I also thought you demonstrated a a lively grasp of dialogue, which is rarely an expertise which can be learnt. A different subject might get round to pulling up trees in my garden and I'm sure you have others. I look forward to reading them. 
 
Well done.
Hi GG
Written by BrianRobertNeal (1195 comments posted) 8th May 2006
It's a scene setter which tells us enough to know the background to the MC's position. But leaves us guessing on the reat. 
 
It really depends on what your intention was, if it was to show how a human being can be treated like a piece of flotsam, whose destiny can be decided on the whim of the lottery known as the Judicial process. You've made your point.  
 
The girl appears to be neither upset at leaving her mother or all that excited by the prospect of re-joining her father. 
 
A bridge between these bits would have been helpfull 
 
" I did and he sped off. 
 
 
Dad started talking as soon as I came in, asking me how was the trip (boring), did you find" 
 
Brian.  
 
 
Promising start
Written by Leigh (254 comments posted) 9th May 2006
Like Bottleblondsurfer, I didn't expect to enjoy this as much as I did.  
 
I found myself really liking the lively, teenage, slangy style. I don't know what age you really are, but you certainly write in a beliveable "17-year-old girl" fashion! I enjoyed the narrator's childlike outlook on her parents' divorce and the world around her in general. She has a lovely cheeriness about her despite the crap she's being put through. 
 
Who is Chloe writing to? Or is this meant to be read as a diary entry? 
 
Is there going to be any more?
nice to know.
Written by moby (5 comments posted) 10th May 2006
The writer have a current theme. I don’t want go into the writing style or anything else but the theme itself. I would like to say that there is always minor news in this sort of stories and it could be good if they are written as a news or report. 
 
I dare to say; if we take a big city of American, the American’s style, and all that what is popularity among the youth in the western countries if we then mix these things with all that unemployment and divorces, the result will be, no more the American’s dream but more like real life in Russian. 
 
There seem be no difference between the new Russian and the America. The writer’s depiction from the New York streets could be just similar as one’s depiction of the streets somewhere from the city of St Petersburg in Russian. 
There are many local hoodlums and hard working thieves and many sorts of dealers there In St Petersburg as well in New York , but what is alarming in this continually increasing crowd of youth, is the choice of their career. Too many young men want to be gangster,(real bantito) and the gun, the ‘pistol, is the first they grimed to get. 
 
 
I could really picture the journey
Written by ndobiecka (20 comments posted) 14th May 2006
I could really picture the journey, could see the girl wandering about - perhaps it's easy to picture this from the number of US films which have that scene in - but it was also very easy to get this from the writing. 
 
I agree that the taxi driving and being in the apartment could do with something in between. It seemed a bit of a jump. 
 
I liked the style and the dialogue too, it was really flowing, easy to read and believable. 
 
N 
 
:grin
Yes, but...
Written by Weirdreamer (17 comments posted) 16th May 2006
Any self possessed girl would have done her homework on the internet and made sure she knew where she was going when she got to NYC. Not my experience of the city, either. Great place, I love it! Still the piece shows promise. Needs a little polish. :)

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