Critique #53: Don Oestreicher #2, Revision
Kevin Andrew Murphy August 14th, 2006
The boys grab Sayraa, hands around her thin arms, arms around her legs, lifting her in the air. Her books crash to the floor. Strange, she thinks, boys usually ignore the girls with books. They run down the hall laughing, past lockers, classrooms, the principal’s office.  Sayraa’s head bangs against a door, “Yo, guys, be careful – you’ll hurt me.â€
They drop her on a cold tile floor. She looks up – toilets, sinks, urinals. The boy’s bathroom! Oh, no– they’re for real, no joke! “Not me, not now, don’t you dare!†She struggles up to her hands and knees, but they force back down.  She fights, straining against them. They slap her. With her remaining strength, she forces her eyes open and memorizes every pocked face, clumsy touch, rancid gasp, harsh kiss, foul stench.
“What’s going on here?†The principal yells. The boys vanish. He turns to the curled up girl, “You’re okay now.â€
Later uniformed Fertility Officers lift her by arms and legs into a gurney, “Relax, it’s all okay.â€Â
“There is no okay!†she screams.
Her throat is still raw when they roll her into a Fertility Center bed.
Helayne examines her nails, gliding a finger over each one, as if to check the finish. Standing with her hands in front of her face, she addresses her daughter, “Congratulations Sayraa, you’re a mother. The miracle of life blooms inside you.â€
Sayraa stands up, “Mama? Miracle of life?  Blooms? I was raped!â€
“Poor child, I’m so sorry it happened like this,†the voice rises with excitement, “But, you’re pregnant! I’m so proud!â€
With each shallow breath Sayraa steps closer to her mother. Please no tears. Â
Manicured hands rest on Sayraa’s shoulders, “Sayraa baby, not knowing your father didn’t stop me from loving you. Besides, now that you have your own baby to love you won’t be drafted for Maternity Service.â€
Sayraa clasps Helayne against her thumping heart, breast to breast, belly to belly, tears trickling down her cheeks, “What do we know about love? That’s why all those babies are dying in their mother’s womb, no love! Helayne, we’ll never be mothers, neither one of us.â€
Hi Don,
I hope I didn’t give you the wrong impression due to my response to your original post. Although I firmly believe the topic of rape has its place in literature given the right circumstances, I’m not comfortable reading an actual rape scene. You’re going to get a very mixed response by starting the story in this way – especially if your readers are victims or family of victims – but that’s definitely your call. However, I think you’d do much better to start with the line:
The uniformed Fertility Officers lifted her by arms and legs into a gurney, “Relax, it’s all okay.â€
After that, you do a good job of establishing the horror of how Sayraa became pregnant without the graphic details. I admit that I am curious about what Maternity Service entails and what happens to the children born through this system. I would keep reading because the premise of your story is intriguing.
Don, I appreciate your effort to make your opening more vivid. But by the end of the first graf i’m shaking my head. No girl (or woman) I know would suffer a gang of boys throwing her books down and bearing her off bodily wthout fighting seriously. I just can’t imagine a girl in these circ.s not instantly getting danger vibes and screaming, kicking, fighting for her life. And if she isn’t, we need to know why. I’m not buying the “ooh, they’re just kidding”–not when they are strangers and bearing her off bodily to who knows where.
Don, I have to say I much preferred the original version.
I don’t need to see the rape; what is compelling to me is the disparity between Sayraa’s understandable reaction to the rape, the offhanded response of the Fertility Officers telling her “Relax, it’s okay,” and her mother’s horrifyingly off-key reaction. Right there you tell us a huge amount about the world you’re creating, and how it has come down on Sayraa’s head. I’d go back to the original version and clean it up.
I got a much better of a sense of the world with this version than the other. It make more sense and I think a cohesive picture is already emerging in a very short span. (Kudos for that!)
I agree with MR Robins that the disparity of reactions among the players here is much more compelling here.
I also agree with SS that Sayraa’s reaction to the boys seems implausible and I’m wondering if the venue is forcing that — you need to get her some place where the thing can happen before authorities intervene. Perhaps a change of venue? (But you’ve probably already thought that — and it seems like the Fertility Officers are actually at the school…. )
As to opening with the rape, I suppose it all depends on whether you want to treat the rape as a Thing She Remembers, or a Thing That Happens to Her and Then Something Else Happens.
Is it that she is raped and then something else happens (strict chronology)? Or she gets pregnant, miscarries and then something else happens because she was raped (flashback)? Another way to think of it — is the rape an explanation or an event? ACK! Don’t know if these questions make sense….. I’m just stream-of-consciousness here.
I like how this opening reads much better than the first version. I have far fewer questions in my head than I did the first time around.
I think it could go either way — your original sequence or this.
I guess it’s the cynic in me, but I’m a bit skeptical about the babies dying in wombs for want of love aspect. I hope that Sayraa’s just being histrionic. I’m not sure about the idea that love has a physiological effect on gestation; I’m afraid it might be hard to sustain a credible sci fi plot based on that. If you can, more power to you!!
Thank you for sharing!
Don,
My reaction is a bit more extreme than Sherwood’s, since reading this the only way I could believe it is if your protagonist is on serious drugs. Anyone who gets grabbed and carried off down the halls of a high school is going to scream and yell regardless of their sex, but as if your protagonist’s characterization isn’t bad enough, you really have to wonder about the type of guys who would bear a girl off as booty in the middle of lunch or the passing period, run down the halls with her, start raping her in the bathroom and expect no one would notice. Why not gang rape her in the teacher’s lounge or on the principal’s desk?
Your story isn’t in the rape anyway, it’s in the Maternity Officer. Either have it be a date rape or else make it the stereotypical thug in the bushes, but shuffle it offstage and get us straight to the creepy Maternity Officer.
The fertility angle is intriguing, but I, too, am squicked by the rape scene.
I’m also confused by the timing of the pregnancy . Is there a time lapse between the 6th and the 7th paragraph? This reads like she’s fallen pregnant within a couple of hours of the rape. Conception might occur that quickly, but implantation usually takes a few days.
A couple of other things also jump out at me:
“That’s why all those babies are dying in their mother’s womb, no love!”
shouldn’t this be “mothers’ wombs?”
“Helayne, we’ll never be mothers, neither one of us.â€
Isn’t Helayne her mother?
I, too, much preferred the original version. Too much explanation, here, with the focus put on the rape instead of the reaction (and the flow has suffered a great deal as a result). Based on your earlier version, I don’ t think that’s what you intended.
I agree with nearly everyone else here. For me, it’s not the rape, but the pregnancy and the off-key reactions to it that make me want to keep reading.
Consider starting with the Fertility Officer’s reaction (”Relax. It’s okay.”). Then intersperse a few vivid, fragmentary images of the rape with the girl being transported to the hospital and examined by technicians, while mother spouts those weird Stepford-like assurances.
Also, I would suggest that you double-check all your medical details about rape and conception. I was not convinced that this girl could walk around that easily, that fast, nor that the pregnancy could take place that quickly. (It’s not that I want a detailed description of her condition, just that her thoughts and actions should reflect what she just endured.)
I did not read a first version.
However, I’m glad I read all the entries for a clearer understanding of your piece.
Beth, had it in a nutshell.
The story begins much later after the rape.
Girls take time to recover from such an experience. There is physical trauma, and I believe even in this society (at least Sayraa) has some psychological trauma.
Throw in all the juxaposed ambivalence to her predicament and maybe you (If you must) could work in the details of the actual incident as backstory.
Though, I too am having trouble with gang rape down a high school hallway with everyone else walking to their next class. I don’t care what world your creating.
Your readers are still from this world.
Grace
I suspect that the physiology of conception is different in Don’s future world. I’m wondering what the fingernails have to do with it. Intriguing.
Otherwise, I agree that the rape is a past event, not a precipating one.