Need crit for a scholarship contest!

Hello all! First off, I admit to being a newbie when it comes to the Writers Forum, so if this thread needs to be placed somewhere else, then I apologize.

Anyways, I'm participating in a scholarship contest involving HIV/AIDS. We're supposed to write a maximum 5 page story involving personal vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. The story can be fiction or non, just as long as it addresses the theme and whatnot. I have mine set, I just need constructive crit.

And I want it bad, lol. I posted a blog on my myspace but that yielded no results, so I'm starting to become desperate. I know without a doubt that my writing fails horribly, so there should be no excuse as to why I got no feedback on my blog (other than perhaps my friends are just ignoring me).

I don't want to post it on here until I get at least one person expressing interest, and so when that does happen I will edit this post. There's no limits as to what needs to be critiqued, btw. Advice on anything/everything is greatly appreciated! Thanks.

 

I would be happy to look at it. In general you'll want good spelling and grammar. The reader should be given who/what/where/when information, one way or another. Also it helps to label the work fiction or non-fiction, again to relieve the reader of having to guess.

Sounds like your teacher is trying to get his/her students into AIDS prevention mode.

 

Thanks! I really appreciate this.

I've proof-read it a few times, but it's very likely I missed a few things. Even though it is not stated in the story itself, this work is fiction, but based on a combination of true stories, and some personal experience. Also my ending is a bit rushed and cramped, partly due to the fact that I ran out of space.

Now, the story:

I’m the untold story.





No, really, I –am-.



Don’t give me that look; No, not the one on your face, the one in your eyes. It’s that same skeptical gleam I always encounter whenever I tell my story.



No, not story; my life.



Because, really, it is my life whether I want to accept it or not, no matter how grotesque it was (is) when I first met it face to face, disguised in human form.



I get a lot of bs for it, ya know? Everyone always assumes that someone crippled by it was either a whore for the body, or a whore for the needle, or both. Naturally, I get the pleasure (not to mention honor) of wearing the façade of the slut. It doesn’t matter that I’ve only ever had two partners, one of whom was, and still is, a virgin. (Nor does it matter that the other insisted we used condoms every single goddamn time, that we got tested once every three months, and that we both came out clean every. single. time.)

No. It only matters that the third one insisted that I gave my consent (because no must mean yes is some language, amirite?). It only matters that all evidence was there when he kicked me out of his house after pretending to be watching movies with me, drugging me, acting out his sick fantasies, video taping it all, and pretending that deep down, I wanted to be violated. It only matters that the video was made in such a way that nothing could be proven. It only matters that, as his lawyer put it, I was asking for it (I was wearing tight jeans and a tank with a hoodie, after all). It only matters that when something was proven; he got a maximum sentence of 5 years but got off in one for good behavior.

But above all? It only matters that I’m the anti-social loser who is really suffering from anger and depression and decided to take it out on the poor jock-student counsel president. It only matters that he’s so popular that there is no way he would commit such atrocities. It only matters that I must have some sort of attention-whore syndrome and came up with all of this to make friends (you can never have too many, eh?) and win over sympathy.



Please, no need to tell me why I’m here, talking to a counselor.



I was scared for the longest time. I’ve heard horror stories about rape. The rapist being a creepy stalker, the girl almost getting killed afterwards, gang rapes, being taped…oh, wait, that already happened. I suppose I’m lucky that there was only one copy (or perhaps that makes me unlucky, since the skeptics would fall off the face of the planet if they knew).

No, I feared what every girl fears when she’s had unprotected sex. I was just starting my senior year, and the last thing I wanted was another obstacle keeping me from college. Now? I wish I had been pregnant, because I would’ve only had to deal with a few hours of pain, and 18 years of care and nurture. Instead, I will be lucky if I end up living to see 18 years.



AIDS, they told me unsympathetically. Did not even get to be friendly with HIV or even have a first date. One morning you wake up recovering from a hangover due to drugs you didn’t know even existed, the next you’re married to AIDS with no divorce papers readily available. AIDS is good friends with Death, too. I’ve accidentally brushed up against it a few times. Remind me in our next session and I’ll tell you all about it.



Wow! You look genuinely surprised. Don’t tell me they didn’t tell you? And even if they hadn’t, what the hell did you think I was talking about this entire time?



Whatever. Sorry.

It’s been a harsh three years. It’s rough acknowledging that it’s only been nine years since... Time seems to slow down when it knows you’re waiting to meet Death in its full for the first and final time. Kinda like what the Jigsaw guy from that one stupid movie said: You take your time, and learn to enjoy the things that don’t matter. You become grateful for every breath you take, every step you can make, every smile you get, and even every glare that pierces into your very core. You appreciate being alive.

Contrary to popular belief (and I would know all about the beliefs –they- hold when it comes to AIDS), we are not afraid of dying. Well, ok, all of us are. What I mean is, none of us is afraid of when. Death is inevitable for everyone, we just ended up (or in some cases, were forced into) drawing the shorter straws. It’s –how-.

AIDS is a mysterious being. Everyone knows that the immune system and it don’t get along and that, more often than not, the immune system ends up losing the war. What everyone doesn’t seem to get is that without an immune system you can contract anything and you normally do contract everything. I think I can honestly say I’ve spent two solid years out of my nine thus far in the hospital. Name any non-fatal infection and chances are wickedly fantastic that I had it.

So, honestly, the chances of my actually dieing from AIDS are laughable. Thanks to AIDS, however, I can count on dieing from some dumb infection difficult to pronounce. In a way, (granted, a very twisted way), I’m glad I know what will cause me to die. Does that mean I can walk around in blessed ignorance? No, but I do at least understand how precious life is and why it shouldn’t be taken for granted.



Is this too much for one session? I feel like I’ve been talking forever.



Ah, okay. Though I’m sure you don’t care, since you’re being paid to sit here and pretend that you care.



No, really, you don’t have to. I don’t expect you to. I mean, you’ll end up like everyone else: caring for a bit, then slowly you’ll forget what I’ve told you, and eventually I will be alone.



But that’s fine. I’m never completely alone, at least. Alone in my quest for freedom, maybe, but I do not walk a path unknown. It’s actually kinda funny how many people you come across that are just like you; yet completely different. Like the other day I met this totally tattooed young lady who got her AIDS from a not-so-sterile needle and she was so completely fine with it I almost wondered if she had understood what it really meant. Another person I met was very much like the young lady, almost same situation and yet he was just completely bitter, almost homicidal. (Now, as for the older gentlemen I had the misfortune of encountering at Starbucks yesterday…)



Oops. Off-topic. Okay, I really ought to save this for some other sessions. I think they said I had to stay for 7 sessions? 10 sessions? Who knows…I’m not paying for it, but I still have to be here so it’s best not to put all my eggs in one basket…assuming I used that expression correctly.

It’s just…hard to stop talking about it because it doesn’t cease to exist when I stop thinking about it. When I leave, it will be trailing behind, forming my shadow. It’s what keeps me from going to bed some nights, miserable that I won’t ever wake up, and it’s what makes me get out of bed some mornings, knowing that this might be my very last and I should spend it wisely. …Well, at any rate, I’m glad I scared away that look in your eyes. It’s my mission, really, to get you people to stop looking at me like that every time I start off with ‘I’m the untold story’. Maybe someday no one will have to be an untold story, or the assumed abuser of lust and needle. Maybe someday people will really get it, and compassion will replace whatever it is you look at us with.



Until then, I –am- the untold story.

And this is my life.

 

Summary:
After only one or two sexual encounters, you (your fictional character) were raped and videotaped. This was nine years ago. The rapist gave you HIV. He was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison but actually served only one. You are now in an HIV support group and your story is being told to a therapist or other counsellor.
You are not only HIV positive but you are coming down with AIDS itself and the horrible AIDS related illnesses such as Kaposi's Sarcoma, pneumonia, cancers, thrush. You are facing an ugly, premature death for no good reason.

This is pretty heavy stuff, and you do a pretty good job of laying it out for the reader.
My suggestions:
1) eliminate excessive white space (line feeds) in the text.
2) give the reader your characters' name, age, and description. Describe the counsellor and the room. Is the counsellor thinking about something else or listening to her? Is there a dialog happening between counsellor and patient? Put it in the story.
3) what is your narrator's current condition? What AIDS related illnesses are presenting? Is her drug therapy working?
4) Does she have a lover or caring partner? Does she have supporting close friends and relatives? Put one or two of these in the story, with dialog.

When I put my stuff onto hipforums, for the most part I did edits in place, so that "posting 3" on the thread would keep changing as time went on. I also put in paragraph headers in boldface from time to time to improve readability, and photos. In your case you might want to put in a photo of what your character ought to look like.
Human nature being what it is, she must be appealing, or you'll lose your readers right there.