Share Your Story! discussion

So I just wrote my first short story! Quite lame for a girl who wants to be a published author someday haha but at least some progress right? ;)
How should I post it? Should I just paste it all here? It’s definitely not more than the word count on goodreads anyway.
It’s about an unnamed narrator that’s reminiscing about a memory...

I think you can post it
And don't worry small progress is progress

I'd say postt it here? Or maybe put it in a google doc where you change the settings in such a way that people with the links can only see and not edit/comment? And then share that link here?

Thank you so much lovelies<3 I think I’m just going to paste it here. Tips and things to change are very much welcomed!

An Austrian Rose

I still remember the smell of this memory. This place, more precisely.
I stepped off from my bicycle, shaking out my bad feelings. The sun was shining so brightly it seemed to be mocking me. The clouds not present to join me in the gloom.
The place was still the same. All these years and still the same. The same street vendors, the same wheelbarrows, the same sign that’s been bleached by the sun so badly it’s almost stark white, the same everything.
Yet nobody seemed to have known me.
I walked around and my feet still takes me to my old default destination. As if my whole body’s plotting against me. I try to get my mind to go somewhere else, but honestly though, I think it’s just a guilty pleasure to go there.
The sitting area.
Everyone knows the sitting area. But people seldom use it except for a group of five. They always sat here.
That group was everyone’s dream to be friends with. They were talented, came from respectable families, always so kind, so ... perfect.
Until Lou came.
Lou.
Lou was the new kid on the block. So it was so unusual for them to bother about Lou. But Lou also came from a highly respectable, wealthy family. Very timid, shy, bashful, but inside, everyone can somehow sense something different from the kid.
Lou was polite, careful in one’s speaking, tall in one’s walk. But surprisingly, not poised.
But all-in-all, almost perfect. A perfect new addition to their group.
And it wasn’t really that Lou changed them, rather they changed because of Lou.
Like I said earlier, Lou was timid, but Lou had an air of something else too. Ferocity. Yes, that’s the word.
But if someone can change someone else’s personality, it’s them. Usually they use it for good, but alas for Lou, they wanted an experiment. A social experiment, we can maybe say. Maybe they saw Lou as a challenge.
They made Lou someone to pick on. Someone they could go to for tea and a chat when sad, then ‘Lou do this, Lou do that, thank you Lou, you’re the best,’ when happy. Someone who they could ask to buy them snacks, then say to people that Lou was the most loving and caring soul for buying them snacks. Someone that was seen as their “good deed”. Everyone wanted to be Lou.
But Lou knew Lou didn’t.
And Lou was desperate to let someone know. But who? Who’d believe the new kid? Especially when the subject were the perfect five?
So Lou wrote. Lou wrote and wrote and wrote. Lou had lost the ferocity in social situations, but judging from the journal entries, I know Lou still knew it was secretly still there. Lingering, waiting. For the perfect moment.
But apparently, it needn’t wait much longer.
One day Lou went home groggy, tired, but above all, angry.
No, furious.
They found out about Lou’s love of embroidery.
‘Are these really your creations, Lou?’ They asked. Lou’s mom was there, beaming proudly, showing the dainty handkerchiefs off.
Lou nodded slightly.
‘You should make us one each so we could all match!’
Lou understood this was a very hard order, softened because mom’s present.
So politely, Lou asked them to go to the working shed to choose the fabric.
They replied with ‘Oh my, now? Thank you, Lou!’
‘Oh, Lou, you’re the sweetest!’
‘We’re so lucky to have you as a friend!’
‘We don’t deserve you!’
Indeed you do not.
They caused quite a deal of noise, asking for opinions, arguing,–much to Lou’s annoyance. But of course Lou couldn’t say. At the end, they all chose each a fabric with the same pattern, but in different colors.
‘To match,’ they said.
So Lou went to work. Handkerchiefs were easy, but it was so draining to have them here. Lou needed peace. But no choice other than keep on working and start embroidering.
Lou’s decided the flowers to put on their handkerchiefs.
One of them a thorn apple; deceitful charms
One a petunia; resentment, anger
Another an orange lily; dislike, hatred
Another one a mistletoe; you are a parasite.
And the last one a hemlock; you will be the death of me.
And also a string of basil on each; I hate you.
They went home showing them off, without even a clue about Lou’s doing. Such ignorant fools, not even knowing the language of flowers.
Lou was quite pleased with the silent vengeance, but also tired. Lou went back home, eyes watery, quite red. Lou’s back was sore and so was the sitting bone. But Lou still wrote.
Lou’s mom occasionally checked Lou’s working space. This time she wanted to check in because she thought Lou was still making the handkerchiefs. So she went in and saw that Lou’s finished making them. She went to the work table and saw the flower sketches Lou drew. She saw the lily, petunia, mistletoe, thorn apple, and hemlock. If not for the thorn apple and hemlock, she’d misunderstand this greatly, for the lily wasn’t colored. Then she saw the basil. She knew something wasn’t right.
She walked slowly to Lou’s room, pondering.
She opened Lou’s door and saw that Lou wasn’t there, but she did indeed hear water rushing from the bathroom.
‘Lou?’ She called. ‘Lou?’ No answer.
She opened the bath with a second key and how she almost fainted.
Without my permission and knowing, tears unleashed themselves slowly, silently. De Saint Exupery was right, the world of tears is a mysterious place.
I just wondered about the feelings Lou’s contained, how his mother felt when she found the journal, about all the things her child’s hidden and bottled away. Heartbroken–deceived; foxglove.
All I want to do now is to give Lou an Austrian rose; thou art all that is lovely.
So I did, on the bench in the sitting area.
I slowly walked to my bicycle, the sun still shining–albeit warmly now, still mocking me.
I glanced at my watch; the cuts on my wrist haven’t fully healed. It’s already quite late, the afternoon sun’s casted a long shadow from the worn-out, bleached sign. So mounted the bicycle I did, and cycled slowly but surely, slowly but surely to the same way I came.

I'll be reading it somewhere the end of the week! Looking forward to it :) (pls remind me if I forget 😅 I tend to forget a lot these days 😅)

Ahh tysm!! And no worries, I tend to forget a lot these days too tbh 😅

Nah wrote: "Thank you so much lovelies<3 I think I’m just going to paste it here. Tips and things to change are very much welcomed!

An Austrian Rose

I still remember the smell of this memory. This pl..."

Aww it was lovely! I really liked it! But just a question bc I'm dumb: is the narrator a random person who knew Lou or not at all?

rat wrote: "Nah wrote: "Thank you so much lovelies<3 I think I’m just going to paste it here. Tips and things to change are very much welcomed!

An Austrian Rose

I still remember the smell of this mem..."

SPOILER ALERT!!!
Omg tysm dbdjdhsj...and noo I’m the one who’s wrong! I didn’t include much details–I think I need to redo some parts but..
TW TW TW suicide
So..I wrote about Lou’s mom looking inside the bathroom and almost fainting, what I wanted to tell was that Lou attempted suicide by cutting himself and by drowning. You can understand about the drowning attempt part from the water rushing, but what I didn’t do was hinting abt the cutting–thus confusing the reader :'(
And it was a big mistake bcs that was the key to the narrator’s identity.
Bcs at the end, the narrator said briefly that their scars on their wrist hasn’t fully healed yet...(yes, the narrator was Lou himself ;))
So yes I did make quite a mistake on the twist 🤧

Nah wrote: "rat wrote: "Nah wrote: "Thank you so much lovelies<3 I think I’m just going to paste it here. Tips and things to change are very much welcomed!

An Austrian Rose

I still remember the smell..."

AHHH NOW I GET IT 😥