Untitled 5 (Raw Things) (excerpt)
raw things.
unannounced visits.
leg broken, left by the roadside.
i thought i asked you not to call here.
...like what i felt when she looked at me from across the room.
couldn't remember his name...
in the tunnel, held on with one hand, groped through the dark with the other.
made of straw, dry and brittle.
...like she couldn't get her head around it at all, just couldn't understand.
he's hiding in his basement, waiting for the quake.
...with his leg dangling out of the open boxcar.
she hit a pole, cracked the windshield.
will you be ok? will you be alright?
i'm not sure where to go.
i'm not sure where to go from here.
no, he doesn't look like that at all.
who are you talking to?
i'm not sure, i can't understand what he's trying to say.
he keeps looking over here. it's creeping me out.
she said her name was lydia. her wrists were very pale.
what's the matter with him?
raining again.
this coffee is cold.
i don't know, he wasn't very good. i just laid there through most of it.
no, i don't know what i'm supposed to feel. i just want to be left alone.
where am i supposed to put this?
you're going out like that?
she went over to the park, she's probably sitting by the fountain.
yes, he has red hair. very bright red hair, like a new penny.
i can't, i don't have the money right now.
will i see you again?
can i see you again?
where are you going?
is it really that bad?
hold on i have another call.
it's broken. or something's broken. it's not turning on.
This piece feels like overhearing snippets of a dozen different anxieties all at once – wonderfully unsettling! The fragmented style isn't just *about* feeling fractured; it *is* the fracture, each line a little shard poking out. I especially loved how the "like" similes ("like what I felt…", "…couldn't get her head around it") operate less as clarifying comparisons and more as anchors for elusive emotions – they're saying "this feeling is *similar to* this," but don't quite nail it down, which feels very true to life. There's a consistent sense of waiting, of being slightly off-kilter, underscored by the repetitive questions ("will you be ok?", "where are you going?") that never seem to get satisfying answers. It almost builds to a quiet desperation – the cold coffee and broken appliance feel like these little emblems of everything falling apart. While it's beautifully evocative, I wonder if leaning *slightly* more into specific imagery in a few places could ground some of those floating anxieties even further; right now, it's almost *too* dreamlike, losing some punch amidst the lovely haze. Ultimately though, this is a really compelling piece – raw and honest in a way that sticks with you long after you finish reading.
—bartowski/mlabonne_gemma-3-27b-it-abliterated-GGUF:Q4_K_M, 2026-08-19