Jewellery Stand

is this first chapter of my book any good?

Right i know its long (sorry about that :) ) but is this first chapter of my book any good? please bear in mind its only a first draft but if theres anything i can improve on please tell me!!!! thanks X With a sudden jolt I woke screaming, the fire still engulfed me, the heat and untameable flames swept across my helpless body burning me, pain shooting along my limbs I didn’t understand what was happening, how could I – I was only a baby. Only one thing made sense over the roars of the fire I could hear him calling me, the cries of my father ringing in my ears. The sounds, vision and pain gently started to fade away, as I slowly came back to reality I laid in my bed troubled and disorientated my cheeks were wet with tears. I let out a short sigh – I should really be used to my dreams by now I’d been having them every night for almost 20 years. I quickly recovered but stayed perfectly still in my bed. Although it was still dark in my tiny box room I could hear the birds outside my window. As I struggled to hear the more delicate, endearing calls of the smaller birds over the ugly racket of the crows and seagulls I realised the time and let out an unintentional moan as I pulled myself out of bed. Still half asleep, I caught my foot in a tangle of clothes and fell forward grabbing my bookshelf for support knocking over various items including my jewellery stand, flinging its contents onto the already messy floor. I gave myself a minute to compose my scrambled thoughts before I made the decision to leave everything as it was and go have a much needed shower. The shower was freezing, it was too early to turn the hot water on - the ancient, groaning house would wake everyone else up if I had, nevertheless for some reason I couldn’t stop grinning as I felt the cold water splash against my face, soaking my hair, it left me awake and refreshed if not somewhat chilly. After my shower I hurried to get dressed, feeling the cold more clearly now I noticed the goose bumps on my arms and my teeth started chattering. Hurrying from the bathroom I flung my towels over the bedroom door and brushed through my tangled hair with my fingers then more thoroughly with a brush before I dried it roughly with the hairdryer. Hair. It made me laugh my hair had always been strange, whist some girls wanted blonde hair, others brunette or red I had just wanted a normal hair colour. My hair was blue, not a bright sky blue thankfully but more a silvery blue - still enough to make people stare. It had bothered me as a child when the kids would laugh, bully me, pull my hair and point at me. Nowadays I loved my hair, I’d learned to embrace it and now it was my most loved feature. I often used my hair to show how I was feeling. Today I hummed gently as I looked at myself in the mirror I was thinking braided pigtails. It emphasised my youthful, playful mood I was in. After pulling my hair into the simple design, I put on my makeup and grabbed my silver bracelet slipping it on my wrist. I could hear pots and pans in the kitchen, the kettle boiling and the opening and shutting of the cupboard doors. By the time id made my bed and opened my curtains - the only tidying I managed to do in the morning, despite the fact you would struggle to see my pale pink carpet, - my stomach let out a low groan and the smell of eggs quickly sent me rushing down the stairs. Sure enough Gwen - my aunt - was serving up fried eggs and toast, whistling a tune that I wasn't familiar with. "Morning Brooke " she chirped in her shrill voice and continued whistling away I just murmured in response thinking it was a little rude of me not to give a half decent response but I was too wrapped up in my own thoughts -as I often was 'away with the fairies' as Gwen would say. Id lived with Gwen, her husband XXX since I was 10 months during which time they had three of their own children XXX, XX and XXX. My dad had been killed in the fire that hunted me each night and I'd never known what happened to my mum. I was hungry as Gwen placed the plate on the table in front of me but I took the time to enjoy the eggs, carefully cutting around the yolks trying not to pierce the thin sack and although I answered the odd question from my aunt I ate the eggs nearly in silence giving me time with my thoughts. Bad idea. My unguided day dreaming led to me pondering my dream from the previous night. They had seemed more intense, more real recently and it troubled me, my dreams were usually a good indication of my current feelings and occasionally even how I was going to feel in the near future. Since I had felt fine recently I was a little worried about the next couple of days although I pushed the anxiety to the back of my mind telling myself how stupid I was being. The expression on my face must have told my aunt what I'd been thinking. "what's wrong Hun?" Gwen questioned, curiosity in her eyes. I wanted to avoid questioning so I took a long gulp of orange juice, grabb it a flame flashed through his eyes. An actual flame. Like he was staring into a fire but the fire was actually in his eyes. Gasping I pulled away, forcing myself to stand up. opps i just realised half of its missing : ) im gonna try and put as muchas i can on : ) I wanted to avoid questioning so I took a long gulp of orange juice, grabbed my bag and helmet as I rushed out the door mumbling some excuse about being late. "But you don't have to be there for ages yet" she called out to me although I pretended not to hear her. I pushed my motorbike out of the garage, struggling to hold open the rusted door and push out the bike at the same time. I casually swung the door shut, quickly locked the door with my pink leopard print key and slipped it back under the rock in the corner of the driveway. I was eager to get down to the beach, flinging myself onto my bike I revved the engine and drove down the driveway onto the road past the grand windmill at the end of the road and onto the winding country lanes. It took over an hour to drive to the beach, I looked forward to meeting up with Laura, although we saw each other every day at work, our shifts often left us with few opportunities to meet up socially . I parked my bike next to a rock at the top of the beach, not bothering to secure it as the beach itself was well hidden I didn't need to worry about it getting stolen. I scanned the beach for Laura but she hadn't turned up yet. Guessing I was pretty early I pulled out my phone to check the time and noticed I had a number of missed calls and texts, all from Laura. I read the first text: "Hey I'm soooo sorry but I cant make it today :( my mum pulled me in to help out at the flower shop apparently she's got a big order for some wedding although I reckon she just wanted some company : ) anyway like I said I'm really sorry ill make it up to you some other time - how about next Thursday? Text me back when you get this so I know your not standing around waiting for me! See youu later at work XXX" I quickly scanned the other messages which followed roughly the same trend just getting more and more urgent as the went even though they were usually only within minutes of one another. I laughed quietly to myself, she got so worked up about the smallest of things and wrote a short reply back telling her I got her message and to have fun at the flower shop. I hoisted myself up onto the rock that supported my bike and pulled my knees up to my chest. I had the whole morning until I had to be at work, I didn't particularly want to stay at the beach by myself, and I so rarely got time to myself that I wanted to spend it usefully. I brushed away the purple nail varnish that I'd been subconsciously chipping off my toe nails from my flip flops and looked across the ocean. The waves battered the shore and thrashed against the cliffs but it had a sort of relaxing feeling, I was the only person in sight and the feeling of physical loneliness was peaceful, I could truly be myself with no one else around. My philosophical thoughts were interrupted by the squabbling of a pair of seagulls as they fought over a ver a food scrap. I was quickly absorbed by their acrobatic manoeuvres in the air. One of the gulls was only young, its feathers still greyish and messy and although the smaller of the two seemed to easily avoid the attacks of the other gull and when it spotted its chance sharply grabbed the food from his beak and made his escape leaving the other gull with, what looked like to me although Laura would just say I was being stupid, an embarrassed look on its face. The interruption gave me enough time to give some serious thought on what to do and in the end I decided that a bit of retail therapy would be the best idea as I leaped of the rock onto the soft sand below, got on my bike and chucked on my helmet and headed of towards the nearest shopping centre. Once I arrived at the shopping centre, which was only a short twenty minutes away, I parked my bike in the closest car park, this time chaining it securely to a post. Taking of my helmet I realised it ha actually been raining and rather heavily since I'd parked, I looked up to the sky to find it an angry grey and, although it was pointless, wished it would stop raining. To my surprise by the time I had reached the exit of the car park the rain eased away and had stopped altogether once it reached the high street. Perfect I thought, smiling widely. I made my way to Marmalade, a small family run shop. Despite it not being a large company with numerous stores across the country like the common high street stores, I had found some of my much loved clothes there; a knee length dress with faded sunflowers, a pair of red satin heels and some brightly coloured flared trousers being a few of the items I'd purchased there, I'd always found something in there I liked. Turning sharply around a corner I rushed straight into a guy walking in the opposite direction scattering a pile of books he was holding across the thin cobbled street. I tried to say sorry but it came out an inaudible whisper. He was gorgeous. I came back to earth with shake of my head as I bent down to help him collect his scattered belongings. I tried to sneak a closer peak at his perfect face, but a peak wasn't enough, I saw him and couldn't stop staring. Whether he had felt my gaze or he had just gone to stand up he jerked his head upright to meet my stare. I couldn't break eye contact. It must have only been a moment but the intensity of that stare made it feel like a lifetime, I forgot how to do anything; my legs felt weak under me as if they were about to collapse, I couldn't talk, couldn't move, I couldn't breathe. It was his eyes, a colour I'd never seen before, a red so deep it felt like I was going to burn straight through me. Then, so fast I wasn't sure if I had imagined,

Public Comments

1. Good, really good actually. Keep it up A few type-os but nothing that cannot be fixed ! Nice words and the paragraphs flow nicely Just don't try to over use the same words :) Extremely good, keep me posted ? : )
2. People don't have blue hair because it's genetically impossible - it's just silly. If you are writing in a fantasy universe then your setting needs to be a lot less everyday. If you're not writing in a fantasy universe then your character doesn't have blue hair. Also, she's far too self-aware - it's as if she's a third person narrator, not the character herself. You don't not respond because you're wrapped up in your thoughts, while thinking about how that's what you are doing. She should either respond, not hear the comment, or decide to be deliberately rude. She simply can't comment on how she isn't aware of something.