Everyone has a story. The question to ask is, what do you want others to read in yours?
Additional Tags: [M/M Shipping][Bittersweet]
As Hearts and Hooves day rolls around, Flintlock goes about his ritual of cleaning the attic - or at least, that's his excuse to the rest of the family. It's also a time to dig out his old uniforms and bits of nostalgia and... to look at pictures. Passion may only last a moment, but love can last a lifetime.
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Must not cry, must not cry, must not... *reads the clipping segment*
All of my feels, Butterscotch. But I demand a happy ending akin to Silverware to repair my shattered feels! *pinkiehappy:
EDIT: To let you know, this is Cloudhammer, just a new username
This is beautiful Butterscotch, thanks for writing this!
This was so sad... Oh god, not the feels! Ugh... Whenever I read stories like this they hit me like a ton of bricks
I really wish for someone to love me that way....the feels
Well, uh...
This story evoked great feeling in me. The letter was beautiful, and its writer's personality shone through with perfect clarity. Flintlock was an endearing character, too; I really felt his loss. As for the more technical end of the story... For a fun party game, take a shot every time the author uses the word "dust!"
To put it bluntly, you use way too many words, enough to severely muddle the imagery. For example:
"The columns of sunlight streaming through the smeared-up attic windows looked practically solid with the amount of dust his hooves had kicked up."
This could easily be shortened to...
"The sunlight streaming through the smeared-up attic windows looked solid from the dust his hooves had kicked up."
...and no meaning would be lost. I don't know if I'm missing some sort of linguistic message about how the clutter in your writing is supposed to reflect the clutter in the attic, but clutter is clutter, intentional or not. It's the only problem I had with this story, though, so keep up the good work!
Thank you to everyone who has replied so far, I really appreciate it. I say that here because as most who know me, know, I read all comments and I appreciate them all, but don't always reply for fear I'll always end up saying that same thing. Still though, whenever someone replies to my work, it excites me, and I'm glad to know what people think.
2054719
NumberNine: Actually, I know what you mean, I'll reply to you in note, though. Thank you for the feedback and the encouragement :)
I'd say something about feels, buuuut I got beaten to the bunch. Several times.
[disclaimer: drunk] The only part about this that bugged me was the letter. I had to skim it because it was just too much. You did a really good job setting the scene before and after but the letter was just kinda over the top I think. I get it: they loved each other a lot. I had the same kinda reaction with Love Letter. It's good that you wanna just pour your heart out in these things but you don't need to be so direct about it. The atmosphere and the trepidation that preceded the letter in this story more than conveyed your point. The letter itself I found to be overly sappy, somewhat unrealistic,. and, frankly, just plain trying too hard to simply tell me that these characters loved each other. Flintlock's behavior alone got the point across beautifully. Trust in your narration; don't tell me stuff you've already shown me.
That aside, I loved it. But I'm a sucker for feels.
2065100
Hey Golden :) I appreciate the feedback. I did want to respond to a few of your thoughts though, if that's alright. I debated putting this into spoilers for people who haven't read the story (or stories) yet. I guess I will - sorry for the black boxes.
I know that the letter parts were "direct" but then again, letters usually are. Remember that neither of the letters in the stories were written to the reader, but to the character doing the reading. The character doesn't see the beginning or the ending of the story. They are in essence, experiencing the story that the reader is being told about and experiencing along with them.
In We Had Today, Flintlock's actions are there for the reader's benefit, but Flintlock doesn't see himself. He's in the attic as a memorial of sorts for his partner, and likewise, Willow isn't trying to tell the reader he loved Flintlock, he's just telling Flintlock. I'd like you to consider two perspectives:
The first is Willow's, and I'll also say I don't believe that the love displayed in that letter is at all unrealistic. I've seen it played out in real life more than once, especially in my grandparents. When you feel that strongly, you typically want the object of those feelings to know you have them, and be aware of them. I don't imagine Willow's letter to contain things he said to Flintlock all the time, but to be a special effort on his part to make sure Flintlock understood exactly what he felt. As Willow said, Flintlock didn't have to say "I love you" for him to know it, but do you think Flintlock never did? If you don't believe Willow or don't take his feelings seriously, then yeah, it will seem sappy and unnecessary. But now consider it from Flintlock's perspective: he knew that Willow meant every word written, and to him it wasn't sappy at all, it was precious.
Again, I do appreciate the feedback. It isn't that I don't "trust" my narration; I just feel that the mechanisms in their current form have a legitimate place in conveying the message of the story, and offer a different perspective than that which assumes the reader knows everything. It gives you a glimpse into the character's mind, and the story itself is the result of that glimpse combined with the character reactions. I'm still glad you enjoyed the stories so far as you did, and here's hoping that any I write in the future will be ones you can enjoy also.
2066598
All fair points, I suppose. Perhaps my aversion to that sort of thing is just me being a heart-broken cynic. :P
But, just for the sake of argument, I'll counter with this: It's not Flintlock reading the story, as you said, it's us. So while there's certainly things that may make sense for your characters' perspectives because they're not necessarily privy to the narration as we see it, showing us those things can lead to repetitiveness in the narrative.
Just something I'd suggest keeping in mind. I probably would have only put parts of the letter into the story, inter-cut with narration so that the two work together, rather than dumping one inside the other like this.
But again, my complaints may all just be sour grapes. I'll look forward to reading more from you in the future!
Oh, and call me Tassel. Golden is far too pretentious. >_>;
2066903
Hehe, okay Tassel.
Well, since we're foregoing spoilers, I'll just trust people to skip over any spoiler-y parts they don't want to read. So, fair warning, my comments here will be spoil-ish.
While it is the reader reading, the point of a story is sometimes to observe and sometimes to empathize. In this story, and in A Love Letter, the purpose is more geared toward empathy. The introduction sets the mood for the reader and introduces him/her to the personality and emotions of the main character. A part of that will be showing that the character loves his partner, and the letter goes on to give a more defined view of the dynamic between them. I don't really see that as redundancy so much as just a more intimate perspective.
As for using the letter in the story as a single piece, part of my goal for the letter itself was to let the reader "read along" with Flintlock, as if the reader was actually in Flintlock's place, rather than someone reading over his shoulder, hence much of the narration itself was written through the eyes and thoughts of the character. The suggestions you made are great for where observation plays a main role, and the reader is "watching" the character through third party omniscience, so I'm not trying to downplay what you're saying. It's just that this story tries to focus on allowing the reader to "experience" the character and view the letter and the emotions through his eyes and his heart instead, and I feel breaking it up would interrupt the immersion more than help it in this instance, and thus lessen the overall impact. I wouldn't call what you're saying "sour grapes." I think it's just a difference in execution/style preference and perhaps story motive.
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None of that is stuff I'd even call spoilers. And on a short piece like this I'd hardly think spoilers would ruin anything. But that's a separate rant.
More to the point, I can pretty much agree with you here and if you're deliberately constructing it that way, then your reasons for doing so sound valid. I can't speak for anyone else, just that I personally find the tone of letters like to be naively romanticized. But again, that's likely just a me-problem in the same way I don't typically care for romantic comedies (some exceptions apply).
Cheers.
i.imgur.com/vFdyv.png
This story, like so many of your other ones, proves that a story doesn't have to be some sweeping epic to evoke true emotion. Thank you. This was beautiful.
Pet peeve: those hyphens you're using to indicate long pauses or interrupted speech should really be em dashes.
2140870
Thank you very much Vimbert. And actually, I would gladly convert them to dashes, but I don't know how. I fail at authoring :(
Do I just use two hypens? *tests* - -- ---
2141895
If you use a standard word formatting program, like Office Word or OpenOffice, typing a letter, then two hyphens, then another letter should autocorrect them to a dash. If not, I think Alt +2014 should insert it.
No easy way to do straight from Fimfic, I'm afraid; you could just copy/paste it, then do a find/replace on the story.
Hey! Congratulations on the EqD feature, brother!
And just read. Damn, dude.
fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2013/051/5/0/cry_liquid_pride_by_potatoevomit-d5vorzg.jpg
This story is amazing. Even though it's one of the shorter fanfictions I've read, the words really did get to me. I was actually tearing up at the end, where he imagines kissing her. I can see that love is powerful. You may have lost the one who shared it with you, but it was what was shared, was what stayed in the heart of the other. It really was beautiful. Well done sir. <3
So sweet, this one.
*
ManlyStallion-ly tears are being shed*Well done, my fellow writer. This is a masterpiece, evoking such emotion in such a short story. This is beautiful. That's all I can say,and even that doesn't do it justice.
-C.Storm
Forgive me if I read anything into this, but is there any connection between the tragedy mentioned in the Newspaper clipping and the fact that tomorrow is 9/11?
3187385
The story itself was written and posted to FiMFiction a looong while ago. It just happened to be put up on Equestria Daily today. X)
Lovely read. The length of the letter was just barely starting to lose me toward its end. The power of the emotion at the end more than made up for such a minor gripe, though.
Wow, that letter was fantastic. I like how this was just out-and-out about the power of love.
I feel like throwing up from the amount of sweetness, love, and feels in this fic.
M/M or not, this is Absolutely beautiful. This is how love should be
Why is this not on eqd? Cause it should be.
Going to cry now, crying and wishing for Equestria. Lol
*sobs uncontrollably*
so beautiful... *still sobbing*
Wow...
I was not expecting that. 
Absolutely beautiful, especially the letter. I hope I have a love like this someday.
*adds to faves and continues to weep*
I kinda suspected that they had broken up or Willow had died or something. Except, I figured that since Flintlock was so old, they might've lived a life together before that happened. But... wow, the day after? The day after that same Hearts and Hooves day mentioned in the letter? :c Can I have a hug?
That was such a good good story.
This hurt to read, but in the best possible way.