Mattyboy

This is awful for Anthony, but maybe just what Mr Miller needs to climb down off his high horse. Two weeks! I wanted the Diner Talk 2 episode, but I guess Anthony never got the promotion to narrator-status. A lot could have happened in that time on that angle. If Mr Miller hasn't been to see Todd's art in the gallery, he's irredeemable (which doesn't seem to be @Superpride's style, but I guess we'll see.

Bunnyboy has a bitter edge, today.

This might be as minor as "home" is an old-fashioned rural estate that has more heritage features than modern conveniences. But, yes, Kenji feels it's better the less it's known he cares about River. And he's been very rational so far (though of course it's way easier to be rational about other people's emotions than your own).

Yes, that was a B-minus showing from Patricia, considering she'd had a heads-up from Cynthia that Barrett that was likely to turn up. Poignant that Todd and Barrett are having simultaneous emotional crises that they're actually well suited to comfort each other over, but happening at the same time is jamming up the connection. Barrett absolutely deserved to have this chapter to himself, but eagerly waiting news of Anthony vs Dad "diner talk: the rematch."

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Yes, after an actual physical food fight, standard practice is that somebody needs to go. but what about . . . Shop at Marty's - join the hunt for limited-edition art stickers! 🎨🦋🤯

Yeah, that's why I don't really know. Clueless old-fashioned and following learned scripts explains him pretty well too.

Yeah, could be. Or just an attempt to parry the pretty strong "parents-should-love-their-children" argument he's being told to face up to. Because it's not her actions, its her heart. If that actually parses out to Mr Miller saying "your mother was wrong to love you" well, yep, that's gonna be a pretty permanent dealbreaker. But he did seem to want this reconciliation lunch, even if entirely under his terms. I'm not sure I get it either, but it feels like the long shadow of something.

"She misplaced her heart" is a really weird thing to say. Mr Miller is terrible, but maybe that was about something

In between the Cynthia plotline and Mr Miller's weird line that Todd's Mom had "misplaced her heart," I wonder if we're headed towards some sort of reveal that someone has a bio-parent who isn't named on their birth certificate. Or not. I can't tell. But "she misplaced her heart" was a really weird thing to say to his sons while they were talking about how much they loved their mother.

Yeah, the attempt was honest. And Dad couldn't hear it, he he did get told the work was being shown in a big gallery. Anthony did what he should by backing Todd up. Anthony v Dad 2 should be a doozy.

Good for you Anthony! (not the getting sloshed part, the being a good brother part)

yeah, "it's nothing" might have been a severe understatement. Or they were actually discussing how to make adobo

And changing scripts on how you deal with people when you've been doing it some way for your whole life is pretty hard. This may be Anthony's maximum speed for change. Yeah, it'd be great if it was a little faster, but this might be it.

I like this strange parallel universe where adults actually work effectively on their problems. I wish I lived there

I like this storytelling tempo where the (humanly flawed) characters actually work on trying to be good people. Instead of maintaining some sweet tension indefinitely (a pet peeve of mine), the plot and the characters keep moving along !

Yay it's an art show!

Here's hoping the thing Todd "probably won't go through with" is either a singing gig or maybe a small art show at the bar (or maybe the Fairy Godfather knows a small gallery somewhere)

Yeah it seems like whatever it is that Todd's bitter about, Barrett doesn't recall, and maybe even didn't do?

I think the literary theorist Roland Barthes once said something on the lines of "there's no reason to assume that the author knows what his story is about" So listen to your beta reader !

Finn's dog is named for the mascot of a school he declined an offer from and didn't go to. (also yes, I was kind of on the same arc, CK)

This. This is it.

Good luck with the writing.

So, I have more questions about why is it a sad ending? You've set this up as realistic that "the narrative ends at its most logical point." But you're the storyteller; you've crafted the whole thing, you've imagined the characters and their situation and the events that occur. (I know there's a few stories around here that started as a character study - or a prompt that sprouted unexpectedly - without a narrative endpoint in mind, but mostly authors have a plan). So are you telling a story about people managing to figure it out and find a happy ending (or good-relations-with in some way) ? Or about a world that's too difficult to survive in, or people who have tragic flaws and don't do the right things and suffer for it? Both of those are excellent story-telling modes, and the choice between them rests with the author. So I think it's maybe an evasion to say we need to be realistic and have sadness. If the logical end is tragic, it is so because you wrote a tragedy. I certainly like stories about people figuring out (with varying degrees of difficulty) how to flourish and be in good-relations-with the world and the people around them. Some people like stories with lots of conflict, even as far as genres like splatterpunk. So I voted for happy endings above, but I certainly don't want the story you're writing to be trimmed to fit that preference. Hash out with your beta reader what the point of the whole thing is, and be true to yourself and your ideas . . . which maybe might have evolved beyond what you originally imagined.

wow, those conditions! This is a really nicely constructed story; I'm impressed how you kept the focus on the characters, but the background of the time colors this very intensely