All Comments on 'The Fifth One'

Wow!

Excellent story - loved the 'reluctance' aspect ... but, the title telegraphed the ending!

:)

Excellent this is the story I have been waiting for, all writers should read this and if they can not match it, they should not try.The build up to the end was great, the first time in ages that I have read a story beginning to end, Usually I scroll down and if it is more than two pages I leave this one keeps me from begging to end. Maybe a short story now telling us if anything else happened between these two. I would defiantly read it.

I know a second part to this story would be difficult and generating the exquisite sexual tension of this tale with these characters would be virtually impossible. Nonetheless the characters have committed to a relationship that would appear to have several outcomes, most of which would involve much anguish.

I would love to read about the lovers becoming a happy couple accepted by society, but a bitter-sweet heart-break seems a more probable outcome.

It's a challenge.

Hot!

Wow!

"I straddled him" that's throwing away the chance to convey how erotic that act truly is. Describe those few seconds, build the heat. "I kissed him", "I straddled him", "I this and that him". There's nothing to be gained but saving time in writing like that. Also, reading about a "reddened, soupy vag" goes beyond lacking class and elegance. This gets a 1 because it's fucking disgusting.

Had me hard throughout

Very erotic but mostly just brilliant writing. Thank you.

Hopefully, her pills don't work, and presents him with their baby. Then,he makes her his wife...For him,I believe she's different than the other conquests... They love each other!

5 Stars!!! Seeing 25.1K words made me check the tags and with "older woman" and "younger man" -- well, you had me!! 😁 Though I'm not *that* old, I am well past high school!! Great story!!!! Loved it!!!!

Good but concerned that after all the warnings she fell for him.

I really want to be careful with what I say and how I review this story, because as a standalone story that would not be in a competition, I would say if this were strictly done on the basis of the sexual encounters and how the two main characters seem to relate to each other.. it would be a 5; however, I have to bear in mind this is for the Valentine's Day competition, which carries certain standards that must be met, and then address other items in the story that may have been overlooked completely unknowingly.

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I admit first of all that you structure your sentence use and deploy different lengths of sentences very well. I also appreciate the care you exercise in the grammar, as well as the transitions; and all those things I cannot find a single fault- - and you should be very proud of that - - as I've read some entries that have been very careless with grammar and/or transitions- - and it really negatively impacted those stories. I tip my hat to you in terms of how hard you worked on these areas, and made sure they would not detract from your story. Well done! In a partially related vein also, I must confess to being a tad uninformed of how common place it has become for female teachers to fall for their male students or just allow these incidents to happen: I have become aware of a Missouri teacher that fled her state on those charges, and when she came to Texas was arrested for those and is now waiting trial back in Missouri. You want to know the really unusual arrangement that occurred? The dad was aware his son was having relations with this teacher, and basically said well I know he's going to sneak out of the house to go meet her, so I might as well give him my blessing and let it happen here where at least I know he'll engage in the activity safely. I also just searched and discovered a case of a female teacher in Houston Texas that was 24 years old, Hispanic, had one child, but also got pregnant by a middle school student! You know what was weird about that? The family gave their entire blessing to the middle school student on his relationship with that teacher! Sadly but perhaps not so shockingly, I found at least four other cases that were documented on YouTube of similar incidents. So in an odd way, I feel like you've employed the story as a vehicle in some cases to raise the consciousness of readers that this is actually going on. Now, from having perused the comments regarding your story, no one seemed to care or even comment on the taboo of the entire story. So I'm not really sure beyond that perhaps you use the story to indicate this. So I will say for the time being it is a very unique and particular universal connection that bridges the gap from this fictional story to current events of today. So regardless of the implications, you masterfully employed that to your advantage.

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I also commend you on how well you developed the storyline, and took your time in developing the sexual side of it. It was not by any reason rushed, nor was it hastily constructed; it flowed well; you prefaced through foreshadowing by the parent conference with his mother that this would possibly happen; then once you broke the sexual ice between them, things began unfolding in a steady progression. In all these things you excelled in your storytelling.

***

What strikes me as such a curiosity- - in terms of required missing elements-- is that you introduce effectively two Hispanic characters by the names of Cruz and La Perla; we know nothing about Noah's father, and that's a mistake in the story partly because you foreshadow that somehow Melissa is just a goner because Noah is going to be in her classroom. Why is that the case? It's obvious that Noah's father was Hispanic, although from where we have no clue. It is also obvious that his mother Stephanie is completely Anglo--and seemingly ignorant of anything cultural--despite the fact that she had a child with a Hispanic man. Now, when we go to Melissa, she mentions her parents having a condo in Florida, but we learn nothing about her parents. Why this is important is because while we assume they have amicable relationship-- evidenced by her having their house - - we don't know if it was truly a good relationship or not. The story also reveals to us that she was previously married, and she's had several boyfriends.. although it's been about 4 months or more since she last got laid. What --if any- - was the reason or the reasons for her marriage failing and the boyfriends disappearing? Was there something missing as a common thread in all those relationships? Why this becomes so important without the cultural part of the Hispanic issue not explained at all.. is because she would not give in to this kid- - and yes he's still a kid because he's not yet 21 - what was missing that led her to so really accept this? Without any reason provided for her resolve so completely disintegrating, what are we left with? Is he really that confident and cocky that it impresses her psyche so deeply that she just has to give in? It's obvious that he expects to bang her, but he really does nothing to win her over: it's not like he's really that charming because he has a potty mouth for one; for another it's not like he's somehow riding her romantic notes on stickies, nor is he paying her compliments all the time, nor doing something over and above what any other kid would be doing in her class. So I question why she even feels that attraction, except for the fact that maybe she hasn't gotten laid recently. The other thing is that when she asked him if there's any reason why he hasn't latched on to any of the other girls in the high school, he just basically says they're not Melissa; the reality is the story insinuates that the one girl named Candice looks similar in physical features to the teacher, but he doesn't pay attention to her for some strange reason: in other words, this suggests a psychological fixation and perhaps a compulsion-level response that he has just got to break some type of social taboo. The reason why this part and its Hispanic background has to be explained through his father is that you can partially float the story credibly if you read a Chilean novel (Casa de los espiritus by Allende) that deals with a man that finds a woman on his property and he's the owner of the hacienda, but when he finds her, he basically forces her and has his way with her. Of course she gets pregnant and has a son but here's the twist: the son carries a genetic desire for revenge and later comes back to try to kill that man. Without an explanation about Noah's father, we don't really know why he's acting this way. The other interesting idea that goes untouched is not at least explaining why neither Noah nor Melissa speak Spanish: this is a major problem because no characters can generally be used for free- - especially if and when they are of a different race that would normally be expected to speak a different language and/or be bilingual. The reason I say this is-- and I'm sure you're just totally unaware of it, but it still applies--is because explaining more of the cultural background and including the language can introduce not only readers to other possibilities, but can't explain the story behind it better. For example, it is common--incredibly so - - for some Mexican couples to actually trade wives because they are compadres. That may sound weird, but it is incredibly prevalent in the literature of Hispanic authors in Southwest. Also, you have to account for the lack of language or include the language because either you need to include it to make sure they're not paper-thin, or you have to explain why that part of their personality was stripped away. For example if you are aware of William Shatner's book series TekWar, he has a character called Sid Gomez, and he's in California.. and while he's not terribly and overwhelmingly Hispanic, he at least exhibits several of the required linguistic characteristics of knowing slang for the area and knowing some basic slang or even proper Spanish when he addresses criminals and or other people in casual conversation. In other words, to some degree you have to kind of check that off and make it convincing.. otherwise people like me who are relative experts in the area are going to call you on this lack of development.

***

Finally, this story is submitted for a contest that's supposed to revolve significantly around the ideas and the spirit of Valentine's Day. He gets her Valentine's card, any participates in the Valentine's play by singing in it, but is he really romantic at all? No he's not. Is he somehow considerate and thoughtful, more so than anyone else or even any adult in the school? No. Does he really try to use the soft touch on her to win her over? No. He's really and effectively a teacher predator if you will. He may fulfill some need she has- - which only seems that she needs to be fucked- - and that's not terribly romantic. As I said earlier, if we only account for the story as a standalone story outside of a competition, you most definitely detail the sexual encounters exceedingly well. However, the spirit of the contest overrides anything else, and unfortunately that was not accounted for.

***

You certainly nail many elements in the submission, although you miss three important ones that needed to be accounted for in the story to truly account for the things I mentioned. It was obvious that both the title and the parent conference with the mother telegraphed Noah was going to have Melissa. Therefore some of the actual encounters could have been paired back or shortened giving you the necessary room to provide at least some cursory examples and explanations for the elements that were required and were missing. As I said if it were only determined by one factor, the score on this would be its maximum; however that would also be incredibly lazy and incomplete intellectually. With the required elements missing, the best I can score this piece is a 3. Regardless, thank you for such a thoughtful construction where you ace the grammar and otherwise provided readers a story that flowed well and provided more than enough details in other areas.

Thank you for your comments. I liked how "Melissa LaPerla" flowed and I thought no more deeply than that. Same with "Cruz." I honestly spent zero time and energy on the racial aspects of the names. I'm pleased that there are readers who care so much about such things. I appreciate you reading. But frankly, the elements you view as "required" are not required: that is an entirely subjective measure. You're more than welcome to submit your own stories with whatever "requirements" you see fit to include.

@Voboy... interesting that you chose to reply, as those statements all reflect the idea of relativism, which is potentially a harmful thing. While I appreciate the unexpected answer, I leave you with this: would it have hurt to have dug a little deeper? Would it have harmed your story to flesh out any of those aspects? There are critics and there are people- - and I'm not talking about general readership at this site-- that emphasize for a story to be successful that you have to account for certain elements and especially those that can form a universal connection with everyone. I remember a professor that brings down about 25 million in research for a university because he's an expert on this one topic.. and this comment always stuck with me, although it was incredibly funny at the time: he said that well by the time you get to Rambo 27, what are the three essential qualities or drops that make that story still relevant to continue producing successful sequels in that series? Those three drops have never left me, and I suggest you should embrace them. For example it's pretty obvious that Noah is a very disturbed young man- - or I should take that back-- is he still a boy because he's not 21 yet. Even his mental state is questionable, because he's going after a teacher. You introduced just that itself and it needed to explore some bit of psychology behind it. I can tell you didn't read the last part of my explanation, because the one Chilean novel I mentioned perfectly accounts for it- - especially when you combine it with the research in 2012 out of London where one scientist studied 30 pairs of twins--and determined that personality is 50% genetic; the rest is more or less evenly divided between a child's family environment and the child's friend's circle. So if you had included something like that, that actually wouldn't have been terribly costly in terms of sentences.. and you could have just explained perfectly your story and built your credibility even more. I agree that ultimately you have the privilege to do what you want but it never hurts to expand your horizons in ways people suggest. That was the constructive criticism you could have taken to heart in whatever way you felt comfortable doing so. But as I said, my score accurately reflects what the story did well at and what it should have explored.

You're welcome to your opinion. Thank you.

Well, I think this is the best story I've read on Lit. The erotic tension is masterfully woven and delightfully described. Thanks.

Great story, Voboy. Loved the concept and your characters are richly realized. Easy 5/5 from me.

I started reading this on Super Bowl Sunday morning, and stopped the first time Noah went to Melissa's house. Savoring it. Up on Edge. Watched the game then came back for another installment.

Noah wasn't jus another dick - he played her and let her indulge herself.

Still on edge, I looked forward to when they finally DID it. Budt neither the author nor Noah were Wham Bam lovers. They eased us.

Now a second day, Super Bow Monday. On page 6. I'm naked to the waist, aroused, edging. I'm as hungry for it as Melissa, and delighted that she's going to ride him.

And THEN they would cum together. Actually all three of us came together. Noah (20s), Melissa (30s) and me (80s).

I shall read on, but there's something special about the First Time.

Delightful. Best of Show.

Really lacked any form of reasoning or build up or any real context to Melissa falling for the MC. This felt like a quick stroke story that was trying to be grander than it was. It's not a terrible read but it lacks depth.