Dialogue Exercises

3rd person:

“Which is apparently unprecedented, or not unprecedented, but—”

“But very unusual.”

“Largely. Yeah, largely.”

Thomas looked back down at the newspaper and continued to read.

“Historical,” she said.

He nodded. She was looking out the window, staring the sun down. It cut into her eyes and made her squint. Thomas paused in his reading to examine her over the top of his newspaper. He thought her rather pretty.

“Oh, if I could go back now…” The sun threw sparks into her red hair.

“Go back…”

She tore her eyes away from the sun to look at him, and he thought he saw its light still lingering there.

“Home.”

And she was squinting at the sun again.

2nd person:

“I really want more chicken, but there isn’t any more.”

What do you say to that? You might say gee, that’s really too bad or you might say maybe that’s because you ate it all, but you think it best not to say anything, so you continue looking down at your plate of food and continue feeding yourself, pretending you didn’t hear.

“I need more water.”

You’ve been sitting here for an hour now and you wished fifty-four minutes ago that you hadn’t listened to your friend who’d set you up. After her first plate of food you’d already listed twelve other places you’d rather be, and by the time she finished her fourth course, you’d revised it to include twenty-seven others.

She has her mouth full but she manages to talk between chews and swallows.

“The beef’s a little salty but it’s bearable.”

No, you think. It’s not bearable. In fact you find her quite repulsive.

Look, you say. They’re putting the buffet away. The restaurant is closing.

She looks surprised. “Oh!” A bit of meat flies from her mouth and lands two inches away from your fork.

You stand up to excuse yourself and walk quickly towards the restroom.

1st person:

“Cigarette for the winner?”

He passed one to me and I lit it against the wind.

He laughed. “I’m the only fucking sober one here.”

I watched as he swung the beer bottle in the direction of his mouth and missed, sending glugs of beer down the front of his shirt. He cast the empty bottle aside and I watched as it rolled down the pavement, gritting against the cement and making a hollow sound.

He made to stand up but swayed instead. I stood to help him but he pushed me aside, angry now.

“I’m the only damn fucking sober one here.”

5 5-min narratives

 1) place
The woods. Early winter. Just when the lakes glaze over with a thin layer of ice. After the first snowfall, maybe. I am sitting on the fallen tree again, the one that makes a bridge from bank to bank over the still flowing river. My legs swing as freely as pendulums, boots brushing the surface of the water. My hands are freezing, I remember. So I get up to go home, but slip on a delicate patch of icy frost and remember the water being cold.

2) person 
I met myself, once. Shira. My alter-ego, my alias, the name I chose for myself when playing those mindless childhood games. Her name was Shira — her real name. My jaw dropped when she said it. I met her in a coffee shop and learned that she’d traveled the world. She’d trekked across countries, roamed entire continents. We exchanged numbers when we parted, but who knows where she is now.

3) a time, alone
I stood on the top of a mountain, as tip-top as I could get. It took me awhile, as I shifted myself about for those last five or so feet, carefully calculating which slightly more elevated patch of land would merit being called the tip. I stood there, hands on hips, looking around. I stood there, quite alone, one girl atop a mountain amidst the mighty Himalayas.

4) understanding the world
When he told me he loved me, I began to reassess my priorities. He gazed confidently into my eyes and I suddenly understood love songs. I suddenly had true empathy for the voices behind all those songs, all those tens of thousands of songs. He broke down a wall and a whole world of undiscovered meaning came pouring in.

5) friends
It was Brittany’s turn, so Louise and I tried to be inconspicuous as we quietly stood watch. The target: a large red bowl of dark chocolate truffles. It was Saturday, so the samples were particularly good today. Ten minutes ago, the bowl looked invitingly full. As I pretended to read the ingredients on a cereal box, I heard, for the fifth time in ten minutes, the small “Aha!” that Brittany let out as if she’d just spotted the chocolates for the very first time, and was presently relishing in her new discovery.