I'm feeling very moved by this story and I'm sort of tears. For it being such a sensitive subject, you handled it pretty darn well. This gave Ralph so much of depth and I love the freinds he has. I just wish the TV show hadnt potrayed him so stupidly. It was such a one-dimensional potrayal and it didnt even do him the justice and develop him into the wonderful character he could be. I really hate Ralph's father and I hate that there are people out there who beat on their kids and think some hsitty beer is more important than anything else. And the fact that Ralph had to cut himself to feel better really made my heart twist because he's Ralph and I just adore him for him so happy go lucky and sweet. I liked the talk Paul had with him and how he made no bones of the fact that Ralph was a real person who was worth a lot more. I cant even begin to comprehend why his father would be such an ** to him. And the fact that Ralph tried to keep it together, but when there was that line about him feeling so tired, my heart twisted a little more. I love this story and I love your writing and the way you handled everything. And I'm glad nothing happened to Ralph. I couldn't have handled it and I would have spent the whol day crying. Once again, this was brilliant and you were brilliant and now I'm gonna stop and go wash my face and try to breathe without blubbering.

i must say that im SO glad that u kept him alive! i just dont see ralph dying...it would be too sad.

oh and i LOVE his dog's name! perfect!

where do u get these prompts?!

cute!!

lovin the story...u should write a sequal or epiloge with tons of dasey lol. great job

OH MY GOD.

That was so sad. I nearly cried. And you should be freakin' proud, because I never cry.

I'm so glad Ralph is okay, though. I love Ralph.

WOW. That was great!

~Jo

Oh my gosh. I'm sorry that I'm just now reviewing this...but I just found it. It's perfect and you just...wow. I read this in the computer lab at school...so you can imagine the weird looks that I'm getting right now just because this was so sad and just incredibly written. I wasn't sure what you would pick, but now I'm glad that you picked this one. It was amazing.

This was a great read. Everyone was IC. And the actual story was just plain good.

When Derek called Ralph's father a pig and then I read that he was a cop I just about died. That was too funny to me.

Good Job!

I think that this is the first LWD "cutting" story that I have read where those involved did not seem out of character. You did a great job with a difficult, though well thought out, prompt.

Wow, you're really brave. It's rare to find a fic about this particular subject. About cutting. You're really brave for writing this, and even braver for posting it.
Cutting is a big deal, and people ignore it. Ralph is a good candidate for it, but then, it could happen to anyone. I'd know.
It can happen to anyone, and this fic is a good example of that. Nice job. Seriously, very good job. People deal with it in different ways, and Derek, Casey, Sam and the rest of them did very well.
Awesome, awesome job. Thanks you for posting, and keep writing.

Liz

Wow.

I've seen plenty of LWD flash fics, and, I think they're all pretty good.

If you want, I could PM you some ideas, and see if you'd want to take up one as a prompt.

What'ya think, huh? Huh? Huh?

Aww! Poor Ralph! This placed him in a POV I've never thought of before! I love it!

Wow. This was so well written. I don't want to say "fantastic!" or "amazing!" because those words seem more appropriate for a happy piece, and this one definitely wasn't. But it was whatever word you would use in place of those for a sad piece.

I love how you make Ralph just as important as Casey and Derek. Or any of the secondary characters. It's a talent.

When I didn't realize it was going to be a sad piece I was going to snark on the fact that Ralph's last name is almost exactly like the last name of my mom's gynocologist, but it doesn't really seem right now.

Either part of your family is Catholic and part of it is Jewish, or you've done a lot of research. Like a lot. Cause you're always giving the MacDonald-Venturi's lines about crossing themselves and what not. I think it makes your fics a lot more realistic than most. Usually people have a religion of some sort, and it usually effects the way they act. And fic writers tend to ignore it if there isn't anything specified for a character, but we really can't believe that every fictional character without a specified-in-canon religion are running around without one! And obviously the Venturi's, with their Italian heritage, that part only figures. But I can see it for the MacDonald's too. I bet Casey and Lizzie's old private school was religious. (Casey sure didn't have trouble with the thought of going back to a religious private school in The Fall "Can you go to a Hebrew school if you're not Jewish?") I wish I had that talent. The way I was raised, the only thing I have any experience with is very Baptist. And well, that gets on my nerves so I don't really like injecting it into my story.

At any rate, all these things you do come together to make some of the best stories on the site. I once compared Steph's stories to chocolate. I said there is the gross baking chocolate, and then the okay tasting Hersheys, and then there is Godiva, and that Steph was one of the few authors on the site whose stories are like Godiva. Well you can definitely consider yourself another of the authors who write Godiva fics.

So this is amazing. You know that right?

I think you dealt the prompt and the whole situation really really well.

It's just so realisiticaly done and tastefully done.

amazing, amazing stuff.


*favorites*

Okay, so I stopped halfway through reading this to open this review...I need a minute.

You amaze me. It's so funny and awesome, and yet here I am all tearing up. My gosh.

I love how Paul's handling Ralph. It's so different from Casey, who really doesn't have any real problems. But here Ralph's been hurting for a long time, and it took his grandmother's death to make something happen...this is so awful.

I love that Derek and Sam are really trying to help, but they're at a loss of what to do.

"She didn't have a lot of money, but she left most of it and the car to her only daughter and grandson." And that's where I lost it and started crying.

So glad you made it a happy ending. My goodness, you can WRITE! :)