Please help me review a short story I wrote for class, "Johanna's Birthday" Options

[Deutschland]

to be honest I'm not proud of this story I wrote, I picked a difficult direction and theme which is the relationship between children and step parents. it's very difficult to find dramatic life events to serve the theme so it might be really dull. Today we had peer reviews but nobody said a word about the story itself, all I got was some gramatical corrections and so on. I would appreciate if anyone could tell me how he thinks about the story.

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Johanna’s Birthday

Sharon sat in front of the TV with her daughter Johanna. It was almost 6 o’clock in a Friday evening; supper was on the table, and her husband Bobby would be home soon.

Johanna was a little quiet today. She was watching her favorite TV series, featuring a front line hospital during the Korean War, but her mind seemed to be elsewhere. Sharon ran her fingers through Johanna’s long red hair, and started braiding them. She wondered what was lingering in her daughter’s mind. She had been wondering about it more and more often in the past few years. Johanna was almost thirteen, and she began to have her own secrets. She waited patiently for Johanna to confide in her.

The sound of a car door being shut reminded Sharon that Bobby was back. She opened the door for him, and went to fix the plates. Bobby took off his greasy jacket, and went straight into the laundry room to put on clean clothes.

“I’m getting you a new jacket this weekend.” Sharon examined the holes on the jacket’s elbows.

“Nah, I’ve had it for six years, kept me warm pretty good.” Said Bobby’s muffled voice from the laundry room, “I like it. If you get me a new one, it’ll be the same in three days.”

When Bobby returned to the living room, Sharon had already got her plates and silverwares set up. “Joey, go get daddy some drink.” She said to her daughter.

“Oh, it’s alright, I’ll get it. Country fried steak, ain’t it?” Bobby stood next to the dinner table, and broke off a piece of steak with his fork.

“Yeah, I got a new recipe from Mrs. Edmund today. How is it?”

“Ain’t bad. Mrs. Edmund? Is she from your school?” Bobby grabbed a glass from the freezer, and mixed a can of Miller with some tomato juice.

“Yeah, she teaches German. Her son’s in my chore class.”

Bobby nodded, and took a sip at the beer. “Joey, come sit down and eat.”

The family ate their dinner quietly. Sharon mixed her mashed potatoes with the baked beans, which was her favorite substitute for gravy. She looked at Bobby: he was raking in food like he hadn’t eaten all day long. She was glad that the dinner fit his taste, for it was quite challenging to do so. Johanna still seemed a little anxious; she was stabbing at the beans and skewering them on the teeth of her fork. Sharon planned to have a talk with her after dinner.

“How was work, Bobby?” Sharon broke the silence.

“Good, I guess. Somebody’s got a blown engine over yonder on a brand new car, might take us a whole week to fix it. Them rich fellers need to learn how to drive.”

“The kids are pretty wild nowadays, too,” said Sharon, “a couple of weeks ago some student wrecked his car on the way to school. I heard he and his buddies were racing.”

“That’s ‘cause the Driver’s Ed ain’t doing their jobs. Joey, when you start driving, you’d better open your eyes and watch out for them. How was your school? Anybody’s been messing with you?”

Johanna didn’t answer directly. “Mom,” she said, “it’s my birthday next weekend.”

“I know, sweetie. Daddy and I are taking you to the theme park, remember?”

“May I ask for something else than going to the theme park?” Johanna stared at her plate, as though afraid of seeing her parents’ reaction.

“Sure. But it’s winter right now, you know, not a lot of places are open.”

Johanna was silent for a few seconds. “I want to invite my real dad to visit me on my birthday.”

Sharon knew it wasn’t going to be an easy one. Bobby stopped eating, his lips moved as though wanted to say something, but he turned to Sharon instead.

“Well, sweetie,” said Sharon, “he lives very far from here, it’s not practical for him to come over.”

“But he’s my father! A father doesn’t want to travel to see his own daughter?”

“He has his own family too, sweetie.”

“I don’t care. I’m almost thirteen years old, and I haven’t even seen my own father!”

“Joey, it’s not that we don’t want you to see him, but it’s kind of hard to arrange the meeting, since he lives so far away.”

“Why can’t we just invite him to the house? He won’t do anything – he’s just my dad!”

Sharon didn’t know how to reply. The past between the family and Johanna’s father was sore, but Sharon never told Johanna about it – she didn’t want her to know what he did to the family. She does want a reunion between her ex-husband and daughter, but not only was she afraid of him bringing disturbance to the family, she also worried about how Bobby would feel.

“Joey,” said Sharon finally, “just let mom and dad take some time to think about it, ok?”


Later on at night, when Sharon was reading in the bed, Bobby came in with a medical report. He had washed off the dust and grease and put on his pajama, but it could not hide the exhaustion from a long day of work.

“You got it today, Sharon?”

“Yeah.”

“How is the baby?” Bobby sat next to Sharon and handed her the report, “I don’t know what those terms mean.”

“It’s prenatal diagnosis, it checks for birth defects and diseases. Our baby is very healthy, Bobby.” Sharon smiled and looked at him, “do you want to feel it?”

Bobby leaned next to Sharon with his ear against her belly, and listened. His neatly trimmed, shoulder-length blond hair brushed her and made her chuckle like a child. She swept them away, and there, she saw a few new strands of white hair. It’s about time for him to build a family, she thought.
Suddenly Bobby raised his head, “I think it’s kicking me.”

“Then you’d better be nice!” Sharon joked.

“Well, wasn’t I always nice to the young’ns?” Bobby seemed a little disappointed, “I ain’t never been able to get along with kids, you know. They just don’t like me and think I’m dumb or something.”

“I’m sure Joey likes you, Bobby.”

He smiled wryly, “I don’t think so. If she liked me why would she keep calling me a grease monkey, and keep asking to see her real dad? Maybe it’s because I didn’t go to college and get a good job.”

“She was only eight when she said that! You know how eight-year olds are. And Bobby, you are doing really well with your career, much better than many of my classmates.”

“But still... It’s been six years, Sharon. She still ain’t talking to me about anything. To be honest, Sharon, I... I kinda feel left out, you know, it just doesn’t feel like my family. Well I don’t mind it but, she never even called me dad.”

Sharon was not surprised. She had felt, for quite a while, that there seemed to be a boundary, an invisible wall, between Bobby and the rest of the family. She could not identify its cause, but she hoped the new child could bring him more security and warmth of home. Sharon put her arm around his shoulder gently, “it’ll all be fine, Bobby, just let time do its work.”

A few moments of silence followed, Sharon pondered about how to start the discussion on Johanna’s request.

“Bobby, do you remember what Joey said today?” She decided to go straight on topic.
“Yeah. Are you going to let him come over?”

“No. I can’t do that. But I don’t know how to explain to her.”

“Maybe we should tell her everything.”

“No. It would be too much for her to handle,” said Sharon, “how would you feel if you suddenly found out you had a dad like that?”

“I know. And I still can’t stand meeting him, Sharon,” Bobby lay down in the bed, “I’ll never forget how he abandoned you when you were pregnant with Joey, and when we were dating came back and tried to take you away.”

“I remember that, Bobby. But it’s just that...” she paused for a while, “somehow I don’t feel like to turn her down this time. She has grown up.”

“It’s late,” she added, “let’s just sleep and worry about it later.”