Please, would you proofread my short story

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Bassim

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This is the second part of my short story "Women", please would you proofread it.

As the only child of his parents, Leif had a strict upbringing. Both his parents were religious and believed in God. They went to church every Sunday, sang psalms and read Bible. They tried to convey that idea to their child who at the beginning believed in every word they told him, until he grew up and understood that the world was a battlefield where only the sly and the strong have a chance to succeed. Unfortunately he soon understood that he did not belong to the chosen ones.

He pondered over his bad luck and who was to blame for his failure. At the beginning he was angry with his parents and their blind belief in the Holy Scriptures and God's words which the majority of people did not bother to follow, however the more he thought the more he came to the conclusion that after all, they were kind people who wished him only the best.
Neither his father nor his mother ever hit him and if he had done something wrong, they would not shout at him but talk to him politely and explain clearly what he had done.

He would never forget the moment when he was 15 years old and his father discovered a pornographic magazine under his bed. Leif's face turned crimson and he expected a proper scolding, but instead, the father clapped him tenderly and said, "My son, there is no doubt you need a girl, but don't forget to use a condom. There are many venereal diseases nowadays and, moreover you could leave a girl with a child."
He never expected such a reaction from a person who read the Bible, but probably his father was more conscious of the society in which they lived than Leif could have imagined.

How he suffered. In the secondary school he saw his classmates kissing girls and even having sex with them and he felt pain growing inside him. His body was healthy and bursting with energy, his urge strong, and yet he was like a cripple, unable to satisfy his desire. If he tried to suppress his urge, it would only return much stronger, forcing his mind into s frenzy. He would have given everything just to have a woman beside him for a few minutes,to feel her body under his fingers, to kiss her nipples and stroke her hair.
Years passed and he did not kiss a woman. When his rare friends went out to a disco or parties, Leif stayed at home, timed and reserved, locked in his shell which nothing and nobody could break. Noticing that he isolated himself, his parents encouraged him to go out and have fun. They even gave him money to spend outside, hoping that he would find a girlfriend, but unfortunately nothing helped.

Leif stopped to go the church because he had an impression that beautiful and attractive women pretended not to see him at all. Many of them had already chosen all handsome men with whom they wanted to settle down and raise children and they seemed to be satisfied with their lives. On the other hand, Leif was not interested in those plain women who came to the church not only to pray, but also because they were desperately searching for a man. They reminded him of flowers who withered away and who nobody wanted to pick.

He used to look at himself in a mirror, wondering what was wrong with him that repelled women. He was ordinary built, his face was not ugly, his nose normal and his hair had not yet began to disappear. On the surface, there was nothing which distinguished him from other men he saw every day on the streets, but still they had girlfriends and wives while he was alone. So it must have been his own mind which was his main obstacle. And the worst of all, he had nobody to talk about this problem. He would never dare to talk with his parents and he was afraid that if he ever confessed to his friends and acquaintances there would ridicule him and make his life more difficult.
TO BE CONTINUED
 

Bassim

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Dear Gil,
Thank you so much for your proofreading.

I wonder if I could write, "They tried to convey the idea of Christian God to their child..."

Thank you to correcting my mistake which I made writing "rare friends". Of course, I wanted to say "When one of his few friends..."
 
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