A thin ribbon of green viscosity slithers under a flautist’s door. It slides along walls and meets other slender ribbons – deep, glistening chestnut from the folk club, vivid scarlet from a classical concert in the town hall and vibrant, earthy umber from the mellow notes of Miles on a stereo. Together they dance solemnly, rising up, coiled together in a strange braid of colour and light, and then part to pursue their solitary tasks. They are creatures of great beauty and ingenuity.
He strokes the canvas. With his eyes closed, and with a gentle enough touch, he can almost convince himself that he is feeling her skin, petal-soft, beneath his fingers. How he misses the feel of her. He can look at photos, listen to recordings, smell her perfume. But the sensation of his skin on hers, that can never be revisited. He swallows the lump in his throat.
In front of him, a meticulously mixed palette of colours – her colours, matched to the exact shade of her eyes, skin, lips and hair – glistens in the hazy garage light. It is as though she is here, all the parts of her, just waiting to be put back together. The thought brings him comfort. She has not gone, not really. Not when she can be re-created again and again, each time a greater likeness. If he just keeps going, perhaps he can conjure her back from the dead. He wields his paintbrush like a magic wand. A super-power, that’s what this is. This artistic gift of his. Dare he say it, he’s a God of sorts, if you really think about it.
In retrospect, I suppose it was kind of like stepping through a door with no staircase on the other side. That’s what it seemed like initially anyway, the rush of fear, the clenching knot in your stomach that you’re dropping, the knowledge you’re going to really… and I mean really hurt yourself when you land.
Funny thing is, I don’t know how long it’s been now, but I’ve still not impacted on anything solid, and I’m not sure anymore that I’m falling, either. I look around… at least, I presume I’m doing so, but I can’t see any light receding behind me. Or one growing in front of me either, I’m pleased to report. It’s scant comfort to not be in a long tunnel with a light at the end, but I’ll take it.
I must say, it was the weirdest outing ever. I can try to laugh about it now but really, it just reinforced all my early fears about not getting into things where you can’t see a clear way out. (I completely blame the Brothers Grimm for this, what with Hansel and Gretel having such a close encounter with an oven – nightmare).
Dilly, my sister, (Delia, but she hates the name)and I live far apart so we take the occasional weekends together and meet up for hotel stays, meals out, the odd show and whatever we fancy.
Putting up the tent, Sam and Evie smiled at each other. They felt like naughty teenagers. It was to be their first music festival. Both in their forties, they had always wanted to go but life had always got in the way. With the twins off on a school trip for a week their time had come. The Hadfield music festival happened to fall at that time.
They had booked a quiet field that overlooked the stage area and had showers and toilets. The weather looked fine, so excitement was bubbling. Wandering around the main area a cacophony of sound and smells assaulted their senses; so much choice and so many people. Although they did notice that a majority of the crowd were quite young, they were determined to enjoy the experience.
The bands started playing, they wandered around getting a taste for each brand of music; some they enjoyed, others not so much. One of their favourite bands was due to play the next night, so they settled for a takeaway and returned to their tent for a reasonably early night.
It wasn’t so much that things had gone wrong, more that they were never right. So it was a great relief to get the metaphorical cards out and lay them, face down, on the table. Let us take a seat at this table, the better to understand the situation.
The first card to be turned up was Tom’s: ‘ I’m so afraid of hurting you that I tiptoe around things. I mean, I’d really love to play 5-a-side on a Saturday and have a few jars with the team afterwards. But it wouldn’t be fair to you, leaving you alone at the weekend.’
a tale foretold. ‘The crowd’s on the pitch. They think it’s all over. It is now.’
Touch, a so missing after trauma, so they tell us, and so I must consider you know don’t you too my mind latched on to but was it ever anything else. and indeed There is something to be said that our contemporary lives invest too much into being ‘happy,, by showering ourselves with happy smiles and emojis that become addictive self smugness of, of well of loony-bin Reality Shows for a start, making us believe that is all there is to life. and STOP us imagining alternatives. and well is writing and engaging with it – literary fiction that is – does this. So, am I here writing this to resolve and maybe dissolve lies I have told myself.? Can I then ‘face up.’, create my and your better life. Give us integrity, enabling skills, perhaps like literary devices, eh Joe?
As a writer yourself, you will know that lots of writers have given accounts of their craft. This doesn’t tend to progress much beyond the foothills of rocket science. They shut themselves in rooms without distraction, they stick to strict schedules and they eavesdrop on unwitting people. As someone slightly lacking in discipline for the first couple of points of writerly consensus, I embraced, for a while, the eavesdropping advice. And I have to say, this doesn’t always end well.
Like other writers wishing to capture ideas and observations, I too carry a notebook and pen everywhere I go. Get a small notebook – not so small you can’t fit much on one page – in an unobtrusive shade of beige, plus two biros. When I started out, I bought a pack of bright pink notebooks with ‘Britney is fab’ – reduced in Lidl – and a pencil with a pink feather on top to match. This may have seemed lacking in seriousness, and so many people commented on the pencil that it kind of blew my cover. Plus I didn’t have a sharpener. So beige and biros is the way to go, I think.
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