Monday, April 05, 2004
The four darkest days
(in no particular order)
******
She, slumped, a defeated mess in his sofa, her body racked by staccatto sobs, her normally impeccable face a mess of tears.
He, seated adjacently on his couch, watching in silence. Slightly shell-shocked by the revelations - although he'd, in his cynicism predicted them a while back; unused to seeing her reality, her (their!) impregnably virtuous mask stripped away. He's played this role a hundred times to a hundred lost souls. He ought to be good at it.
He's even, somewhere in the past counselled the He that's caused her to flee, on a dreary london day to the ? shelter of his apartment.
Watching her, this child-like creature so utterly devastated by Him, he feels a faint flash of anger - did He expect him to choose? Did He not know that he'd choose her ahead of Him? She was his friend, He, an acquaintence.
He feels moved to do something, to say something. He... stands silently and proffers her a tissue.
Her mobile rings and they both glance at it.
He wants to take her by the shoulders and shake her, hard. To ask her to look anew at the reality that's brought her to his place; to lend her some small degree of his cynicism and skepticism to see through the lies. To remark, pointedly, that she's Not Happy.
His code of ethics silences him. It's her life to lead; her choices to make. Her perception of her reality.
She looks back down and answers the 'phone.
He doesn't, somehow think he'll be seeing her again.
******
He cradles her in his arms, seated on his bed as she cries in bewilderment and incomprehension. She's so small and warm, and so, so utterly broken. His fault. I made this! Years of pent up frustration, upset and resignation rise up in an uncontainable eddy of emotion, tinged with much of her filtered-through sadness. They cry together for a while more before she leaves.
He does see her again a few times more. But everything's changed now. They speak as familiar strangers, they avert their eyes and tread carefully. The feeble walls he's built have become insurmountable by their mutual apathy. They're intimate just once - only as strangers can be. Even that is a sad moment for them both.
She asks him just the once if perhaps in the future...? He doesn't want to be the heartless bastard that he feels like, but he doesn't have a choice. He says he doesn't think so.
He knows now what She meant, when She said She could Hurt people.
******
He sits by the window, chin down on his cradled knees staring out aimlessly at the darkness of a night sky reflected off the sea; pools of eternal darkness lying in troubled sleep in their immense bed, turning over incessantly. Listlessly.
Everything, all of tonight a bittersweet memory compared with the knowledge that Tomorrow, he will probably never see Her again. For the rest of his life. Every laugh, every grimace, every glare; the strangely intense sadness in her eyes, the slightly tragic set of Her brow as She turned, her hair fanning out. Everything, only moments ago - tomorrow, only a distant and ever widening memory.
******
He asks one last time for Her to be still so that he can memorise Her face (he means Her eyes, really) one last time.
(He remembers the first time he asked, when they first met, and the silent moments they shared as she arched her brow in unprotesting bemusement.)
She turns in exasperated irritation, with a muffled "whatever" and steps out of his life.
Forever.
******
He deals the cards to find the answer
the secret geometry of chance
the hidden law of a probable outcome
the numbers lead a dance
(in no particular order)
******
She, slumped, a defeated mess in his sofa, her body racked by staccatto sobs, her normally impeccable face a mess of tears.
He, seated adjacently on his couch, watching in silence. Slightly shell-shocked by the revelations - although he'd, in his cynicism predicted them a while back; unused to seeing her reality, her (their!) impregnably virtuous mask stripped away. He's played this role a hundred times to a hundred lost souls. He ought to be good at it.
He's even, somewhere in the past counselled the He that's caused her to flee, on a dreary london day to the ? shelter of his apartment.
Watching her, this child-like creature so utterly devastated by Him, he feels a faint flash of anger - did He expect him to choose? Did He not know that he'd choose her ahead of Him? She was his friend, He, an acquaintence.
He feels moved to do something, to say something. He... stands silently and proffers her a tissue.
Her mobile rings and they both glance at it.
He wants to take her by the shoulders and shake her, hard. To ask her to look anew at the reality that's brought her to his place; to lend her some small degree of his cynicism and skepticism to see through the lies. To remark, pointedly, that she's Not Happy.
His code of ethics silences him. It's her life to lead; her choices to make. Her perception of her reality.
She looks back down and answers the 'phone.
He doesn't, somehow think he'll be seeing her again.
******
He cradles her in his arms, seated on his bed as she cries in bewilderment and incomprehension. She's so small and warm, and so, so utterly broken. His fault. I made this! Years of pent up frustration, upset and resignation rise up in an uncontainable eddy of emotion, tinged with much of her filtered-through sadness. They cry together for a while more before she leaves.
He does see her again a few times more. But everything's changed now. They speak as familiar strangers, they avert their eyes and tread carefully. The feeble walls he's built have become insurmountable by their mutual apathy. They're intimate just once - only as strangers can be. Even that is a sad moment for them both.
She asks him just the once if perhaps in the future...? He doesn't want to be the heartless bastard that he feels like, but he doesn't have a choice. He says he doesn't think so.
He knows now what She meant, when She said She could Hurt people.
******
He sits by the window, chin down on his cradled knees staring out aimlessly at the darkness of a night sky reflected off the sea; pools of eternal darkness lying in troubled sleep in their immense bed, turning over incessantly. Listlessly.
Everything, all of tonight a bittersweet memory compared with the knowledge that Tomorrow, he will probably never see Her again. For the rest of his life. Every laugh, every grimace, every glare; the strangely intense sadness in her eyes, the slightly tragic set of Her brow as She turned, her hair fanning out. Everything, only moments ago - tomorrow, only a distant and ever widening memory.
******
He asks one last time for Her to be still so that he can memorise Her face (he means Her eyes, really) one last time.
(He remembers the first time he asked, when they first met, and the silent moments they shared as she arched her brow in unprotesting bemusement.)
She turns in exasperated irritation, with a muffled "whatever" and steps out of his life.
Forever.
******
He deals the cards to find the answer
the secret geometry of chance
the hidden law of a probable outcome
the numbers lead a dance
