Wednesday, June 15, 2005
True Beauty comes from Within
He examined her fingernail with a puzzled frown, his face drawing closer to it as he saw the lightly-charred edges. He commented about a hundred dollar manicure gone up in flames...
"Oh, it's sponsored." she shrugged.
Sponsored fingernails. Gee.
*****
He'd heard her say it before; he'd even written mockingly about it in a story; but somehow he'd always assumed it was equal parts hyperbole and egocentricity; the creation of a new urban legend.
But as she walked down the corridor, it happened as if in slow-motion. Heads turned to follow her passage; all eyes were her possession. Elderly men watched with suddenly-young eyes; elderly women with impassive malevolence; young men watched with seething desire; young women with... something else, much akin to jealousy.
They stepped onto the ward, and still it continued; every head swivelled on every neck.
It was almost unreal, walking beside her. He didn't need to glance out the corner of her eye; he could feel her beside him... drawn up tall. Regal. The queen... of hearts.
A beauty that turned heads.
And yet as he listened, and laughed at her (? with? her?) through the evening, as they clowned around and fooled with the table lighting, he realised how wrong people would be to judge this book by it's cover.
For beneath the (probably largely sponsored) veneer lurked a hidden quality - a sort of - warmth - that didn't need to turn heads... but lay siege to his rapt humour and attention.
As one of her readers put it - a beauty that came from within.
He wondered at all the many men from her past, blinded by that radiance, and lying, in the aftermath, by the wayside.
Were they the brave... or the foolish?
Or perhaps just... the honest souls who spoke their minds, and wagered their dignity.
"Oh, it's sponsored." she shrugged.
Sponsored fingernails. Gee.
*****
He'd heard her say it before; he'd even written mockingly about it in a story; but somehow he'd always assumed it was equal parts hyperbole and egocentricity; the creation of a new urban legend.
But as she walked down the corridor, it happened as if in slow-motion. Heads turned to follow her passage; all eyes were her possession. Elderly men watched with suddenly-young eyes; elderly women with impassive malevolence; young men watched with seething desire; young women with... something else, much akin to jealousy.
They stepped onto the ward, and still it continued; every head swivelled on every neck.
It was almost unreal, walking beside her. He didn't need to glance out the corner of her eye; he could feel her beside him... drawn up tall. Regal. The queen... of hearts.
A beauty that turned heads.
And yet as he listened, and laughed at her (? with? her?) through the evening, as they clowned around and fooled with the table lighting, he realised how wrong people would be to judge this book by it's cover.
For beneath the (probably largely sponsored) veneer lurked a hidden quality - a sort of - warmth - that didn't need to turn heads... but lay siege to his rapt humour and attention.
As one of her readers put it - a beauty that came from within.
He wondered at all the many men from her past, blinded by that radiance, and lying, in the aftermath, by the wayside.
Were they the brave... or the foolish?
Or perhaps just... the honest souls who spoke their minds, and wagered their dignity.
