It wasn’t that he didn’t appreciate her present, in a way he did but he didn’t like furry things, he just liked her. She looked so disappointed in him that he hadn’t picked it up to admire it, but he couldn’t and had just shouted at her to take it away. He was sorry now he had slammed the door after her, he would give her five minutes and then he would call her back, he’d make a nice cup of tea and he’d give her a nice treat, after all it was because of her he had no mice.
Hey. You up?
Yes. Alright, Tim? Had a good night. You? Didn’t CU. Where U go? In town with friends. Still with them? No. Home now. I hoped 2CU. Next time maybe. Night! Your green dot’s still on. Who you talking to? My buddy in the States. G’night, Tim. X Like Really? You liked my kiss? I’m kinda busy right now. Jani, are you still there? Fall asleep? No. Not asleep just chatting with my other friend. I like you. I know you do. That’s why we’re mates. Want to be more than just friends? You’re drunk. Go to bed. An old man sits on the street clutching a small box. His sign says: ‘FOR SALE – octogenarian’s teeth, one careful owner.’
‘Whose are they?’ asks a man in a suit. ‘Mine.’ ‘Why are you selling?’ ‘I’m hungry.’ ‘How much?’ ‘Five pounds?’ He pays and turns to leave but the old man insists he takes the box, saying, ‘I’m not a beggar.’ Next morning the suit is in the old man’s place. ‘How much?’ asks the old man. ‘Five pence.’ The suit takes the coin and hands back the box. ‘Much obliged,’ says the old man, his eyes brimming with tears. When you were born, you had ten perfect toes and fingers, a dimple on your chin, a full head of hair, and a crooked smile that melted my heart. I thought I knew love until I held you. My only child. My son.
Birthdays came and went. There were fifteen of them. One year, it fell on Father’s Day, and I gave you a card that read, “I am … because you are.” “You were you before me, Dad,” you laughed. Your imperfect heart took you away from us. I don’t know me without you. I’m no longer a Dad. It came unexpectedly- the sweetest and most unexpected turn of events.
They share a park bench. He sits feeding pigeons as she watches her grandchildren play. Soon, everyone’s laughing, eating ice cream and suddenly facing new beginnings. Phone calls that make her feel as giddy as a teenager. Humming and singing to herself for no reason. And now, she’s on her first date in fifteen years. She’d thought such days were over- had closed her heart to romance. Yet romance has found her. Sitting there, holding hands… Smiling. Butterflies. Once again, her heart is light, happy and open to love. We pile them high, sand bags stuffed to brimming. The fortitude of misshaped walls was not meant to last. First the thunder. The rumbling of distant drums, like foam preceding waves, roars to our shore.
We rush to posts, we’re armed. Lying prone we wait. Kicked up dirt dangles in mid-air. The old earth remembers, knows we’re foreign. They remember too, their blood ancestral legacy. Their charge has started. We unload the rounds. Broken daggers lie handle-less. When the steam settles, we’re told its over. The next advance won’t come. But restless nights I wait still, I don’t deserve satisfaction. Editor's Choice Reema was deeply asleep when her smartphone’s alarm began ringing. A millennial entrepreneur, she was in Darjeeling to close a lucrative deal. Waking up, she opened the curtain of her hotel room in sixth floor. A magnificent view of the snow-capped Mount Kanchenjunga appeared; a world battered by a pandemic and an ongoing war, the nature remained beautiful.
Soon, the irony appeared. This Himalayan town was developed by the colonial power to escape the summer heat of the plains. Now the climate-change, brought on by rampant western industrialization, has been burning past colonial capitals. Mother Nature was warning all along. The shadow of death follows us all, creeping up from behind us . . . It's a stealthy mother, yet it's all an illusion. Yet how does one know existence is real and one is not some dream or figment of the imagination, a simple character in the cerebral mind, a small part on a much bigger stage . . . We are all Hamlets screaming To be or not to be, while the gravedigger tosses up another skull. In the bloodbath of war we all hope for a shitless death. Either you will die peacefully in your sleep or covered in someone else's blood.
Showers of water fall from the overcast sky. The boat rocks aggressively, and Sir clutches his stomach.
“Sir! Are you seasick?” I ask worriedly. “Get me a pretzel,” Sir orders, flicking me away with his chubby hands. I reach into my bag and pull out a pretzel. Emergency food. “Sir, I brought you this.” Sir’s thick brows narrow. “How do I know this isn’t poisoned?” I take a couple bites of the pretzel. Sir snatches it immediately. “You leave,” he says, filling his mouth with food. I obey, and once I’m out of sight, I take the pretzel’s antidote. Janu Mami, my mother-in-law's friend, often visited with spicy gossip. One morning she dropped by, tired. My mother-in-law welcomed her and offered the customary coffee. Mami demurred. “This is the fifth house! Get me cool water. It’s sizzling outside.” I overheard her asking about me, “How's the new daughter-in-law adjusting?” My mother-in-law evaded the question and instead asked, “So what brings you here?” Mami said, “Do you know that third house girl ran away with a Punjabi?” She watched my mother-in-law’s shocked expression and continued, “What would you do without me!” I thought, "No wonder we call her The Newsletter!”
Nine days ago, it happened.
In that foggy November soup, a hit-and-run driver left you lying unconscious as you walked to school. X-rays and scans are normal. No hairline fractures. Pupils are equal and react to light. All good signs. We wait. We watch the glucose bag attached to your left arm, drip, drip, drip. We listen to the beeps from the monitor dissonant and constant; the ever-present audio wallpaper in the room. Neurologists reassure us sleep repairs; heals the brain. We wait. Yesterday at noon, they switched off the monitor. There wasn’t a mark on you, no sign whatever. Some people have pet cats, pet dogs–
I have a pet spider. A tarantula, Eddie, as frizzy as an afro and just as black. He and I often take a walk around the park, unless it's raining. (I mentioned the frizz.) To avoid standing out amongst the other walkers and their befuddled canines, we play fetch with a little plastic fly. I flick it, Eddie chases it, catches it, and brings it back. This we do over and over until the park closes. Then a quick pint, a movie, and we ride the last bus home. “And what do you do?”
“As little as possible.” I replied. The slim, middle-aged woman politely tottered away on her heels. A burly man with slow-moving eyes asked me something similar. “Sweet Fanny Adams.” I chortled. You’d think I’d asked him for a quick toot on a crack pipe the expression on his face! Well, my wife insists that I mingle; so long as I behave, and drink responsibly. I’m an arms dealer, a stuntman, a semi-retired gigolo down on his luck… Some might say I’m a smug old fool; but, oh, how I love a PTA meeting... Monday, we’d overslept and were squeezed into the bathroom, all trying to get to the toothpaste at the same time. I’m not sure how I heard my phone over the screaming kids.
“Ethel’s gone AWOL again.” It was Dad with his usual to the point telephone manner. I said not to worry and that I’d try and nip over after the school run. Ethel was there though, pacing at the school gates, she’d wet herself. “I’m waiting for me Mam.” She told us and I ushered the kids into school, not wanting to explain about Grandma to them just yet. As Sharon reached out, it vanished for the fifth time. She loved millionaire’s shortbread. When did she last eat?
A tap on her shoulder made her turn to see a Victorian lady. ‘You can’t eat, dear. You’re a ghost. Anything will vanish when you reach for it.’ ‘I’m thirty. I can’t…’ ‘You had an accident, dear. Let’s find somewhere better to stay.’ ‘This is my home.’ ‘Was, dear. Do you know those people over there?’ Sharon shook her head. The last year was a blur. No wonder Rory and the boys weren’t here. They had moved on. She had not. Here.
Here they shoot you out from the pod at 593.76km an hour. A calculated figure by a machine that didn’t study postgrad trigonometry. The casing squeezes my core - despite the guaranteed oxygen - I’m breathless. I picture exploding like those teenage spots that left crater scars over my forehead. I never listened to my brother’s warnings not to pop them. '…17, 18.' The meant-to-be-reassuring voice continues. I try to lift my head, see something, anything but the helmet’s held fast; same as the clamps round my feet. '20.' There I am, before I can remember where here was. “This is Glasgow Airport. Railway Services flight G-AGZA out of Northolt is showing overdue, can you tell me where it is?”
“A loft.” “It is still aloft?” I ask, checking the time. “Not anymore.” I scratch my head. Something about his tone… “So it crashed?” “Landed safely, a touch sooner than expected. I don’t think they will be coming to Glasgow tonight. Landed so gently it did not wake the baby. Little David slept right through.” “So where is it now?” “I told you already!” The first-chair saxophonist arrived to rehearsal with a scowl. He pointed out our section’s every small mistake and refused our attempts at friendly banter.
“Can you believe his arrogance?” one player asked. “Too good for the rest of us,” said another. No one wanted to sit by him, but it fell to me. I took his glares and mumbled insults. Until the night I’d had enough. “Why are you so mean?” I wanted to say. But instead, “I’m really glad you’re here.” His face softened. “I almost wasn’t. I had to put my wife in a nursing home this morning.” The boy sits watching the charcoal fire, entranced. He has never seen such beautiful orange red flames dancing and licking the pot. They snap, crackle, pop as they twirl clapping hands. A happy tongue of flame invites him to join.
But you are very hot, I’ll be burnt. The flames dance slower. Now they are languid, sleepy-eyed, struggling to keep alive. The boy sees them no longer interesting. Wake up, dance more, he demands. Bring in our siblings to light us up. The flames dance once again, larger and brighter. The boy is again entranced, he is awake. My six year old feet first climbed the Craig ignorant of danger. My ten year old feet were confident, I had climbed this way many times before. At sixteen they knew respect, they loved the wild and rugged Craig face.
Then just a memory fading. Forty years passed. In time on urban pavement I’d stumble, uneven cracked and dangerous. But returning to the Craig face once more, breathing in that fresh fresh air, I stepped onto the rough terrain. My feet remembered, surely knowing their place and pace. Mona tightly clasped the precious little piece of metal. She opened her eyes briefly to the bowed heads around her, all in silent repent.
Slowly, hope and faith filled Mona’s every cell. Life became focused, her path certain. She would live a just, truthful existence, part of something bigger, bigger than her. She closed her eyes again to pray - heart pounding, senses heightened. “Sorry, everyone,” announced the captain. “Just some bad turbulence, but we’re through now.” Mona gasped with relief. She leaned back, re-opened her in-flight magazine to the fashion page and took a sip from her beer can. They say my garden is wild, Platero, as is my hair - Martha would be ashamed if she saw this garden.
Don't they know this garden is an ode to Martha? That every year when the leaves lose grip, I prune erratic. I seek your approval, Platero, because you‘ve seen Martha do it so often. That hedge over there: sloppy and unevenly shaven; the bushes butterflies like to sit on, brusquely stripped of their thick branches - hopefully none vital. That’s why this garden is an ode to Martha: because I’m lost without her and not just in the garden. The coat was silvery-white, like the Arctic fox from his encyclopedia. In it, his Mum became a different creature. Nocturnal. Cold. Soft fur, but not cuddly.
"A solitary animal, females group together, leaving the male with the young" he read. He remembered her saying goodnight and a smell like leftover trifle as she unfurled his fingers, pushing him away. "They may abandon the family altogether." Every night from his window he watched swift white shapes in the dark evaporate into air, just plastic bags or ghosts floating by. In Spring, he’d look for greyish-blue instead. He waited for the thaw. Last night I dreamt you came back. Again.
I was just enjoying the part where I’d shoved you over the edge of a suicidally steep cliff on the West Coast of Ireland, when you reappeared. You’d landed on a ledge and managed to scramble back up. Bloody typical. You were scratched, bruised and angry, seriously angry. Yelling at me that I’m useless, ugly, pathetic. Just like old times. I hate having to relive your rages night after night but it’s worth it for the sheer joy of waking up and realising I’d dreamed the bit about the ledge. Lonely hearts are the easiest to take; picking broken pieces off the dirty basement floor. It’s easy to pretend when their souls are empty—they’ll trust kindhearted lovers to take them in. Swear they’ll never be alone again.
But how the façade falls apart under silver moonlight. Glistening on the edge of the blade. Out to rid the world of another broken spirit. Serenading the night with their screams. In the morning, they’ll dance in the basement. Over the makeshift grave of lonely girls. Proud that they had kept their promise. Beneath the dirt, they never again would lie alone. |
"Classic"
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