In the dim 5 o clock light she could clearly see smoke around the toppled piles of clothes. Somehow it was comforting; it gave her one of the Feelings. Sitting in her red second hand smelling chair, where she could just peak out of the window, the Feeling made her look and breathe in the fresh warm spring air. Her eyes fell on a globe that was displayed amongst elaborate babushkas below on the Street.
She thought about Creation and how it had not been thought through by a being that did not love man or a being that had been hurt deeply and wanted to punish man.
It was time to get going. She picked a black cardigan out of the nearest pile, and thought that she must always smell of smoke with everything lying exposed like that, and decided that she had to start putting it in the wardrobe and furthermore start using body lotion every day. She thought about his hands on her thighs. Then she cried a bit and realized that she couldn’t go out just yet and rolled a spliff, which she smoked out of the window and wondered whether people on the street could smell the smoke. The floating smoke and the thought of Creation with all its errors it was enough to put her in a cheerful mood.
She laughed quickly at a thought, then she had to go back to the Chair and picked up a book from the floor. Paradise Lost, she found another.
Twenty minutes later she was on the Street. Past the Bar first. She might catch a glimpse of him, sitting there with people that she talked to sometimes. Maybe they would tell him something upsetting about her. She wondered if they all saw her there, everyday.
Everything was ruined and she went home and then he was there! And his voice filled her up and she sopped soundlessly into his neck; he took it for passion and opened his pants. She told him she didn't want him, only this, that she was better, because she was Beautiful, and he was nothing. She begged him to love her, but in a language that he did not understand. Almost bursting, she wanted him to finish. What part of the process was it that she craved so much, she wondered suddenly?
She went to the window, trying to make him feel as she felt every time he moved a millimeter away from her.
Later in the Chair she tried to count how many minutes of bliss there had been. Desperately she tried to subdue the Feeling that made her hipbones burn.
She stroked her face, her breasts, her collarbone. Then she rolled a joint and let the Fuzziness overtake, until tonight when she would run into him, surrounded by her fabulous friends. But then he would stroke the small of some other girl’s back and her friends would hug her and say that she was prettier. And she was.
1 comment:
There's a nice dreamy speed to this that I like. Actions are over in a minute but thoughts persist. The character seems to prefer her musings to real life. I also think I like the idiosyncratic way you use Feelings as referring to something very specific.
On the flipside, this is a little meandering at points and seems to flit about. I know some of this might be to do with the fact that this story has been condensed from a longer one, but also this is essentially a piece about reflection so it's a lot harder on the reader as a short story than something with a more active progression.
Also some of the poetic construction can be hard to decode when the reader is struggling to understand the event you are describing:
'She told him she didn't want him, only this, that she was better, because she was Beautiful, and he was nothing. She begged him to love her, but in a language that he did not understand.'
It has a lyrical intensity and tells us something intriguing about the vanity of the character, but is very difficult to fathom in terms of the mechanics of what is going on.
A few thoughts anyway. Hope they make sense.
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