the pier

the pier, jutted out into the sea, rising up above the besieging waves, on cement legs. Along its length men held long rods, finger width spires trailing nylon whispers into the grey waters.
the wind railed against him, and her- he shivered and her laugh sprang up, was caught in, and was quickly dispersed. out on the shimmering blue horizon the sun, an obtuse orange disk plunging to the sea. he was trying to put it into words, she was feeding greedy sea gulls kettle chips from her purse.
there was no point in thinking too hard about it he thought. the sun was going to down, the wind was not going to stop, she was going to get on that plane tomorrow. he thought he heard music coming out through the glass less windows of the bar they had walked passed.
it was all dissolving so quickly, the light to his right, each delightful explosions of her laughter, the bourbon induced warmth at his lips and nose. she caught him looking at her, tucked a rebellious dark length behind her ear, smiled, responded in turn to the chorus of cries from the birds with an explanation that the chips were gone.
there was no reasoning with the birds, or the retreating sun, or the pounding waves.
a weathered black man near the edge called out. from his rod dangled a shark, maybe a foot in length. reeled in and thrown down onto the gritty cement pier, it's black shiny eyes, confused, spasmed as a crowded circled to stare. he looked over a shoulder for a second.
voices from the crowd commented on its bared dangerous prepubescent teeth. braver onlookers knelt near the head for pictures.
the white underside appeared appeared so soft and innocent.
she had wandered down the pier. in each direction water pulled back again and again the veil of the beach. the gulls had disappeared. he wanted another drink, there was so much sound. he noticed lights coming on in the houses that ran like a wall the length of the beach.
he was losing track of time, the colours were all changing, the individual noises blurring together.
she called out and waved him to her. his eyes met hers. this too was ending, met yesterday, gone tomorrow. he smiled at distance to her, the wind whipped through her hair and her silk turquoise scarf. he started to walk towards her.
but stopped. everything was suddenly silent, still. he turned around.
the crowd, a circle of vacant faced statues.
the shark had stopped jerking. the beautiful thing had fled. the sun set too, he noted, had ended without him seeing it. he was cold.
he began to walk down the pier, he couldn’t see her.
he forewent going to the bar. went to the beach, kicked off his sandals. the water raked his feet and clawed heavily into the bottoms of his jeans.
the wind again, charged off the water.
someone hoisted the grey limp form of the shark over the side and dumped it into the water. he supposed that they had meant to revive it by returning it to the sea. but he thought that was not the way life worked, for sharks or sunsets.
or for men.
perhaps most of all for men.
there was comforting about the brutal indifference of it all. it was all the same. pulled away by the waves, or lost in the wind, or fading on the horizon, or ceasing on the pier.
or so he told himself.
and then, he felt a hand take his hand.

The Girl From New Hampshire

The was film on everything, he felt. His eyes, joints of his bones, his soul. Residue of a misspent night. The shower hadn't been able to wear away the subtle smell of the hot tub. Dry hands, sore finger tips.
The ballroom was a garden of people varying from the most tightly trimmed trees to unseemingly, unkept shrubs. Moving in pace to the ringing of hundreds of glasses, the sound of the disjointed gentle collisions of various pieces of silver.
He saw her approaching immediately, a stormcloud in a sundress.
The dark lengths of her hair fell amongst her bared shoulders in a heavy down pour.
At arms length she stopped, defensive posturing, her eyes were lovely and hard to read.
He felt the room shimmer, or shift just a bit, to the right, or perhaps it was just his imagination, the feeling of a shifting, a slipping away.
She had a face that could clear the air.
- I'm never going to see you again am I?- she asked. He smiled at the sweetness of the question.
- It's unlikely- he didn't lie, it seemed it unfaithful to lie to the sad music of her voice.
- Then why did you kiss me last night?- No tremble of contained anger, just a faint confusion.
- Because I wanted to know- He looked down into her eyes, and she kept his gaze.
- Know what?-
- What can only be known by kissing someone-

a crow

The casualties had grown, smothered ends, a pile of brown filters.


She kept them to the side, away from him, she sat on the ground, as did he. Her legs crossed, back against the peeling paint walls of the porch. He sprawled out, laying on side, propped up on an elbow.

He made some comment, she laughed without really hearing what he said. He was in one of those rare moods, pleasant, entertaining. It was unusual, unexpected. The sun was in decline. it feels like two falls ago. or was it spring? how could i forget? the light is so different between fall and spring. the days feel nothing alike. but i’ve lived this feeling before, i remember this. was it fall or spring? when am I remembering?

Clumsy fingers into the box. A survivor heard but evasive. He rolled onto his back. She found the cigarette. They looked out into the parking lot, she turned to him. He was staring at something, she couldn’t figure out what. A few besieged trees, a handful of silent browbeaten cars was all the lot held. there’s more grey in his hair. a lot now. and some in that silly beard of his, as if anything could hide that still boyish smile.

inhale.

-You should move down. You could move in here. It’d be fun.- Him

exhale.

-Yeah it would-

-We could get giant black and white posters- Him

-An Elvis one? When he was young. And a Michael Caine one?-

-Was Michael Caine ever young?-Him

She laughed. Or did she? Or had she been laughing the whole time? when was this moment i am in again? A crow landed in an empty parking spot. His voice again in the background. She was never going to move in with him she knew, and so did he.

It was okay, they carried on.

She stared at the bird. i don’t think i’ve ever seen a crow so black, its feathers dark, depthless but somehow they’re still distinct. the sort of dark you could never see through, only stare into, like the black of space, like the black of time. when was that time? that feeling? She could smell bourbon. He had gone quiet, as had she. The bird cocked its head to look at her.

And she realized she was wrong.

The bird was not black, it was an inexplicable dark blue.

And she realized she was wrong.

She hadn’t been remembering a time, she had been remembering the sound of her own laughter.

Because I used to love you

The Tree rose, in youth, out of the square of exposed earth in the concrete courtyard. Steady, straight. Stone structures loomed above It, boxed It in. The tree grew, peeled at Its trunk, spread at Its joints, stretched at Its tips. It shared in season Its passing leaves with the unappreciative patterned cement surrounding ground.  Then in time It stopped, potential growth contained by the small space into which it had been born. Repetition then deadened any sense of the passing of time. Rain came and went. The sun moved in repetitious cycles, pathing across the sky. The many shades of the sky became monotonous. Eventually the tree became indifferent to the indifference of Its surroundings and then inevitably forgot that it was even a tree at all.