friends

I've decided that in this post, I shall include some of my friends/acquaintances. Try not to be offended. I have a vague idea of who I shall include, but I'll probably just add people into this short bit of prose as and when I feel like it. Oh, but Robyn, you're it. :D

-

The sky, taking a quick piss, and then over. Five seconds. The trees were dripping. Karma, Alicia Keys belted from the Macdonalds store radio, what goes around comes around. Umbrellas up everywhere like instant mushrooms, then withering back into stalks.

A tall, lanky teenager had herself drenched. Cursing mildly -she reserved the heavier words for the chatrooms-, wringing the water out of a purple t-shirt, no friend's house to have a change of clothes. She was on the way to an interview, a very important one.

And at that moment of frenzy, episode Of Flailing Bags and Temporarily Missing Tissue Paper, another one on the set.

It was at the moment that she was bumped roughly in the side, and with barely any time to think, she was on the ground. In the pavement mud. With a heavy, bony weight on top of her.

"Damn... aunt... shirt!" Said the weight.  

"Oh my god," she breathed, managing to stand, bags still in the mud. "I'll be so late!" And she sneezed.

A grimy hand was shoved in her face as that weight got up. "My new shi- Err, sorry. You okay?"

She glanced at the new figure, despairingly. There were most important matters.  "Yeah." Distractedly. Then the epiphany: "Um, sorry, do you have a tissue?"

The figure was male. Skinny. Taller than her even, with grass and mud in a few fell streaks across a gray polo he was clutching at the hem, quite anxiously. He rubbed at a stain, and looked up. "Sorry, no." Pause, and then, "You sure you're okay?"

"Ye-" she sneezed here, disappointed, and rubbed her reddening nose. "Yeah."

A few meters away, a bus screeched to a halt. She sneezed again.

"Um," said the guy, "Okay. Bye-"

But he stopped at the look on her face. She was staring at the bus, at the bus number, at the last passenger boarding, the door closing. Drip drip, went the wetness in the hair as they slapped against the pavement mud. "Ohmygod, that's my bus." Some pitch of frenzy rising in her voice.

"That's my bus!" she screamed, just as the bus rumbled their way and sent road puddles sloshing all over them.

lufuopsis ab initio

Inspiration. It used to flow to her easily, in torrents of originality and colour and verve. Perhaps she'd used all of these up too fast, or maybe she just lacked the passion. She tried to force out what she had in her, each time failing, each time retreating in defeat. Some great wall, a challenge, a constant burden that incited no tears but a burning, empty hole somewhere deep in her. Her talent wouldn't come. Her eyes wouldn't open. She nagged at herself. She didn't want to face the truth. The words were no longer beautiful. One whole load of grammar and vocabulary, something that belonged to school, something she had to leave behind. She despaired. She angsted. She did not cry. Her emotions found little release. Even this little passage, dry and sparse as a leaf left over from autumn and frozen in winter ice. The love and the skill vanished into the air like a rain puddle losing its gleam.

!#^%^*^($*7

"Hey."

He staggers around, tipsy, and nearly topples over the girl who greeted him. In alarm she reaches out to steady him, and he squints in hope of recognition.

"Ellen?"

"Yeah. Hey." She's shoving her hands into her jacket now, plugging in earphones and looking down as if regretting her impulsive greeting.

But he's ignorant, never was one to catch hints. Ever the insensitive drama king. He takes a step back, assessing her. His gaze is drunk but meticulous, taking in her worn homemade jacket, frayed threads galore as they rim her sewn-on pockets, sleeve edges. The very one she wore that night. But that's not special, she probably wears it every single day, he realizes with disappointment.    

A blaring honk tears away his breath. They are at the sidewalk, taxi stand, and he has teetered too close to the road. He's in a crouching position on the ground now, doubling over as the taste of bile fills his throat in rancid retribution. His eyes are closed but he sees stars, spinning in a dizzy black haze of his subconscious. Memories of that night flood out with the onslaught of booze like a clear, starry dream in the landscape of his room. Hankering, hassling like traffic. "Ellen," he manages through the rising coughs and wheezes, and suddenly it all seem irrelevent.

Fleetingly, she's there, colour hovering at the horizon of his sanity. "Are you okay? Um, I-"

He flops onto his side, suddenly exhausted, and reaches out for her hand. But then snatches of sound in her voice, "I've gotta go, sorry, I'm in a rush." Slamming of a car door, rush of pipe exhaust, and he knows she's gone. What's her phone number? He doesn't know. What's her last name? He doesn't know either. So profound an effect they seem to have on him, and he closes his eyes, letting the background whispers shudder to a stop, and this is the only special memory he has of her.

topsy

I want to write a meaningful first post, but that's ridiculous, ain't it.

So she walked along the night-fallen street, cobblestones cascading under sandalled, unsteadily gaited feet. The local tramp, as they called her, ragged and morose and background-blended.

-turvy