young he looks in sleep, how pink, how beautiful; to whisper, âI love youâ and then wake him up.
He is not beautiful. He is not even pink. The syringe in his hand is empty and its sharp, nasty needle has a bead of blood at its tip. His lips are blue. She lowers the seat back, extends his head, watches his face flush with colour and hears his breath deepen. Now her legs tremble. Now loud angry cries roll from her mouth ugly wet noises sending saliva dripping onto the car.
The sun falls further through its clouds flooding them with late warmth and a strange tangerine glow. Bullet rain startsfalling hard. She shakes him awake, enough to stand up, take his weight, stumble into the house and to the small pink bedroom by the front door. She pushes him onto the bed, rolls him on his side and bends his knee up then brings the syringe and tourniquet from the car and puts them on the pillow by his head.
In and out he breathes, ribs expanding then collapsing like a flower unfolding and closing up, one long breath in for the coming sun, one long breath out for the night. He is a stranger, a character caught in his own private storm, his own lightening, his own rain raining down while all around is the warm summer blue, and the ordinariness of a sunset.
Not all stranger though. There are some things she recognises: this ankle at the edge of his jeans, this knuckle of bone and sinew, an arched foot, the pearled nails of his toes. And this long leg with its heavy thigh and fat bellied muscle, this rosary line of vertebra and corrugated ribs and the sparse dark hair circling his nipples, spreading over his sternum, marking the place where his heart beats invisibly. Familiar too, this flow of soft skin down from neck to belly to the top of his jeans and underneath to the hair that is lush and thick and so much darker than eyebrows and lashes. She lies next to him, remembers the warmth of his breath on her mouth and the heat of his skin on hers when all that will fit between them is one layer of sweat. Her fingers roll over the sphere of his shoulder, trace the line of clavicle. Bones and knuckles and thumping heart. Add a punctured vein. Add morphine to his stormwater blood. He is not the stranger. He is her lover.
His pulse speeds up to her touch. He opens his eyes, sees a syringe; a tourniquet. Sees no chance to lie. But the caress of her hand has the brush of leaves and twigs and her arm over him is apale bark branch and her hair a canopy of blossoms and birds are sleeping there and butterflies rest in her cool green shade while her roots sink down through the bed and the floor and the earth to its rocks and he feels the rain sliding over him, dripping from her leaves, his lover like a tree.
Trees line the road in even measure. Perfect lawns stretch away behind. There should be jazz on the breeze and elegant people dancing by the fountain. Or at least nurses in white dresses and red capes with fob watches bouncing over their breasts as they hurry up the steps. In reality she canât tell the difference between staff and patients in this quiet pretty clinic until she is close enough to read the name badges pinned to t-shirts. Or to see the tremor of a hand. What will she say if he agrees to see her this time? That she loves him still? That love is not enough. That she is too ordinary to do this. She pushes the buzzer, waits for the voice to ask who she is then let her in. The curtains are closed. Reflected in the window she sees a man (right shape, right height) walking quickly across the lawn, past the fountain. He wobbles unevenly from windowpane to windowpane, then disappears. They let her in. She sits and waits till a phone rings and the receptionist has a quick conversation, then calls her over and explains: he left a message. He will not see her today.
But the day is bright and clear so she dares to follow the reflected man, who is probably him but might not be, dares to step out into the lawn, walk past the
He is not beautiful. He is not even pink. The syringe in his hand is empty and its sharp, nasty needle has a bead of blood at its tip. His lips are blue. She lowers the seat back, extends his head, watches his face flush with colour and hears his breath deepen. Now her legs tremble. Now loud angry cries roll from her mouth ugly wet noises sending saliva dripping onto the car.
The sun falls further through its clouds flooding them with late warmth and a strange tangerine glow. Bullet rain startsfalling hard. She shakes him awake, enough to stand up, take his weight, stumble into the house and to the small pink bedroom by the front door. She pushes him onto the bed, rolls him on his side and bends his knee up then brings the syringe and tourniquet from the car and puts them on the pillow by his head.
In and out he breathes, ribs expanding then collapsing like a flower unfolding and closing up, one long breath in for the coming sun, one long breath out for the night. He is a stranger, a character caught in his own private storm, his own lightening, his own rain raining down while all around is the warm summer blue, and the ordinariness of a sunset.
Not all stranger though. There are some things she recognises: this ankle at the edge of his jeans, this knuckle of bone and sinew, an arched foot, the pearled nails of his toes. And this long leg with its heavy thigh and fat bellied muscle, this rosary line of vertebra and corrugated ribs and the sparse dark hair circling his nipples, spreading over his sternum, marking the place where his heart beats invisibly. Familiar too, this flow of soft skin down from neck to belly to the top of his jeans and underneath to the hair that is lush and thick and so much darker than eyebrows and lashes. She lies next to him, remembers the warmth of his breath on her mouth and the heat of his skin on hers when all that will fit between them is one layer of sweat. Her fingers roll over the sphere of his shoulder, trace the line of clavicle. Bones and knuckles and thumping heart. Add a punctured vein. Add morphine to his stormwater blood. He is not the stranger. He is her lover.
His pulse speeds up to her touch. He opens his eyes, sees a syringe; a tourniquet. Sees no chance to lie. But the caress of her hand has the brush of leaves and twigs and her arm over him is apale bark branch and her hair a canopy of blossoms and birds are sleeping there and butterflies rest in her cool green shade while her roots sink down through the bed and the floor and the earth to its rocks and he feels the rain sliding over him, dripping from her leaves, his lover like a tree.
Trees line the road in even measure. Perfect lawns stretch away behind. There should be jazz on the breeze and elegant people dancing by the fountain. Or at least nurses in white dresses and red capes with fob watches bouncing over their breasts as they hurry up the steps. In reality she canât tell the difference between staff and patients in this quiet pretty clinic until she is close enough to read the name badges pinned to t-shirts. Or to see the tremor of a hand. What will she say if he agrees to see her this time? That she loves him still? That love is not enough. That she is too ordinary to do this. She pushes the buzzer, waits for the voice to ask who she is then let her in. The curtains are closed. Reflected in the window she sees a man (right shape, right height) walking quickly across the lawn, past the fountain. He wobbles unevenly from windowpane to windowpane, then disappears. They let her in. She sits and waits till a phone rings and the receptionist has a quick conversation, then calls her over and explains: he left a message. He will not see her today.
But the day is bright and clear so she dares to follow the reflected man, who is probably him but might not be, dares to step out into the lawn, walk past the
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