As the winter chill receded and the air began to thaw, the rattle of garage doors opening merged with the slamming back of bolts on garden sheds. From said garages and sheds, the men of Kingfisher Avenue emerged, shielded by their lawnmowers.
Steve, with his bog-standard electric mower, the cord masked in electrical tape to repair the damage from all the times he’d mowed straight over it.
Gareth, with his fancy cordless affair that Steve is jealous of, not that he’s ever vocalised that fact.
Jack’s toes stretched, pointed like a ballet dancer, aching to keep him tall enough. But the water kept creeping.
Rising.
At his chin.
Rising.
His nose.
Chloe mentions that she got her new track pants in the metaverse when she went shopping with Alessa and you hate to think that they’re hanging out without you in some virtual Ivy Park and getting matching tattoos while you’re sitting at home eating salmon salad with your parents. She told you she’d get a matching tattoo with you, a real one when you both graduate – two halves of a butterfly – but you’ve heard that in the verse when you have tattoos like that and you line up the ink, the blue outline will shiver and crawl right out of your skin, hover above you as you hold onto each other on a roller coaster at Cedar Point even though you’ve never left Florida.
Shit is so much cooler in there. Tattoos mean something in there. People go places in there.
“C’mon babe, let’s watch another show,” Melanne Collie said, swathed in an unwashed, grey hoodie, and face painted with runny mascara. “Or we can take another nap.” She had felt Jack’s phone vibrate through the sofa cushions.
Jack could no longer remember how long they’d been a couple for. Even the memory of their first meeting was foggy. But Mel had moved into Jack’s small apartment almost immediately, decorating it to her taste–with dust, a dish-filled sink, and closed curtains. “Hang on, Mel,” he said.
When I was little, I always loved watching my sister paint. She would create the most realistic snow capped mountains and the rustiest torn down barns. I would sit next to her and watch her create whole worlds with just a few flicks of her palm. She would give me a blank canvas, and tell me to draw anything I wanted. I hated seeing that blank canvas, it was just a square of nothing, so I would paint streaks of color everywhere. Turquoise, maroon, magenta. Off they went, covering every corner of that ugly blankness.
No one actually knew if a girl drowned in the pond or not. That’s what local legend suggested, and plenty of people swore they remembered hearing about a tragic afternoon where something like that happened. That, and the family that moved away from the home on the small hill above it. Was the girl their daughter? A stranger? It depended on who you asked.
Her feet always showed her age more than the rest of her body. Dried blister atop dried blister, flaking skin; a bone spur adding dimension to her little toe. I cradle her foot in my hands and began to massage it starting with the toes and working my way down to the heel. Slowly and evenly I make circular motions with my thumbs, kneading the cold flesh of the woman who raised me. Everyone needs a little pampering. What you don’t get in life, you should get in death.
The hotel room was cramped, but it would have to do. She let the suitcase land on the floor with a solid thud. The air was stale, but it had never been more beautiful. Her body felt heavy, for the first time all of the energy from being on that constant alert had been drained from her.
It is lifted away from the others and cradled. It is comfortable. One hand gently closes around its slender neck. Fingers press, politely adjusting the selected strings to the desired pitch, while the other hand strums once. It agrees. The hand strums more. An understanding begins.
Chords are chosen in the most workable sequences. These are the hands of one who will become a master.