A friend took me to task recently about my failure to write anything she’d want to read.
‘What do you like?’ I asked.
‘Something easy to read, easy to follow,’ she said, vaguely. ‘Ideally dealing with relationships, human interactions, you know, romance for want of a better term. You don’t write Romance, do you?’
Well, no I don’t, but that’s not to say I couldn’t write in that genre if the mood takes me. I once entered a Romantic Short Story competition. I offer that story into evidence as exhibit A.
PS. Spoiler alert. My entry didn’t win.
It Started with a Kiss.
The first time I kissed her was also the last. Sad, but in the circumstances, inevitable. We’re still together, but the relationship has changed. I’ve moved on and so has she.
Each in our own separate ways.
I perched for a moment on the arm of a wooden bench where a brass plaque said, ‘In memory of Dennis Clarke 1938 – 2003. A true friend and a devoted husband and father. He loved his work. Presented by his colleagues at Johnson and Son.’ Devoted husband and father who loved his work? A bit of a contradiction there, I thought, doing the maths in my head. Died at sixty-five. Retired and popped his clogs straight away then. Perhaps he really did love his work.
A small white cloud rushed across the sky like a runaway swan, but in the lee of the gleaming three-storey buildings the air was still and quiet. In the absolute silence, you could have heard a nun fart.
A middle aged couple, walking side by side but not engaging in any way, walked past the bench and glanced at its inscription without particular interest. Poor old Dennis Clarke, nobody cares.
A police car drove slowly down the road, the officer in the passenger seat looking at parked cars as if their very presence was an affront to the custodians of law and order. He gave me a long, hard stare that I returned with interest. I’d have to check online, but as far as I’m aware, loitering on a park bench without any discernible intent was surely not a crime.
The police car turned round at the far end of the service road and headed back towards me. This could go either way as I’ve never been one for turning the other cheek, but I’m doing nothing wrong. What possible interest could they have in me? Almost without noticing, I clench my fists, inchoate rage building unbidden in my gut.
The car came abreast, slowed slightly, both officers now favouring me with long, searching looks.
The car didn’t stop. Moved on. The attention of its occupants reverting to parked cars and the possibility of yet to be discovered miscreants. I relaxed, calm now the urge for combat was past. They wouldn’t be back.
She was still with me and I could still clearly recall that first and last kiss. Memories are so much better than reality, I always feel. Memory remains while other aspects of a relationship decay.
I picked up my carrier bag from the side of the bench and tied a further knot at the top. It wasn’t leaking, not yet anyway, but there was always the chance. That’s the only problem with human heads when they’re still fresh. After a day or so, they’re fine, but the early stages are ruinous to white linen trousers.
Gulliver Smith 