Tag: fiction

One Eight Six

With the exception of sharing a link to a piece of fiction I recently wrote for another website, it has now been over a year since I last published a post. Because it has been so long, a lot of people have begun to ask whether I still write. And the answer is, absolutely. Over the past twelve months I’ve been just as busy as ever, writing and partially editing a novel, as well as producing a handful of entries for this site that I ultimately decided against posting.

For the most part, my aversion to publishing the entries that I’ve written comes from the fact that they are a lot darker than pieces that I would typically share. They’re posts written by a man who after more than a decade of writing is trying to comprehend what comes next for him in a creative sense. They’re poorly constructed and overflowing with more questions than answers regarding the continued existence of this blog. While they’ll never be shared with the anyone other than myself, they’ve been instrumental in my decision to keep this site alive despite updating it so rarely.

Yet despite the roughshod nature of my recent attempts to create something worth reading, I’ve found myself thinking more and more about updating this site over the past few weeks. So, rather than post something that I will eventually regret publishing, I decided to do something different for entry number 186 on this site and share a draft version of the prologue from the manuscript that I have been working on.

In Brunch, a simple meal shared with a soon to be former flame quickly spirals into a fight for survival. When Mack Trevor, a fast-talking builder from Boston agrees to meet his girlfriend at a cafe in Back Bay, he knows that the meal is going to be uncomfortable. The couple are ill-fitted, have almost nothing in common, and are both aware that their relationship is coming to an end.

What Mack doesn’t know, is that sitting in the same restaurant is Detective Paige Greco; a police officer with a bounty on her head who has relocated from Los Angeles to Boston as part of the witness protection program. Mack and Paige have never met. But by the time their meals and his relationship are over, they’ll both be running for their lives.

I hope that you enjoy the excerpt below…

Mack

When Mack Trevor’s girlfriend asked to meet for brunch at a small café on the edge of Back Bay, he never imagined that the meal would end with him running for his life. Yet just a little more than an hour after he’d ordered coffee and a plate of overpriced eggs, here he was splashing water on his face with trembling hands in a restroom halfway across Boston, wondering how his world had turned to shit so quickly.

He had known that brunch was going to be uncomfortable even before he had agreed to meet Danika. They’d been dating for almost six months and were entering that dreaded phase every new relationship goes through, where the novelty of having a partner starts to fade away and you begin to question what it was that attracted you to the other person in the first place, and if it’s still enough for you to stick around.

What he had initially seen in Danika Mitchell was obvious: the girl was a total smoke-show. Her auburn hair, tanned skin, endlessly-deep hazel eyes and gym-toned body were so damn sexy that his jaw had almost hit the floor the first time that they’d met. Yet despite her drop-dead gorgeous looks, the lack of mutual interests between them and their inability to maintain a conversation were becoming increasingly apparent to him – and even starting to severely dampen her sex appeal.

At twenty-nine years of age, Mack was a builder by day and sports fanatic by night. During football season he sat in the bitter cold and watched the Patriots move a pigskin over an icy field. In basketball season he barracked for the Celtics in TD Garden when he could track down reasonably priced seats. And come baseball season he pulled on his Red Sox cap and cheered until his throat was hoarse.

Danika hated sport – and just about anything else that he was into, which made spending time together tough. Her interests were limited to the world within her smart phone and finding ways to hone the online version of herself that would lure in scores of new followers. He could not care less about his online profile. 

During the first two months of their relationship she’d happily tagged along to a few sporting events despite her disinterest, rapidly stabbing at the screen of her phone with the pads of her thumbs as she posed her way through hundreds of selfies and status updates. But after a while she decided that her followers had grown tired of seeing her hanging out at sports games in her casual wear, and he’d suddenly found himself sucked into a world of café culture and pretentious black-tie events where he didn’t quite fit in.

It wasn’t that he didn’t enjoy dressing up – Mack had always considered himself to be a half-way decent-looking guy, and he must have scrubbed up alright: he’d bagged Danika Mitchell after all. It was just that he hated the way that most of the events she dragged him to seemed more centred around having your picture taken to create an illusion of having fun, rather than actually having some fun. 

Most of Danika’s friends were stiffs too, the kind of people who had been spoon-fed opportunities their entire lives. They didn’t know how to talk to a guy that worked with his hands, and they didn’t want to learn how, which meant that he spent a hell of a lot of time at the parties she dragged him to cradling an overpriced beer and standing around while she gossiped with her friends. But he tried to never let on that he was bored – he wasn’t that much of a self-centred asshole that he would ruin her nights. Instead he feigned interest in what little small talk was offered to him, and made his own fun by dancing, pounding a few shots and striking up conversations with bartenders. 

Come on Mack, focus. Why the fuck does any of that matter right now?

There was a woman that he’d never met before today sitting in the passenger seat of his truck, just outside the restroom. The woman had pointed a gun at his head in the alley that ran alongside the café where he’d met Danika, and now they were on the run together. He wasn’t sure who she was, or who or what they were running from. All he knew for certain was that he and Danika had called it quits with a conversation in the café, he’d stepped into the alley outside and a few seconds later a bullet had struck the side of the building just over his shoulder, sending concrete shards and grit into his face.

Danika had taken the break-up well. Her mood had already been upbeat after he’d let her talk him into choosing his meal, one that was light on taste but easy on the eye so that she could post a picture of their plates side by side online before they had the talk. She had nodded when he’d said that he felt like there wasn’t much communication between them, and that they had been growing distant. Then, as if able to read what was coming next, or maybe having already reached a similar conclusion herself, she had cut him off mid-sentence and dropped the hammer on him, suggesting that they break up.

He’d let the words settle into the space between them, pushing the last forkful of eggs into his mouth as he realised that he should have known when she had artfully angled her camera to ensure that there was no part of him present in the photographs of their meals that she had also decided that their relationship had reached its end.

She’d left not long after that, leaving him alone to drain what remained of his coffee from his mug and to pick up the bill. She hadn’t even offered to pay, and he hadn’t asked. He had paid for so many bland yet highly photographable meals throughout the past six months that doing so one last time seemed like a fitting climax to their time together.

He’d fixed up the bill and left, and then everything had gone to hell. Now here he was, staring at his reflection as he dried his hands on a piece of paper towel so thin that it crumbled in his hands, wondering how something as innocent as brunch had led to whatever was waiting for him on the other side of the restroom door. 

Horizons

I once read a quote that said it is impossible to watch a sunset and not fall into a dream. But I’ve been dreaming for so long now that I can’t tell if it’s the beauty of the sunset before me, or a little arrow that Cupid shot into my chest that makes me conjure up these images of you.

I’m sitting alone on the shoreline, basking in the final rays of evening light reflecting off an ocean so calm its surface has turned to glass. The air is so still that I can taste the ocean on my tongue and hear my own thoughts passing through my head. I don’t know what you’re doing right now, if you feel what I feel, or if I’ll ever find the courage to tell you this in person. I just know that you are miles away from where I am; two hundred and forty-six to be exact. So, as I watch the sun slowly sink beneath the water’s edge, surrendering the sky to the moon and the night, I utter a silent prayer that when the time comes for me to cross my own horizon, I find you waiting on the other side.

I wriggle my toes beneath the sand and imagine the warmth of your body pressed hard against mine. I want to kiss the places where an artist’s needle has left tattoos buried beneath your skin, or hold you down and blow raspberries against your hips until your stomach cramps from laughter. I want to know how it feels to lay beside you as you’re wrapped up in fresh white sheets; I long to press my lips between your shoulder blades while your chest rises and falls with heavy sleep. I want to run my fingers through your hair in a moment of passion, and be the name you utter through breathless lips as we kiss.

I close my eyes as the sun takes its final bow and slips beneath the skyline. When I open them again, the warmth in the air has faded away and night has descended around me. The moon casts a pale yellow light down on my motionless body, as if it knows that you’re always on my mind. I’m not sure how you did it; how you found a way to bury yourself beneath my skin. But now I’m sitting here watching the endless blue ocean turn into an inky black abyss, telling myself that I would risk swimming towards the horizon if I knew it would bring me closer to you.

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I picture myself swimming hard towards the distance, my body breathless and fatigued. I imagine a storm raging overhead, turning the water’s glassy surface into a sea of violent waves that crash down upon my battered frame. My life has never been smooth sailing, nor should it have ever been. The rough waters that I have endured have made me stronger, more confident, and more certain when I say that I once I have swum across the horizon and dragged my weary body onto the shore, I hope to feel your waiting arms wrap around me, and know that I’m forever yours.

I want to hold you tight when you’re hurting, and tell you that I’m proud when you achieve your wildest dreams. I want to carry you to your bedroom when you’re exhausted, you’ve partied too hard, or in those moments when we are consumed with insatiable desire and lust. I want to explore the contours of your body and trace the curves of your hips with the palms of my hands, kissing my way along your calves and up the back of your thighs until goosebumps cover your skin.

I long to feel your heart racing in the throes of passion as your fingers interlock tightly with mine. I yearn to feel your breath against my neck and your teeth against my skin when your body trembles at my touch. If I could just spend my time with you, I would run my hand across the soft skin of your cheek and let our eyes meet as I whisper that no horizon could ever keep us apart. I would swim through waters to find you, no matter how dark, how eerie, or deep.

But I’m not with you in your bed right now. I’m still sitting alone on a beach that has been swallowed up by the hollowness of night. I’m no longer sure if I am dreaming, or if your name has been carved into the chambers of my soul. But I do know that I want you, and that when I find the strength to cross my horizon, I pray that you’re waiting on the shoreline to throw your arms around me.

I know that I would do the same for you. If I ever saw you swimming, I’d be there to watch you take your final stroke before I pulled you from the waters and into a tight embrace. I would tell you that I love you, that I need you, and that you’ve crossed the horizon and found a man who will ensure you never need to swim through such treacherous waters again.

Dirt

A few days ago I suffered through a crisis of confidence while attempting to gain a better understanding of what direction I am trying to move in with my writing, and my life. During this crisis I managed to convince myself that I have nothing of value to offer a potential lover, and that I was destined to be the man who spends his life writing about love, without ever being fortunate enough to experience it for himself. Realising that I’d fallen into a creative and emotional lull, I decided to write down how I was feeling in a piece that I have since come to know as Dirt. 

I never intended to share the post with anyone. It was simply an opportunity to release some of the angst that has been building inside of me as I continue to work towards establishing myself and my voice within the literary industry. But as someone who believes in the importance of acknowledging that it’s alright to not be OK, I decided to share what I wrote below. My reasoning for doing so is simple: I don’t want pity. I want to give hope to anyone out there who resonates with how I felt. I want them to realise that they are not alone, and that negative thoughts will always come and go; but life will get better if you give it a chance. I promise…

 

An old Ugandan proverb says that the one who loves you, loves you with your dirt. But it’s not the dirt that concerns me. It’s the scars that are hidden underneath. Dirt merely clings to the surface; it can be washed away. I know that one day mine will be. I’ll find you, we’ll fall in love, and the sins and virtues of my past will become meaningless in the context of our lives. Yet I’m still so scared that when we meet and all the grit and grime of who I am is stripped away, you’ll see the blemishes on my soul and realise that you’ve fallen for a man who hides behind his words because his humanity has been broken beyond repair.

When all the dirt is washed away you’ll see the scars on my hands that were caused by a lifetime of fighting to find my place in a world that has always left me feeling lonely and afraid. You’ll see that my knuckles have been split on the cheeks of my enemies, and that I have torn skin from bone by driving my fists into brick and mortar in moments of frustration. You’ll hear the click in my wrist when it moves, and your fingers will feel the callouses that have left my palms feeling gnarled and worn. I’ll be forced to swallow my pride and tell you how they serve as a reminder of a time when I held onto a life that caused me great pain; and how all I had really wanted to do was let go.

I’ll explain that there are scars inside my head too. And that I can still see them when I close my eyes. There are the wounds caused by driving down a motorway with my eyes closed, wondering how it would feel to simply cease to exist. Or the marks left behind by the nights I spent lying awake questioning how I became a sky that no one wants to fly in.

I never wanted to be the man who was different. When I was younger I never thought that I would be twenty-eight years old and still alone. I didn’t ask to feel an empathy so strong that I was willing to sacrifice my own happiness to protect those around me. People often say that it sounds like a noble calling, but I have had my heart broken too many times by those that I have tried to save to find solace in the decisions that I have made.

All I ever wanted was to be normal; to be loved like everybody else. But as the sun sets each night and my sky turns from blue to black, I realise that even the stars are afraid to shine within me.

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And yet my head and my hands are nothing compared to the wounds that lay buried within my chest. My heart has been ripped apart and crudely stitched back together more times than I care to remember. I haven’t even met you and I’m already struggling to find a way to show you just how fragile it has become. How can I ever tell you about the marks left by the infidelities of lovers, and how they make me afraid to love again? How could you ever want me if you knew that a piece of me died when I told a woman I wanted to grow old with her and she left me all alone?

I wish that it was only my dirt that you had to fall in love with…

I wish that I could smile at you with a face covered in filth and grime and steal your heart. But there’s more to me than what’s on the surface; it’s buried beneath the dirt. Life hasn’t always been easy. But I wouldn’t be the man that I am today without the scars that I mark my skin. I wouldn’t know how to love, how to smile, or how to find that little piece of happiness within myself even when I feel like giving up.

I can’t promise that I’ll be perfect when you meet me. Chances are I will be so excited just to see you that I’ll say something stupid, or try to hold your hand. But I promise that I will always think the world of you, and try my hardest to say and do the right thing. I promise that I’ll love you, your dirt, and the scars that hide underneath.

I’ll hold your hands tightly when you’re sad. You may not have the same callouses that I do, but that doesn’t mean you haven’t had to hold on when it felt like life was dragging you down. I’ll kiss your head when you close your eyes and the scars inside your mind manifest as visions that cause you pain. You may have never driven down a motorway with your eyes closed, and maybe you’ve never thought of yourself as an empty sky. But I promise that I will fly in you if you let me. Every day; and every night. I’ll fly one of those little gliders that leaves a trail of smoke, writing love notes across your horizons for as long as we both shall live.

And when your heart hurts as the wounds of lovers passed make you question who I am, I promise to be patient. I’ll lend you my ears, a shoulder to lean on, or just give you a kiss to show that I don’t ever want to lose you. I know that I said that I never wanted to be different. I know that I told you it has caused me a lot of pain. But I’m hoping it’s all for a reason; that maybe when I find you, and you look into my eyes, those differences will be what makes you take a leap of faith, and risk falling in love one last time.

I can’t guarantee that I’ll be perfect. I would do it if I could. But I promise that I will spend every day loving you, even when you’re covered in dirt.

Lacuna

Some days are harder than others. There are times when I barely notice that you’re not around. Some days my life can seem so busy that I almost feel complete. I have a job that despite my shortcomings, I have managed to excel at. I have my writing; I run a website, and I wrote a book. It’s a love story. I think that you would like it. I have my family and friends too. I’m trying to be a better friend, brother and son, yet I know that I don’t always tell them that I love them as much as I should.

But there are also times when I reach for your hand, only to grasp at air. There are days like today when I’m surrounded by the people that I love, and they’re all married, partnered, or engaged. Some have families; or are expecting. And I’m standing there alone, wondering when I’ll meet you. Or if I ever will.

I used to think that we had met. I found a girl who was so beautiful that I knew I was in love from the first time that I saw her. She was smart too. She taught me about flowers, about having an open mind, and how wonderful it is to feel content. I tried so hard to make her love me; and even harder to make her stay. But she left. And she broke my heart. The final lesson that she ever taught me was that true love doesn’t just happen. It takes hard work, and sacrifice. She taught me that just because you love someone, it doesn’t mean that they know, that they’ll love you back, or that you’ll get the happy ending you have always longed for.

I wish that I at least knew your name. That way when I lay awake at night and picture our life together I could call you something other than Lacuna. It’s not even a real name. It’s just a word that I found in a book. But I chose it because it means a blank space; or a missing part. I’m twenty eight years old and I don’t have a woman to love, or to hold. There’s a blank space in my life that I wish I could fill; a missing part to the puzzle that is me.

I promise that when we meet I’ll do everything that I can to sweep you off your feet. I’ll spend every waking moment trying to take your breath away. 

I want to be your husband; and for you to be my wife. It sounds crazy because I don’t even know what you look like, but thinking about the day that I ask you to marry me brings a smile to my face. That doesn’t mean I want to be hasty and ask you as soon as we meet. I want us to take our time. I’ll ask you out on a date, and try and hold your hand. You’ll look at me as if I’m insane, and my heart will skip a beat as our fingers interlock. At the end of the evening I’ll drop you home and walk you to the front door, placing my hands on your hips as we kiss goodnight. It probably sounds silly to you. I know that people don’t do that kind of thing anymore. But there’s no need to rush something that is meant to last forever.

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I promise to take care of you too. I want to be there for you during the tough times as much as I want to share our moments of joy. When you’re sick I’ll tuck you in at night and wrap the blankets around your body before dimming the lights. I’ll make you soup when your throat hurts; or rub your stomach when you turn ill.  If you need to talk I’ll listen with great patience. And I’ll buy you flowers on your birthday, when you get a promotion, or just because I can.

When we have children, I’ll be the best damn father you have ever seen. I’ll change nappies, and teach them how to count, or to read and write. We’ll laugh and cry as they say their first words, and take their first steps. I’ll make sure that they grow up in a house filled with so much love that it radiates from their smile.

If we have a little girl I’ll learn how to tie pig-tails and play with dolls.  If we have a boy I’ll teach him to ride a bike and that real men treat women with respect. I’ll be at the front row of their sports carnivals, their spelling-bees, and graduations. You will too. We’ll be hand in hand, just like we were when I took your hand on our first date. We’ll be older by then; but just as in love as we have ever been.

Eventually we’ll grow old and retire. I’ll have to give away the job that I managed to excel at; I don’t know where you work, but I’m sure that you’ll be missed. We’ll travel the world, our faces cracking into a series of wrinkles as we smile gleefully at one another. When our hips give out and we can’t travel anymore we’ll find a little cottage to live in where we can form bizarre habits, like eating dinner while the sun is still up, and drinking so many cups of lukewarm tea that we spend most our nights dashing to the bathroom.

I know that one day I will find you. My parents always told me that good things come to those who wait. I just never thought that I would be twenty-eight and still searching for the woman that I grow old with. As a child, twenty-eight had seemed so old. I thought that I would have figured my life out by now. I wish I didn’t have to hurt as bad as I have in the past. I wish that I hadn’t had to lose the girl that I thought was you, and that I didn’t have to write a letter to someone that I’m still waiting to meet.

I don’t know where you are right now. Or if you’ll ever read this, but I want you to know that one day you are going to be my wife. And that I am going to love you, you are going to love me, and we are going to be happy. I promise to sweep you off your feet so that we can create a life so wonderful that your heart never aches again. When that day comes, I won’t need to call you Lacuna anymore. You won’t be a blank space, or a missing piece in my life. You’ll be my best friend; and I’ll be yours. We’ll be in love with one another, until the day that we die.

Halcyon

He looks just like me. It’s as if we are the same. But we’re different. We are two men walking underneath a sky so polluted with halogen that there are no more stars to guide us. Our feet pound at the concrete; our hands are jammed deep into pockets and our shoulders are hunched to avoid the rain that’s already soaking through our coats. We pass so close that our shoulders almost touch. I take a sideways glance and scowl, but he smiles a smile so pure that it cuts like glass through the chambers of my soul.

We’re wearing the same coat, the same pants, and have matching rain soaked shoes. But where my brow is furrowed so deep that rain water runs through channels and leaks down my face; he grins like a Cheshire from ear to ear. It’s as though this stranger is completely oblivious to the tears of the gods splashing against his features.

We are so alike. So similar, but different. He looks happy. And I’m…

…I’m not even sure what I am anymore. But I know that I’m not like him. I didn’t get that promotion today. I never wanted the position. I just needed the money. I never even wanted to be a businessman. I never wanted to sit tethered to a desk crunching numbers or filing complaints until my hips seized up and my wrist began sounding like a cement mixer whenever I tried to move it. I wanted to be a free spirit. As a child I wanted to be an artist and an astronaut; I wanted to change the world. As a teenager I wanted to travel. I told myself that changing the world wasn’t nearly as important as walking across it with strangers by my side.

But when I became an adult I screwed everything up. I made stupid decisions, ruined friendships and accumulated debts. Before I knew it I was trying to convince my employer that I gave a damn about their strategic vision and business objectives. I started selling my soul for a paycheck that would inevitably be whittled away on material possessions or by my ever amounting irresponsible choices.

But I bet this man before me never had these problems. I bet he got the promotion. He probably didn’t go searching for happiness at the bottom of a beer glass or by eating himself into a stupor.

I raise my hand and flex my fingers, feeling the tendons in my arm pinch as he mimics the movement; except he does it pain free.  He looks like a family man. One of those successful self-driven types who manages to balance a day’s work with raising a household whilst still finding time to stay in shape. His kids would love him. They’d call him daddy and throw their arms around him when he arrived home from the office. My children don’t even exist. They’re part of a dream that I pray will one day become my reality.

He straightens his shoulders while mine hunch further to protect my tired body from the heavy rain. We’re so similar. But we’re so different. He’s just like me. But a better version. A doppelganger walking the same streets as I am, only he does so with a heart swelled by providence and emotional wealth. Whereas mine feels like a stone sinking towards the bottom of a sea so black that not even light can reach it.

‘How?’ I ask in a voice so weak that I doubt he can hear me above the sounds of pedestrians jostling around us. ‘How did you do it?’

He cocks his head and throws me another disabling grin, as though my question perplexes him.

‘You’re just like me. We look alike. We dress the same. And yet you’re happy. You’re caught in the pouring rain and you’re smiling. But I’m standing here and I can’t even tell whether the water on my cheeks is from the rain or because I can’t hold back my tears. You look so happy. I’m so fucking tired.’

I raise my hand and pull back the sopping wet fringe that has fallen against my face and try to wipe my eyes. He mimics my movements, pushing his hair from his forehead until it’s semi-styled and dries his eyes for a few precious seconds before the rain assaults them again.

‘I bet you have a great job. You probably followed your dreams and travelled the world. You’re in love. It’s obvious. There’s a euphoria in your eyes. You idolize her. She wouldn’t ever dream of loving someone else. You’re fulfilled and confident. You’re intelligent and respected by your peers. Shit, you are truly happy and I just don’t get how you did it. You found the secret to contentment and I need to know how. You have to tell me. Please, I need you tell me.’

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A passerby strikes my shoulder and causes me to stumble. My feet slip against the rain-slicked footpath and I have to use my hands to catch myself. I stand slowly, and wipe my filthy hands against my coat, catching eyes with the stranger once again. He has taken two side steps so that we are still facing one another. His smile has tightened in the corners of his mouth and he looks down at my hands. There’s blood on my left palm. I’ve grazed it trying to stop myself from colliding with the concrete.

‘Please,’ I beg again. ‘Please tell me how you did it?’

‘I didn’t do anything,’ he says slowly. ‘I work a job that leaves me unfulfilled. I have no children, and I have dreams that I have spent my life making sacrifices for. I struggle and strive, and sometimes I feel like giving up, just like you do. There’s no difference between our lives. How could there be? I am you. And you are me. I just choose to look at things differently.’

He steps towards me, and this time it is I who replicates him. We’re barely a foot apart now. We are so close that if I were to reach out we could touch each other. I give it a try and feel the coolness of his wet fingertips and the sensation of his palm press against mine.

‘I don’t focus on the negatives. I don’t look at my behind the scenes and try to compare them to the highlight reels of others. I hate my job. It hurts my hips and screws up my wrist. But I’m healthy. I have a family that loves me, and I have a roof over my head and food on my plate. I don’t have kids, and I haven’t managed to achieve all my dreams. Not yet. But I have a girl who looks at me like I’m her hero. It doesn’t matter to her whether I’m worth a ten million dollars or ten cents. She loves me. And I love her. We’ll have a family one day. I know it.’

He steps closer again, and raises his spare hand to meet mine so that we are standing palm to palm, staring one another in the eye.

‘Life is about perspectives,’ he says. ‘It’s about whether you chose to focus on the good stuff or let yourself be eaten alive by the bad. It’s about celebrating your strengths and accepting your weaknesses. And it’s about allowing yourself to be vulnerable and afraid. Those same people that love me; they love you to. They want to see you succeed. But they are there for you when you fail. You just have to be prepared to let them know when you’re not OK. If you can learn to do that you’ll be truly happy.’

I open my mouth to respond but before I get the chance a door flies open and a woman in her early forties steps out from her business and looks at me through concerned eyes.

‘Sir, are you OK? You’ve been talking to yourself for the last fifteen minutes. You’re scaring my clients.’

I turn away from her, startled by the intrusion. But the man is gone. The open door has disturbed the lighting and I can no longer see my own reflection. Instead I can see through the plate glass window where her client’s faces watch me with fearful eyes. To them I am just a crazed man with his hands pressed against the glass talking to himself while the world passes him by.

‘Sir,’ she says again. ‘Are you OK?’

‘No. No I’m not,’ I say with a smile. ‘I’m really struggling with a lot of things right now. I feel lost. And I feel alone. But I have friends and family, and a beautiful partner who will listen. They want to see me happy. More than anything, they want me to be happy. So no. I’m not OK. But I will be.’

With that I let go of the shop front window and continue my walk down the street as the woman watches me go. The rain no longer bothers me. It makes me realise how lucky I am to be alive.

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You

If a writer falls in love with you, you can never die. That’s what they told you from the very start. If an author pines for you, you’ll be immortalized in their words. Your eloquence will be captured in their prose as they strum at the chords of your heart and kiss the innermost chambers of your naked soul. So let me take off your clothes and take you in my arms.

Let me enfold you. Let me take your heart in my hands and feel it beat my name. Let me be the air that fills your aching lungs and swells within your chest. I’ll breathe life into your soul and be the man who basks in a beauty far greater than his own. Throw your bones against mine and feel the solidarity of my embrace. Let my kiss your skin, stroke your hair and settle your racing mind.

You are poetry in motion; a landscape of flesh so exquisite that to lay my trembling hands upon you causes my heart to skip a beat. I am nothing more than a foolhardy wanderer determined to claim you as his own. You are the fluidity and grace that course through my life as surely as blood passes through my veins. So let me enfold you. Let me take away your pain.

Feel my hands on your hips, my fingers tracing the contours of your curves. I’ll kiss your dimples and run my fingers through your hair. Feel my lips on your neck as I whisper my hopes, dreams and desires against your skin. No words could ever describe the beauty of your cheeks as they burst to life with a rush of blood to the head. I want you to lose yourself in my eyes. I want to be your reason to breathe.

Let me feel you writhe beneath my sheets as I take your breast in the palm of my hand or interlock your fingers with mine. Let me devour and defile you as I pin your hands above your head and leave teeth marks against your skin.

You are divinity incarnate: a woman of heavenly beauty. Angelic in poise and grace. So let me encompass you in my arms and show you what I have yearned for. Let me worship the ground beneath your feet.

Embrace my warmth as I set your world on fire. Watch the flames of my passion rise and fall with every kiss and every touch. Feel the euphoria wash across your skin and cause your hairs to stand on end as my hands grace your delicate surface. I’ll tease your goose bumps and watch them prickle beneath my fingertips.

Let me peel back the layers of your soul and quell your innermost fears. I long to make love to your flesh. But it’s your mind that I crave the most.

So open your heart and take me inside. Tell me your innermost insecurities and fears. Let me take away your pain and carve my name into the chambers of your soul. Let my love enfold you as I capture your magnificence in my prose. You are poetry in motion; the apple of a writer’s eye. So throw your bones against mine until we become one. Let me take your heart in my hands, let me feel it beat my name.

Landscape

landscape

I lie beside her and watch her back rise as her lungs fill with air. She breathes so carelessly in her slumber. She holds her breath deep in her lungs for the faintest of moments before she exhales and her body melts into the softness of the bed. A smile creases her lips as my fingertips graze her shoulders; firmly enough for her to feel my presence, but light enough so as not to rouse the muse twisted between my sheets. Her lips curl so gracefully in the corners, her cheeks dimple in response. This woman, this muse of mine is beautiful; from the crown of her head down to the tip of her delicate toes. And as I lie beside her and watch the rhythmic movement of her breath I can’t help but imagine how glorious it would be to shrink myself so that I can explore every inch of her not as a woman, but as a landscape.

I would start in the small of her back. To my north would lay the bottom most ridges of her spine. Small vertebrae visible beneath the smoothness of her skin, stretching away into the distance until they slip between the rolling expanse of her shoulder blades and vanish beneath her silky hairline. To my east and west her sensual hips arc and curve beneath her sleeping frame. And to my south the gorgeousness of her buttocks rises beneath a fragment of crisp white sheet that is draped across her. Such choices. Such wondrous journeys await me as I discover her beauty inch by glorious inch.

I would move south, slowly venturing to the crest of her round buttocks. I would cherish my climb; pausing to inspect a freckle, or to marvel at the intricacy of a birthmark. Her skin would be so smooth; my calves would ache rewardingly as I journeyed to the summit. I’d stand atop her rear and pull the binoculars from my hip, casting my gaze down the seemingly endless legs that stretch across my sheets. Oh how I would die to walk the length of her luscious legs I would think to myself before realising that in my miniature state I can do just that.

I’d march across the suppleness of her hamstring, descend the hollow at the rear of her knee, and traverse the concave of her calf. My journey would take hours. I’d stop to note pigmentation here, a scar from a youth filled with sport there, until I arrived at her ankle. I’d follow the runway of delicate bone past her padded heel, through her arch until I reach her toes. Her nails would be painted brightly, my footsteps tickling her slightly as I walk right off of the tip of her big toe onto the sheets before journeying across the bed and climbing onto her opposing limb, reversing my long walk back to her buttocks.

My journey would take me across her hips. Her gorgeous rounded hips would be like walking across a beautiful knoll. They’d rise gently from her back and roll across her side before delivering me to the firmness of her stomach. I’d reach her navel and camp by its edge. I’d dangle my weary legs over the edge and I would marvel at the feeling of her stomach muscles beneath her tantalizing flesh.

Rejuvenated, I would journey on to the base of her sternum. I would take my time to walk beneath her stellar breasts, running my palm against their curves before ascending each one to marvel at the loveliness of her areola. My, they are beautiful. Their pinkness so perfect against the whiteness of her untanned flesh; it is so exquisitely her. I can’t help but imagine how my loins would cherish this moment atop of my muse’s chest.

But my travels would not cease, I would venture on to the nape of her neck, and descend into the crevice of her collarbone. I’d track a path across her neck and over the precipice of her jawline until I arrived at her lips where I would plant the smallest, most fragile kiss she had ever received against them. I’d move to her ear and whisper into it just how completely she moves me as the scent of her hair fills my senses. I would move around her hairline and descend her occipital ridge until I arrived at the upper echelon of her spine between the two matching crests of her shoulders.

I’d begin to walk slowly now. More aware that my journey across the luscious landscape of her if drawing to an end. I’d run my fingertips across her shoulder blades and kneel to plant the softest of kisses against her skin. And when I finally arrive at the small of her back once again I would turn ever so slowly to view the beauty of her once more. My eyes would fill with tears. Neither of sadness nor those of joy. But the tears of a man who has witnessed something more extravagant that he ever believed possible. The tears of a man who believes in God, for he has found the true magnitude of his work in the flesh of a Goddess.

But alas, I cannot shrink to such a minute state of being. I cannot worship my muse as a landscape and venture along her supple flesh. I cannot plant those miniscule kisses against her skin, or stand atop her buttocks with a yearning within my soul. But I can lay beside her as she sleeps and watch as her lips twitch and eyes fritter with the makings of a dream. I can hold her tight as she stirs, and tuck the loose strands of hair that fall loose behind her ear as she wakes. I can be hers, and she can be mine.

Crime Without Punishment

You broke into my chest and stole my heart. You looked me in the eye, asked me to take your hands and then robbed me blind. Like a thief in the night you moved so silently; climbed through the boarded up windows of my soul and pillaged from within. You should have been punished! You should have been reprimanded and rebuked! But yours was a crime without punishment. You stole my heart, and all I could do was watch as held it in your trembling hands and told me to trust that you would keep it safe.

I told you that your body was a landscape. I was supposed to be the vicious world eater with an insatiable lust to destroy the map. But now I feel you inside me; feel my heart beating your name and know that I have been bested by the contours I fought valiantly to conquer. I scaled your breasts, left my teeth marks on your neck and impressions of my hands on your hips. But these marks were only skin deep; you broke beneath the surface and saw the nakedness of I. You forced your way into a place no other has ever reached and carved your name into the fleshy chamber of my humanity. You took a soul plagued by anger and stole from it. You took away the anger; plundered from the well of bitter thoughts. You should have been punished. You should have been admonished.

But how could I ever hurt someone so darling? How could I ever dream of stringing you up like a thief and tearing apart your innocence? Your crime was one committed through best intentions. A soul descended from the heavens, dragged through the mud and tarnished by a wolf. I could have been your fall from grace. But instead you lead me to the waters of my rebirth. You stripped me bare and asked me to bathe until I was washed clean. So I sank beneath the surface until I was engulfed by a world so calming, so wondrously silent and tranquil.

Alone with my thoughts I could think of nothing but you. I could feel you with me; imagine your fingers interlaced between mine. I was the devil. I was the world eater and wolf. But you tore apart all the misguided preconceptions I had of you and I. You showed me in the silence beneath the waters just how beautiful we could be.

I emerged born again; infatuated and no longer alone. I had never imagined I could be so contented; so smitten and besotted. I tried to fight it. I wrapped my fingers around your throat, left bite marks and bruises on your legs. But I couldn’t fight the remorse or shake the feelings of regret. The thief who stole my heart deserved more than I could ever give. You broke open the vault of my heart and found it barely beating within.

You took it in your hands, stared deep into the eyes of a wounded beast and nurtured it back to health. You committed a crime without punishment. You stole my heart to set it free. You should have been chided, strung up and ousted for your devious ways. But all I could do is stare into your eyes as you asked me to trust you and place my hands in yours. You stole my heart, now it’s yours to nurture and keep.

I am at your mercy. A wolf swallowing his own pride. I am vulnerable and exposed. You are the thief who committed the ultimate crime.

An ode to you, the saviour of the ferryman’s intrepid passenger

350px-Charon_and_Psyche
‘I was lost, until I found myself inside of you.’
-Austin Carlile

The saddest part of it all was that I just didn’t realise how lost I truly was. I was an intrepid traveller traversing a mind as volatile as the river Styx. Guided by Charon, my soul was dying, withering like a flower with no hope to bloom. But you saved me. My heart and mind were caught in a vicious storm of chaos and self-loathing. I knew not who I was or what purpose my life served as I drifted between this existence and the next. I was naïve enough to pine for something greater than I, but I was too insignificant to be deserving of my dreams.

Then I heard your siren’s song. It rose from the depths of the earth, drowning out the cacophony of withering souls screaming for salvation by the river’s shoreline. I ordered Hades’ ferryman to steer towards your heavenly calls and he moored his vessel before you. You took my hand in yours as I disembarked and pulled me towards your bosom, your comfort became my solace and the savageness that had plagued my existence slowly faded. I was lost my love, but in that instant I found myself inside of you.

You showed me a world unlike anything I had ever imagined. A realm of possibilities where I was limited only by what my mind could conceive. The first time we became one I was so nervous, so unsure of myself. I fumbled as I gave life to your flesh, my thoughts disjointed, my fingers moving unsteadily as I fashioned your landscape. It was frantic and short lived, and when I stood back to admire what we had created I was stunned by the simplicity of our artwork. You were so beautiful and well-rehearsed; my awkwardness was barely concealed behind a wave of passion as phrases and irrational ideas raced through my head.

But you can never belong just to me. I know of your beauty and the intense lovingness of your touch better than most. But I can never possess you. Instead I am forced to share you with strangers the world over. Some would say that this is ill-fated love, that it is dangerous to a soul as complex as my own. They would snicker at my willingness to accept your infidelities and call me submissive and weak. But how can they ever comment on the intricacies through which I love every part of you, without first knowing the thrill of your all-encompassing embrace? I share you with others and my heart breaks when I see you answer their prayers or place their dreams before my own. But it is better to live with the knowledge that I am one of many than to never have known just how complete you make me. Oh my love, I was so lost aboard that demon’s ferry. I was a soul plagued with a life of nothingness, self-doubt casting fret channels in my brow. But now I have found myself inside of you.

I know not how to love another as deeply as I love you. You took a man parading himself as a wolf in sheep’s clothing and you allowed him to undress and expose his naked soul. You took a boy as afraid of living as he was of death and showed him that with your guidance he could create a legacy that would survive his mortal form. You took me in my broken state and you rebuilt me until I was whole. You taught me to relish in the beauty of the crack marks left in my flesh from pieces held together by something far stronger than any glue.

You found me aboard Charon’s ferry adrift on a river of fire and brimstone, and you kissed me with your lips, breathing life into my dying soul. I was so lost aboard that wretched craft, and now I have found what it means to be alive once again inside of you, my beautiful muse. I was once a fumbling amateur exploring the contours of your flesh, but through your patience and your guidance I have flourished into someone stronger than I ever thought I could be. Now every time we dance, when you place your palms upon my shoulder and whisper inspiration in my ear I wish that I could get down on my knees before you with reverence and pay you the penance that you truly deserve. For you are my beautiful muse; without you I would be so lost, so cold. But I have found myself inside of you. You have made this boy into a man. This man into a wolf. This flesh into a legacy. And you’ve taught me how to strip back the layers of my soul and stand naked before the world for all to see.

I was lost, until I found myself inside of you.

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