Gardens [11]

She was a rose garden.

The kind you see in old houses. The ones where the Lord of the Manor builds a stone garden for his wife and fills it with roses. He carves her a bench to sit on, and tells the gardeners to clear off at 10 in the morning so his lovely wife can sit in the silence, the breeze gently ruffling her skirts, and contemplate.

She was the rose garden.

The gift that gives.

Gave.

A smile when things go wrong. Gentle hands to wipe away tears, caress a face, run over smooth silky hair.

He watched from afar for years.

He watched her roses bloom, but never for him.

She danced through life sunlight glinting on golden locks. Larger than life, large as life, real. But never tangible.

When she laughed, with him, at him, next to him, but never for him, his heart would ache.

She gave him her friendship, held it out on a gilded plate. A bouquet of roses, their edges curly, their centres blushing, their scent tantalising.

She put her hand out, and when he took it, she let go.

He was there, you see, for all her joys and sadnesses, but never a part of them.

And he asked her. He asked her once, and she…

Said no.

She was the rose garden.

He only wanted one rose, but she was a rose garden.

The rose garden at Tatton Park, which inspires my thoughts. It was actually built by the Lord of the Manor for his wife, and he did indeed tell the gardeners to clear off at ten in the morning so his wife could enjoy the roses, undisturbed by anybody.

Ethereal [10]

I don’t know how to pay attention.

To the moon, to the stars, to the earth spinning in the galaxy.

I don’t know how to slow down and hear the leaves fall.

I sometimes stand still when it is dark, but light. I can hear the call of the humming system that is life. I can hear it in the way the trees rustle together.

I can see it when the clouds, dark and purple, scud themselves over the beaming moon.

I can hear it when humanity is tucked away for the night. In the stillness.

It roars loudly when the machinery shuts off for the night.

It roars and it calls me, you see.

But I am always in a rush, I don’t heed its call.

What would happen if I stopped, and listened? If I turned my eyes upwards. If I let them focus, till the blur became a sharp knife to slice through reality as I know it.

What would I hear? What would I see?

Image Credit

Dinner and Charlotte

When Charlotte made dinner, the kitchen was a bomb site.

A no-man’s land of waste and debris.

Two children flailing their arms, running in and out of rooms.

Screaming.

The smaller one, with the large, round, peachy cheeks, chasing the older one.

Large, fat tears rolled gently down her cheeks, which wobbled with each step she took.

Charlotte wailed, taking her burnt chicken out of the cracked oven. Her blue bows twitched atop her head, sitting on a pile of chestnut curls, all askew.

The older ones watched, shell shocked, from the corners.

Charred vegetables. Broken chair legs. Fire licked the stove ring, the choking sound of gas a gentle, whirring background noise.

‘What’s wrong, Emilia?!’

‘She isn’t giving me my balloon!’

‘You should share with your sister, Emilia.’

Charlotte wiped the sweat from her forehead.

A car drew up outside. The engine rumbled, jittering, vibrating, humming through the floor. Then silence as it switched off.

The screaming indoors worsened.

A sigh, in the car.

Then he emerged, his shirt rumbled and his face drawn.

When he darkened the front door, the screaming stopped. The children froze. Charlotte bit her lip, staring at the charred remains of dinner.

He took a deep breath. The damage could be heard from outside, but it did not prepare him for the abhorrent sight before his eyes.

‘Let us go out for tea,’ he said, calmly.

Charlotte dried her hands on a dishtowel.

‘It appears,’ she began slowly, ‘that a tiger came to tea already.’

Her crimson face, in all its weariness, broke into a gentle, oh so faint, smile.

The End.

N.B. I didn’t like this at all. I wrote it, it needed to be written, but it left me with a strange, disgusted feeling in my gut. So I tried to insert a Carlotta-the-fourth feeling around Charlotte, although I’d hate to think of Carlotta-the-fourth feeling like that. Given her era, however, it must have been inevitable. I also wanted to try a ‘Tiger Who Came to Tea’ ending, because making reality a little surreal takes the harsh, uncomfortable edge off it.

My mum says my dad drives her mad. My aunt says her husband drives her nuts, and that he intends to retire in a remote, mountainous area and she doesn’t want to retire there with him. My old neighbour buys her groceries separate from her husband, and they bicker like cats and dogs. They have been married for fifty odd years. I told my mum, ‘I really don’t want to end up like that.’ She replied, ‘well, you will, eventually. Married couples do eventually get sick of each other.’

I don’t want that to happen. I don’t want to rely on my kids to make my marriage interesting. My mother in law doesn’t like to travel or be alone with her husband unless her kids are there. They just don’t have a relationship. And, I don’t know if its because I am 23 and ‘inexperienced’, but I strongly feel that that situation can be avoided. I feel like you can make an effort to like each other, and change with each other, and complement each other over the years?

What is your opinion on the matter?

 

On a Footprints Challenge

I am going to be participating in this excellent challenge by Frank, from A Frank Angle. If you love writing, especially short stories, then this is the challenge you will certainly enjoy. If you’re interested, please check it out on Frank’s page, and maybe join too! 🙂

A Frank Angle

It’s challenge time!

Long-time visitors to my little corner of the world know that writing fiction isn’t my thing. With over 1,900 posts, I’ve written one fiction post. Actually two because the original post did turn into a short story challenge that involved me changing my original story.

Not that I’m changing my format in on these pages, but what the heck – let’s try it again!

1. Write a short story based on the image below in the genre of your choice.

2. The story must be 150 words or less.

3. Publish your story after I post mine (Monday, July 10th @ 12:15 am Eastern US) AND link back to the post with my story (not this post).

4. Display the image above your story

5. The story title must be Footprints in the Sand

6. Display the following image after the story.

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Dream

She was a dream. No, she was dreaming.

She thought that dreams were just thoughts your brain is trying to have, but because it is asleep, it jumbles them up and gets confused. Poor thing.

She found this out because last night when she was trying to sleep she was asking her friend why her shoulders were over there. That was strange. There was a bird in a cage.

It made sense when she was awake, though. Because she was thinking of Barney’s canary. And Barney had wonderfully large shoulders. That was slightly sexual. She didn’t want to think of Barney’s shoulders, because what kind of name was Barney? A big fat purple dinosaur name, that’s what it was.

She couldn’t tell if this was a dream, or reality. She was standing, and she felt pretty tall. And Barney was there in his purple jacket, kneeling on the stone before her. The stunning view that was Granada fell away behind his back, and all she could see where the white houses tripping down the mountainside, cobbled streets winding around them like gleaming snakes in the bright sunshine. There was sweat on her back and behind her hair, and her lips were sticky with the remains of an ice cold coke, that left a hot, melty film around her mouth. It was horrible. She needed a drink. And he was on his goddamn knees.

Wait. He was on his knees. Dusty with the stone of one of the towers. Palm trees and red sand in the distance. Sweltering heat and tapas bars blaring sultry music. And he was on his knees.

She felt sick, suddenly. Barney with his purple jacket in the heat. Like the big fat singing dinosaur. The coke churned very realistically, very uncomfortably in her stomach.