[ Up ] [ Hearts Ease ] [ Interview ]

Heartsease

Plip. Plip. Plip. The constant drip of the drainpipe outside of her bedroom window. She lay in her bed and listened to the raindrops as they smashed against the pavement. Dark. Excepting the haloed sodium light framing the window. Enough light to make her feel crowded. She closed her eyes. Images struggled with themselves in her mind, behind her closed lids. Sounds that didn’t exist rang in her ears. Cars hushed past in the distance and joined the menagerie of words that she heard. The pictures she saw. The vision of a girl, with summer sun slanting in its dying rays behind, coppering her yellow hair. Barefoot. Eyes that were filled with the gathering blackness of the sky.

The Vision. Infected with a sudden laughter she threw her head back and howled soundlessly. Dying to a melancholy of birdsong. Meaningless babble filled the late evening air. She cried out again, expression of loneliness. Whirling round, skirts flinging wide. The air syrupy with pollen. Stale sweat and diesel fumes. She danced slowly, methodically, a dirge. Someone stretched out a hand to the girl. Someone who could not be seen from the vision’s viewpoint. She shied back from the hand, away from the embrace, spinning. The vision shifted to reveal a man, tangle haired, tall, arm stretched out in invitation. Extending to touch her, lithely dancing. She looked up at him, lifeless eyes shadowed. The endless babble resolved itself into song words, into music. The words made her cry, made the watcher want to scream out to the girl to warn her. But she knew that this was past. Knew that a warning would not stop the flood of images. The girl allowed herself to be swept up. The words kept going round and around in her head. Tracing patterns across her memory. The vision changed. She wanted to close her mind’s eye, just as she had closed her physical ones, but the scenes went flooding on, melting into dreams, where those things that never occurred were allowed to happen.

Awakened with a start to the fading themes of thunder. Grey light filtered into the room through her curtains. She groaned and turned over. Somewhere a radio weaved in and out as a car door opened and shut. Pictures from her dreams faded like the

thunder. Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, she caught a glimpse of her dishevelled appearance in the mirror. Sighing, she pulled on her dressing gown and padded down the stairs.

The rain still fell but it was lighter than it had been the night before. It was colder too. Cold. The sort of cold that creeps between the teeth and stays there. She studied the

weather over the top of her steaming mug of coffee. The grey of the sky reflecting in her eyes. Swallowed by her soul.

She remembered once when her heart had been light. Once, when she had been human. When she was with him. When she had trusted him. The picture came unbidden, while her eyes were fully open. A parody of the true happening. A girl. Becoming a woman while he becomes a man. Growing smaller as he grows up and drifts apart from her. Diminishing her self-respect as he gets exactly what he always wanted. Crawling while he was running away. The life that he had put into those dead eyes faded after a time. Maybe it hadn’t faded completely. Analysis. No, not completely. Self-respect diminished but not confidence. The daydream swirled away from her leaving unformed thoughts. ‘Maybe life won’t be so bad.’

She finished her coffee, washed, dressed and turned on the radio. Words. That’s all that the music existed as. Weaving in and out to the beat of the bass. Making patterns of the flat, two-dimensional words. The words swelled up and out, spilling down over her mind, muddying the thoughts contained therein. The song ended and she awoke, her head on her arms, sobbing. Tears, like the interminable rain, did not want to stop. Overcome. Heart aching. More pain than she thought she could possibly bear.

It was all her fault. It had to be. Her fault, not his. At least, she thought it was her fault.  But she couldn’t work out what she had done wrong. She buried her head in her hands and screamed. Screamed loud. Screamed until her voice was raw and the old dear next door banged on the wall. She stopped. Looking in the hall mirror her countenance had changed. Older. Wiser? Maybe. Maybe not. Reddened eyes from the tears still coursing her cheeks. Needed someone to kiss those baby tears away. Sulky. Almost petulant. Needed to be kissed and comforted. The flat rang emptily with the empty music. She went to the kitchen and flicked the switch on the radio.

Silence, incomplete as the rain began to rattle against the windows. She sat at the kitchen table and stared, blindly, out of the window once again. The dark houses across the street were marred by the streaky rivulets of water. Street lamps still glowed , the darkness of the day keeping them alive. Pale orange mist surrounded little balls of light. Shone in her eyes and then she did not want to be alone. She longed to be crowded.  With a speed that she did not know she had, she leapt up and

grabbed her coat. Pulling it on, she was out of the door and into the rain.

Into the rain, hitting her bare head, making her forget, causing her to cry out in sheer relief. She lifted her face into it and stood statue still, palms upraised. Then she ran for the absolute pleasure of being free of the nightmare that had ensnared her. Memory flowed from her fingertips like a never-ending stream, almost palpable, almost visible. She cried out with a maniacal laughter that chimed round the quiet streets. They seemed to sing out, a lullaby to calm her and keep her silent. Nothing could keep her silent.

She danced down the road, kicking up her heels, splashing her knees with water from the copious puddles. She stooped, removed her shoes and carried on running, weaving and wefting in the fabric of the pavement. She darted down an alley, through a pair of gates and finally onto the common. The spinney of trees closed in on her, surrounding her with green light. She looked down and beheld her hand. A white phosphorescent radiance seemed to emanate from her skin. Removing her coat she looked in wonder at her translucent skin. It had all begun to glow with an unearthly incandescence. She slowly removed each piece of clothing, caught up in awe of what she was becoming. She scrubbed at her skin but it would not go away. Completely naked, she stood beneath the trees and the green light changed into brilliant white light.

A feeling deep in her soul bubbled up into a laugh. She stopped scrubbing at her skin and stretched skyward, water pouring through her hair, running down her body, caressing her face like cold fingers. Cold. Like the deep scent of autumn moss frozen, stroked her icy body. She became a candle, a brightness that did not want to stop. She stepped out into the rain.

And she danced. Danced as if nothing mattered any more.

And it didn’t. As if her life had ended and another’s had begun.

And it had. As if dancing through the rain was the only thing that could cleanse her.

And it was.

Dancing, naked, in the rain. Memories drained out of her body, joining the light as it enveloped her. Yellow hair plastered to her scalp, great dead eyes gaining colour, beginning to dance with the dance of the light that she danced in. Under a gunmetal grey sky she ran with the wind, flew with the clouds, dragged from the grassland a kind of pity. She giggled insanely, the light of her growing until the whole world was filled with the reflection of her broken heart healing.

She lost her footing, tumbled forward, rolling over and over in the wet muddy grass, covering her luminous skin with a fine coating of soil. She stopped rolling at the bottom of a small ridge and lay there a moment, letting the heavy drops peel away her outer layer, her eyes closed. She felt all the love leak away into the grass as she lay there, then she felt everything fizzle out. She slept.

back