[Imogen Slaughter] She looks at him once, sharply, when he says 'angsty existentialist' the movement one of restrained violence, where she nearly interrupts, nearly spits out a reply and then - simply - subsides. He finishes speaking.
Again, another silence. Imogen has always chosen her words carefully. She has always been reserved. It's the kind of quality that can draw a man in, but just as quickly, repels him when he realizes that it isn't an act. She really is this reticent.
Her finger taps on the edge of the cigarette, scattering ash toward the snow, until there is none to drop. A few more taps, and she stops, her fingers stilling on the fag. She flicks the cigarette away toward the gutter, and watches it until it disappears at the bottom of its arc, behind the sidewalks curb.
"That poem," she says finally, "by John Donne speaks more of humanism than it does of friendship.
"Look-" one sentence follows the next, but is abruptly truncated. Sharply so. She pauses a moment and then a moment becomes several, and several becomes an eternity. Her jaw tightens and loosens repeatedly as her gaze turns back to the street.
"There were people here who knew me once," she says finally. "And they've all died or chosen to leave. I haven't quite worked out how t'fill the holes they've left behind. Or even -" another pause. This one is complete. When she speaks again, it is a new sentence.
"I don't do this," she gestures toward the bay window. "I know its yours and it makes you happy, but it's not mine. I cannot sit there and tell lies about my life and enjoy it and find connections there. I don't even celebrate Christmas."
[JB Cavanagh] "Jesus Christ - " his curse is voluble; he breathes out a lungsworth of tobacco smoke with the words, nearly coughing at the end of the breath. Out here, the air is bright and cold. The sidewalks has been shoveled clear of snow, and scattered pearls of deicing salts that crunch underfoot when they move. There's an illusion of warmth from the warm light washing through the windows of the small café. Strands of small LED lights frame the windows, and there's a garland of fresh pine cuttings over the door.
"Do you always put things into so fucking many boxes? You don't do what - " there's a pleasure burn of alcohol in his veins, and he reacts thoughtlessly, reflexively now, taking a quick pull on the cigarette and exhaling smoking through his nostrils. His sleeves are rolled half-way up his forearms. The black lines of his tattoo move like water when he clenches and unclenches his hand. " - this?"
The echo is accompanied by a sharp gesture toward the interior, the murmur of voices, someone turned from the table, a profile etched in sharp relief against the warm lights. "You don't eat food and drink alcohol? You don't do that? Or you don't do it with strangers, or you don't do it when you aren't paying. Or you don't let go and smile at a fucking stranger across the table? What the hell do you think this is? We aren't celebrating the birth of some future zombie-man. I'm pretty sure Cindy and Lara only exchange presents on Martin Luther King, Jr. day.
"Christ." He curses again, shaking his head as he looks from her to the street, maybe unaware of the damned irony. And she must imagine, by now - that he's missed the interval piece. There were people here who knew me once. Except now, looking away, his jaw set, a band of tendon flexing underneath his skin, the summer's tan faded, pale beneath the bristle of dark stubble.
"It's not a fucking equation. It's not something you work out."
[Imogen Slaughter] For some time, Imogen is quite still. There is something nearly preternatural about it, this absolute stillness. It almost appears as if she does not breath, though the truth is, she merely breathes shallowly. The air is heavy with her cigarette smoke, and her breath steams as if she were still smoking, with her exhaling, giving her away.
A gust of wind, tunnelled between the buildings sweeps over them. Despite herself, she shivers, and it breaks the moment. A tendon moves along her jaw, then. Her mouth tightens and she steps away from the bay window.
She is graceful in all things, including this.
"I think I'll get my coat," she says. "Enjoy the rest of yer party." She steps toward the door.
[JB Cavanagh] The silence is broken only by the flare of embers in the cigarette he smokes. The ashes are caught by the wind, whorl about like snowflakes rising like heat over the heavy, cold air. When she speaks again, he looks back at her, brown eyes swimming with light, his mouth a flat line as he exhales another cloud of smoke. His mouth twitches into the edge of a prescient smirk that only deepens as she finishes her thought. Tells him to enjoy his party.
He exhales again, a sharp burst of forced air. Irritation, vexation. Or something else: the snap of a tendon finding its fixed groove against the bone.
She steps toward the door; he looks up and away, the slice of sky visible between the low brick buildings here, the red lights flashing underwing of some airplane climbing away from the city, into the mottled, snow-laden evening. And he smokes - smokes the remnants of his cigarette down to the quick, until the burning embers start to melt the filter and the chemical burn fills his nostrils. Only then does he throw it away, a low sound in the back of his throat as the butt his the slushy puddle in the storm sewer, disappearing with a small hiss.
Only then does he go back inside, smelling of smoke and the winter night.
[Imogen Slaughter] He is still outside when she leaves. It takes time for a cigarette to burn down to the filter, and Imogen is swift in her farewells, though polite. She smiles at all the right moments and answers the right questions. Yes, she's sorry to go, but she has to work in the morning. Everyone should have a drink on her account.
She steps out of the restaurant again, adjusting her coat around her torso and pausing past the threshold to wind her scarf about her throat. Her gaze is forward, the street, the cars as they pass. Her wool coat does little to warm her, there is little heat left in her bones.
She glances at the Fianna kinfolk, smoking steadily. "Goodnight," she says, simply, and turns and walks away, her heels clicking on the snow strewn sidewalk.
[JB Cavanagh] "Night." That's all he says, a truculent edge to the tone, though it goes no farther than that. And only in response - in grudging response, it should be said. He straightens when she walks past; throws out the cigarette with the force necessary to jam a hockey puck into the net. To stuff a basketball into a hoop. To punch some stranger in a bar brawl for love or money, for the honor of Kierkegaard, or another round of stout. He straightens when she walks past, throws away the cigarette which gutters and dies in the icy murk floating about in the storm sewer, and goes back inside.
Lucy escapes from someone's clutches and comes barreling up to him from the table, demanding to be excused until dessert. She's laughing, shrieks something in bright response to a familiar tease from someone at the table and wraps her arms around his legs, then back away, her little nose wrinkling.
"EWW!" she exclaims, all vehemence at the smoke in his clothes. "YOU SMELL."
He laughs, tangles a rough hand in her hand and pulls her closer while she wriggles to escape his grasp.
[JB Cavanagh] get transcript!
to JB Cavanagh
Again, another silence. Imogen has always chosen her words carefully. She has always been reserved. It's the kind of quality that can draw a man in, but just as quickly, repels him when he realizes that it isn't an act. She really is this reticent.
Her finger taps on the edge of the cigarette, scattering ash toward the snow, until there is none to drop. A few more taps, and she stops, her fingers stilling on the fag. She flicks the cigarette away toward the gutter, and watches it until it disappears at the bottom of its arc, behind the sidewalks curb.
"That poem," she says finally, "by John Donne speaks more of humanism than it does of friendship.
"Look-" one sentence follows the next, but is abruptly truncated. Sharply so. She pauses a moment and then a moment becomes several, and several becomes an eternity. Her jaw tightens and loosens repeatedly as her gaze turns back to the street.
"There were people here who knew me once," she says finally. "And they've all died or chosen to leave. I haven't quite worked out how t'fill the holes they've left behind. Or even -" another pause. This one is complete. When she speaks again, it is a new sentence.
"I don't do this," she gestures toward the bay window. "I know its yours and it makes you happy, but it's not mine. I cannot sit there and tell lies about my life and enjoy it and find connections there. I don't even celebrate Christmas."
[JB Cavanagh] "Jesus Christ - " his curse is voluble; he breathes out a lungsworth of tobacco smoke with the words, nearly coughing at the end of the breath. Out here, the air is bright and cold. The sidewalks has been shoveled clear of snow, and scattered pearls of deicing salts that crunch underfoot when they move. There's an illusion of warmth from the warm light washing through the windows of the small café. Strands of small LED lights frame the windows, and there's a garland of fresh pine cuttings over the door.
"Do you always put things into so fucking many boxes? You don't do what - " there's a pleasure burn of alcohol in his veins, and he reacts thoughtlessly, reflexively now, taking a quick pull on the cigarette and exhaling smoking through his nostrils. His sleeves are rolled half-way up his forearms. The black lines of his tattoo move like water when he clenches and unclenches his hand. " - this?"
The echo is accompanied by a sharp gesture toward the interior, the murmur of voices, someone turned from the table, a profile etched in sharp relief against the warm lights. "You don't eat food and drink alcohol? You don't do that? Or you don't do it with strangers, or you don't do it when you aren't paying. Or you don't let go and smile at a fucking stranger across the table? What the hell do you think this is? We aren't celebrating the birth of some future zombie-man. I'm pretty sure Cindy and Lara only exchange presents on Martin Luther King, Jr. day.
"Christ." He curses again, shaking his head as he looks from her to the street, maybe unaware of the damned irony. And she must imagine, by now - that he's missed the interval piece. There were people here who knew me once. Except now, looking away, his jaw set, a band of tendon flexing underneath his skin, the summer's tan faded, pale beneath the bristle of dark stubble.
"It's not a fucking equation. It's not something you work out."
[Imogen Slaughter] For some time, Imogen is quite still. There is something nearly preternatural about it, this absolute stillness. It almost appears as if she does not breath, though the truth is, she merely breathes shallowly. The air is heavy with her cigarette smoke, and her breath steams as if she were still smoking, with her exhaling, giving her away.
A gust of wind, tunnelled between the buildings sweeps over them. Despite herself, she shivers, and it breaks the moment. A tendon moves along her jaw, then. Her mouth tightens and she steps away from the bay window.
She is graceful in all things, including this.
"I think I'll get my coat," she says. "Enjoy the rest of yer party." She steps toward the door.
[JB Cavanagh] The silence is broken only by the flare of embers in the cigarette he smokes. The ashes are caught by the wind, whorl about like snowflakes rising like heat over the heavy, cold air. When she speaks again, he looks back at her, brown eyes swimming with light, his mouth a flat line as he exhales another cloud of smoke. His mouth twitches into the edge of a prescient smirk that only deepens as she finishes her thought. Tells him to enjoy his party.
He exhales again, a sharp burst of forced air. Irritation, vexation. Or something else: the snap of a tendon finding its fixed groove against the bone.
She steps toward the door; he looks up and away, the slice of sky visible between the low brick buildings here, the red lights flashing underwing of some airplane climbing away from the city, into the mottled, snow-laden evening. And he smokes - smokes the remnants of his cigarette down to the quick, until the burning embers start to melt the filter and the chemical burn fills his nostrils. Only then does he throw it away, a low sound in the back of his throat as the butt his the slushy puddle in the storm sewer, disappearing with a small hiss.
Only then does he go back inside, smelling of smoke and the winter night.
[Imogen Slaughter] He is still outside when she leaves. It takes time for a cigarette to burn down to the filter, and Imogen is swift in her farewells, though polite. She smiles at all the right moments and answers the right questions. Yes, she's sorry to go, but she has to work in the morning. Everyone should have a drink on her account.
She steps out of the restaurant again, adjusting her coat around her torso and pausing past the threshold to wind her scarf about her throat. Her gaze is forward, the street, the cars as they pass. Her wool coat does little to warm her, there is little heat left in her bones.
She glances at the Fianna kinfolk, smoking steadily. "Goodnight," she says, simply, and turns and walks away, her heels clicking on the snow strewn sidewalk.
[JB Cavanagh] "Night." That's all he says, a truculent edge to the tone, though it goes no farther than that. And only in response - in grudging response, it should be said. He straightens when she walks past; throws out the cigarette with the force necessary to jam a hockey puck into the net. To stuff a basketball into a hoop. To punch some stranger in a bar brawl for love or money, for the honor of Kierkegaard, or another round of stout. He straightens when she walks past, throws away the cigarette which gutters and dies in the icy murk floating about in the storm sewer, and goes back inside.
Lucy escapes from someone's clutches and comes barreling up to him from the table, demanding to be excused until dessert. She's laughing, shrieks something in bright response to a familiar tease from someone at the table and wraps her arms around his legs, then back away, her little nose wrinkling.
"EWW!" she exclaims, all vehemence at the smoke in his clothes. "YOU SMELL."
He laughs, tangles a rough hand in her hand and pulls her closer while she wriggles to escape his grasp.
[JB Cavanagh] get transcript!
to JB Cavanagh
Post a Comment