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Chapter 1, Prologue
- written 14th May 2007 by Lupert
- view the story page
There is a beginning to a story but to Elias the main character there is the realisation that this is a finality, an ending that he has been searching for.
Tags : otherElias and London
Prologue
Where are you now, he wonders, have you wound up in a movie with no story, thinking of me? Hesitate. Don't start. No, I won't send this...my invitation to hesitate, to go back to the start, because it will make me wish for ten more ways, to wish for what I want her to want from me.
I knew you once, I saw your face everywhere I looked until I realised it had gone and was replaced by something new, something possessing less meaning to me. I can still picture your face in my mind; it's a postcard of a painting in low light, dim but forever sullen with resentful beauty. I was looking for something lifelike in a seedy nightclub full of smoke, girls and phantasmagorical ideas. I found what I needed, what I wanted. You found me and changed my life.
Memories of those days have constantly flooded my mind, but that's what you wanted isn't it? I will keep the dimly lit painting postered on the wall of my mind, this I assure you; but that's all it will be, a memory and nothing more. I'm sailing on now; the wind is strong, blowing my hair. You were my land, my stability, and then the earth quaked forcing me to sail away from the cracked continent.
Goodbye girl, because you know now I'm lonely; goodbye girl, because you knew it was only love; and, goodbye girl, you are the only one that could've owned me, you did for a time. I would've stopped the clocks for you girl, but now time cannot be stopped, foolishly I thought it could've and I could find you and go back. When you were gone I was out of my mind, when you were gone I made a new friend, she taught me how to live in the end, to live again. The ticking will never end, not for us, its over, cause it's lights out for you, and there's not a hell of a lot I can do.
As a party rages on not far away, he sits on the beachside under a clear star bespeckled sky full of thought. He'd left that party, he'd fled, too full of thought to be drinking, to be clung to by her - the girl he now knows. She's the latest attraction, a smoking, gorgeous distraction. But, having fled he wonders why he sits alone clutching this diary so tightly that his knuckles are white, it's binding digging into his palm leaving it's embossing.
Her memories that were so long forbidden to him are his only refuge as the crisp night air bites deep, chilling his bones, pleading for his soul to return to the party, to the warmth of passive attraction, programmed reaction and a heating of the loins. Nothing can beat denial. Realising this he runs a hand through his scruffy hair and stands slowly without meaning. He walks leisurely towards the light of a beach fire and the sound of raised voices, drifting to him over the soft lap of the waves against the shore. From the pocket of his filthy skintight black jeans he fishes a cigarette. A flame bursts to life and is reflected in his blue eyes. It flickers and disappears leaving the glowing tip of his cigarette. Again he reaches into his pocket pulling out a crumpled sheet of paper. The lighter returns to life for a brief period allowing the paper to come alive with devilish instincts. The flaming paper falls from his hands. He stands before it, staring transfixed, the flame reflected in the intensity of his grey-blue eyes. His gaze rises to the horizon, pauses and then searches the sparkling night sky.
Shaking his head he walks on toward the voices, leaving behind the weakening flame. Under the magnanimity of the stars above he realises the words in that letter - scrawled in his hand with the speed of pure emotion - had become inconsequential.
He enters the ring of flickering light cast by the fire, her face gleams with a genuine smile so natural and open that it crushes him. It delights his drawstring bound soul as he allows her to be drawn into his embrace, a knot retying itself above the fraying tip of the rope that is his life.
His hand is raised to his lips and he draws deep on the cigarette, it's tip glowing brighter. Inhaling he allows the smoke to travel further into his lungs, infect his body and purify his soul with it's drugged heat. She takes the cigarette from him and does the same. He stares deep into her eyes and wonders if her reason for doing so reflects his in any way. No, he decides, it doesn't. She wants to hold on, he thinks, while I am only beginning to take hold. He blinks and the importance of such an action, of such thoughts is lost on him. She leans towards him and their lips touch, he feels her warmth and the stable, reliable person beneath her smooth tanned skin. Is she good for me, he ponders, is she what I need?
His attention is drawn to the sky and again the depthless empire of the stars above subdue him; he is but a breathing speck...a breathing, loving, hurting, searching speck.
Glancing over his shoulder he sees the last embers of the letter float out over the waves, carried by a soft evening breeze. As they disappear into the darkness he feels resolution, a room in his life finally emptied of unnecessary feelings and obsessions.
Acting on impulse he throws his arms around the girl's waist and lifts her from the ground whilst spinning around. Her laughter envelops the air around him; he closes his eyes and sinks deeper into the sound as a heavenly scene takes hold of him.
He'd been going against his mind for too long, fighting reason, and had finally relieved his heart from the clutches of that evanescent sullen resentful drug embodied in a postcard of a painting on the wall of his mind.
Later she will tell him that at that point she was truly happy; that she knew he'd made his decision and put the past behind him; that it was an ending; but more importantly to both of them, that it was a new beginning. Endings are, she realised, new beginnings.
Where are you now, he wonders, have you wound up in a movie with no story, thinking of me? Hesitate. Don't start. No, I won't send this...my invitation to hesitate, to go back to the start, because it will make me wish for ten more ways, to wish for what I want her to want from me.
I knew you once, I saw your face everywhere I looked until I realised it had gone and was replaced by something new, something possessing less meaning to me. I can still picture your face in my mind; it's a postcard of a painting in low light, dim but forever sullen with resentful beauty. I was looking for something lifelike in a seedy nightclub full of smoke, girls and phantasmagorical ideas. I found what I needed, what I wanted. You found me and changed my life.
Memories of those days have constantly flooded my mind, but that's what you wanted isn't it? I will keep the dimly lit painting postered on the wall of my mind, this I assure you; but that's all it will be, a memory and nothing more. I'm sailing on now; the wind is strong, blowing my hair. You were my land, my stability, and then the earth quaked forcing me to sail away from the cracked continent.
Goodbye girl, because you know now I'm lonely; goodbye girl, because you knew it was only love; and, goodbye girl, you are the only one that could've owned me, you did for a time. I would've stopped the clocks for you girl, but now time cannot be stopped, foolishly I thought it could've and I could find you and go back. When you were gone I was out of my mind, when you were gone I made a new friend, she taught me how to live in the end, to live again. The ticking will never end, not for us, its over, cause it's lights out for you, and there's not a hell of a lot I can do.
As a party rages on not far away, he sits on the beachside under a clear star bespeckled sky full of thought. He'd left that party, he'd fled, too full of thought to be drinking, to be clung to by her - the girl he now knows. She's the latest attraction, a smoking, gorgeous distraction. But, having fled he wonders why he sits alone clutching this diary so tightly that his knuckles are white, it's binding digging into his palm leaving it's embossing.
Her memories that were so long forbidden to him are his only refuge as the crisp night air bites deep, chilling his bones, pleading for his soul to return to the party, to the warmth of passive attraction, programmed reaction and a heating of the loins. Nothing can beat denial. Realising this he runs a hand through his scruffy hair and stands slowly without meaning. He walks leisurely towards the light of a beach fire and the sound of raised voices, drifting to him over the soft lap of the waves against the shore. From the pocket of his filthy skintight black jeans he fishes a cigarette. A flame bursts to life and is reflected in his blue eyes. It flickers and disappears leaving the glowing tip of his cigarette. Again he reaches into his pocket pulling out a crumpled sheet of paper. The lighter returns to life for a brief period allowing the paper to come alive with devilish instincts. The flaming paper falls from his hands. He stands before it, staring transfixed, the flame reflected in the intensity of his grey-blue eyes. His gaze rises to the horizon, pauses and then searches the sparkling night sky.
Shaking his head he walks on toward the voices, leaving behind the weakening flame. Under the magnanimity of the stars above he realises the words in that letter - scrawled in his hand with the speed of pure emotion - had become inconsequential.
He enters the ring of flickering light cast by the fire, her face gleams with a genuine smile so natural and open that it crushes him. It delights his drawstring bound soul as he allows her to be drawn into his embrace, a knot retying itself above the fraying tip of the rope that is his life.
His hand is raised to his lips and he draws deep on the cigarette, it's tip glowing brighter. Inhaling he allows the smoke to travel further into his lungs, infect his body and purify his soul with it's drugged heat. She takes the cigarette from him and does the same. He stares deep into her eyes and wonders if her reason for doing so reflects his in any way. No, he decides, it doesn't. She wants to hold on, he thinks, while I am only beginning to take hold. He blinks and the importance of such an action, of such thoughts is lost on him. She leans towards him and their lips touch, he feels her warmth and the stable, reliable person beneath her smooth tanned skin. Is she good for me, he ponders, is she what I need?
His attention is drawn to the sky and again the depthless empire of the stars above subdue him; he is but a breathing speck...a breathing, loving, hurting, searching speck.
Glancing over his shoulder he sees the last embers of the letter float out over the waves, carried by a soft evening breeze. As they disappear into the darkness he feels resolution, a room in his life finally emptied of unnecessary feelings and obsessions.
Acting on impulse he throws his arms around the girl's waist and lifts her from the ground whilst spinning around. Her laughter envelops the air around him; he closes his eyes and sinks deeper into the sound as a heavenly scene takes hold of him.
He'd been going against his mind for too long, fighting reason, and had finally relieved his heart from the clutches of that evanescent sullen resentful drug embodied in a postcard of a painting on the wall of his mind.
Later she will tell him that at that point she was truly happy; that she knew he'd made his decision and put the past behind him; that it was an ending; but more importantly to both of them, that it was a new beginning. Endings are, she realised, new beginnings.
Tags : otherElias and London